well i installed a oak. now to wait and see when it gets cooler to see what happens. ill keep updates. also i put a lighter up the intake and it pushed the flame back in to the room. so will see what happens
dutchwest 2479 WORST STOVE EVER
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not sure what you mean, installed an aok!! dont engage the everburn untill you have a good hot bed of coals, usually the first small load of wood needs to be chared and hot. leave the bypass open untill the things really takes off. I heat a 1400 sq ft shop with mine 27/7 on 3 cords maybe 3 1/2.
an outside air kit. yes hanko i know how to get the thing hot and get the coal bed going believe me. this is my second year with this thing and i ve read everything on this site and tried everything.
I think Hanko had a good suggestion when he mentioned creosote or ash clogging the afterburner - have you checked out the guts of that stove yet? I don't know how your downdraft combustion system compares to mine, but mine will build up ash. It is also very fragile, so clean gently.
Oh yes I've had that thing apart to clean it more than once a season to clean.will see how it goes. I added 2 45s also rto replace the 90s. Will see what happens when it gets cold. Hopefully I don't have to insulate .
ecocavalier02 said:
Stuff some rock wool or Kawool insulation between your liner and chimney in the first couple feet below the cap, that should keep the liner warmer. I also think the OAK will help with a basement install but if you ran the pipe up the wall and out the sill plate that cold air will push into the stove too hard and create other problems. Best to have it below the stoves air intake so the stove will draw air as needed.
I have the intake hooked directly into the stove it does go up the wall and out but that's my only option. Should I put a damper in the intake or maybe take it off and just dump the air behind the stove
ecocavalier02 said:
Have you inspected the fountain in the back of the stove, behind the refractory material? This is what Hanko is referring to. The fountain looks like a piece of drywall (and is about as durable as drywall when heated to 500 degrees).
These stoves like perfect draft. I lucked out with my 2478 but I still have some problems when the temp outside is above 35. Don't go by the rumble to determine if everburn is working look at stack temps. If you run 500 stack temp (about 18" up ) your good.
I've gotten great heat out of my dutchwest for the past 4 years (more than my PE insert) but boy they are fragile and a pain to run if draft is not just right. I've never had to fight with wood placement, amount of coals etc. with my setup but everyones' install is different.
ecocavalier02 said:
Yes! There are two small holes one on each outer edge of the fountain that will fill with burn dust (creosote). CAREFULLY vacuum these out. If you have a hole in the center of the fountain you won't have everburn and you will need to shell out $400 big ones.
ecocavalier02 said:
You can try the damper, but it didn't work for me, the colder the air, the faster it pushed into the stove. If you just let the cold air dump behind the stove it would be just like having an open window.
bsa0021 said:
i dont know if your talking about just the back of the stove where you take off the flue collar, because i've cleaned back there throughly and taken the shoe out once a week while burning and clean that out as well.
Here is a picture of the fountain after the flue collar is removed from the back/top of the stove. There shouldn't be a hole in the middle but toward the outside edges of the opening are two small passages (barely visable at the edges of the picture). You need a very small diameter hose (maybe 1" diameter) to vacuum out these passageways w/o damaging the fountain.ecocavalier02 said:
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Ahh i see. thank you for the pic. but yes i cleaned that out very good with are small soot vac from work with a small hose
well i've had the stove lit now for a couple days. trying a lot of different things. Im finding that i can get the everburn to engage when i shut the primary air completely off once the coal bed is achieved. IM wondering that by cutting the air off forces ignition in the secondary chamber. because there is no other air for the rest of the fire to burn. Im determined to conquer this stove. i just want a relaxing stove that i dont have to baby every freking minute.
I think maybe by having that primary air fully open it robs the secondary chamber of air??? any feed back would be great thank you..
What stack temps are you getting when everburn kicks in and what temps when you think everburn stops? When my damper is closed the air intake controlled the speed/temp of the burn. Air open = more heat and faster burn. Air closed = long burn time and lower heat which is as it should be. I don't know why your stove would burn hotter with the air closed. My overnight burns would run best with a touch open from the completely closed position. Did you insulate your liner as mentioned earlier? Your "t" may be giving you some problems. Why are you using a "T"? Are you running another appliance into the stove pipe?
i have a hole in my chimney. thats how its connected in. the t is capped on the bottom. i never insulated the liner. i dont think insulation is my problem. to tell you the truth im about 10 minutes from giving up on this piece of crap and starting to research a new stove. sometimes when you have everything stacked in there just right it'll take off for an hour then boom nothing and smoke out the chimney like crazy. i mean i got a frekin 4 to 5 inch hottt coal bed. all wood been split and dried for 2 YEARS. i cant handle anymore of this. IF the cresote build up wasnt so bad i wouldnt care as much but it clogs it up like crazy...
ecocavalier02 said:
I'm not sure how to picture that "T" but why wouldn't you use a 90 degree pipe? Do you have any pictures? If creosote is clogging up your chimney with truely 20% moisture wood, then you definitely have draft issues.
One thing is to make sure the small holes in the shoe (just behind the grate) are open. There are about six holes that I poke a small wire into every week.
As far as buying another stove, if you can afford it, now is a good time with the 30% tax break. If you purchase a new stove with the secondary burn baffle system as I did when I bought my Pacific Energy insert, you will be amazed at the difference in operational procedures. But if your draft/liner is not properly installed a new stove will give you fits as well.
also if my draft was soooo bad then why does it have no problem lighting up and i never have any smoke spillage. and when i damper down it burns fine. doesn't look lazy. also the stove it's self will be at between 4 and 600. but yet smoke coming from the chimney and creosote like crazy. because of the low stack temps. BOGGLES MY FREKIN MIND. ive lost all patients with this damn thing. im really done after this year and am starting to research hard on a new stove. not making the same mistake again.
I THOUGHT I WAS THE ONLY ONE!! I have this stove at my cabin up in the mountains. I thought the secondary combustion chamber didn't work because I was at 10,000 feet with no oxygen, I thought it didn't work because I was burning aspen. I thought it didn't work becasue I didn't have an outside air kit, (I installed one and took it back off, at the time, I think the intake of the supercold -5 degree air actually made it run worse). Perhaps it doesn't work because all the invisible passages in the secondary air chutes, downdraft tubes, (whatever...) are plugged...perhaps my 20' of straight stack with 15' inside my valted celing isn't enough somehow. Or perhaps the overall mass and air flow design of the secondary combustion chamber just isn't enough to maintain the temps required for thoes of us with poor wood, poor drafts, high elevation, etc. I don't know what it is, but I know that from day one I could never keep the stove hot enough to maintain burn in the combustion chamber. It alsways, always petered out after 30mins to 1 hour, requireing me to open the dampener to get it back up to temps. I no longer engage it and I get grim satisification every time I overfire this stove (which seems rather tuff in that respect)....I don't care about warranty, 3 years ago when the stove was brand new I couldn't get replacement parts...much less now. If and when it breaks down (and dont think it will, I've been hard on this stove), I will replace it. I will tell you this...it is so much more relaxing not worring about that stupid damper control...mind you, it takes about a year after your huge investment to finally be able to relax within site of it, but once you are truly over the fact that the little lever on the left top of your stove is only astetic, enjoyment will return to your life. In the mean time, try not to look that the black smoke comming from the top of the chimney...that only brings anger and prolongs the process...good luck...
This is what you need to do... inspect the gasket at the flue exit "collar" etc. replace if necessary. Inspect the gaskets around the gass and front door and replace if necessary, tighten the front door nut so that it tightens to the gaskets really good...(like me, this may require replacement of the nut/bolt etc due to siezing..) Then stop opening the front door alltogether...utilize only the side door and keep maintaining so that it is always tight to the gaskets...were trying to minimize leaks here. Next, clean your flue. Now, and this is the tuffest part, but necessary for the theriputic value...with an allen key, remove the crome lever from the rod of upper damper and go outside and throw it as far possible....you will no longer need it... You are now free from incessent babysitting of the "neverburn" technolgy... and your stove is as airtight as possible, you will find that you can burn anything you like! Wet wood, bad wood, rotten wood, burn it all!! Thats your only plus, you can now burn what ever you like. Its quite liberating actually...Your problems are solved!! You no longer have draft problems, you no longer need to eliminate "T"s etc. Your stove will no longer "burp" "backdraft" "belch" at the slightest breeze, it will no longer smell like smoke in your house. You don't need an O.A.K...This stove burns like a champ like this!! YOU ARE FREE
Just reload every 4-6 hours, I would think oak will give you that time frame with good air control...I reload every two to three with aspen...I have to relight every morning, but I would think that at night, if you throttled it down all the way, and with the stove being as tight as possible, and burning oak, your coals will allow you a re-light by just adding wood and opening the ash door. You will smoke like crazy, you will need to inspect and clean the flue more often, and you will need to stay on top of the gaskets on the side door and the ash door...But the stove works great like this... Just keep the flue clean and get the cheapest wood possible. Some day you might have an effiecient stove you will love and care about, treating it to best most dryest woods, but that is not now, BURN THAT @#$$@#@#!
Just reload every 4-6 hours, I would think oak will give you that time frame with good air control...I reload every two to three with aspen...I have to relight every morning, but I would think that at night, if you throttled it down all the way, and with the stove being as tight as possible, and burning oak, your coals will allow you a re-light by just adding wood and opening the ash door. You will smoke like crazy, you will need to inspect and clean the flue more often, and you will need to stay on top of the gaskets on the side door and the ash door...But the stove works great like this... Just keep the flue clean and get the cheapest wood possible. Some day you might have an effiecient stove you will love and care about, treating it to best most dryest woods, but that is not now, BURN THAT @#$$@#@#!
ecocavalier02 said:
Tryin out that theory this year....to an extent there is some supporting data behind this given the design. Assume that a given stack & outdoor temp, atmos. pressure, etc. that your stove is going to draft a certain value, lets call this X. A certain amount of draft needs to go through the reburn chamber in order to sustain secondary combustion, let's call this Y. If X<Y, of course its not going to work. Causes of this are too cold a fire, stack not warmed enough, stove not receiving enough air due to oversealed room, etc. etc.
Now let's break down Y into two different components, the amount of air coming in from the primary air control and the amount through the secondary intake (uncontrollable without unsupported modifications). If there is too much air being let in through primary, then this is going to subtract from the amount coming in through the secondary, and you could stall it out.
One way I try and prevent this changing the primary air setting after loading fresh splits and letting them heat up/coal sufficiently (bypass open). The amount of primary air is dependent on many factors like stack temp, amount of time the stove has been running, whether I've had successful secondary on this fire before this reload, etc. but for new fires its typically mostly/completely open and less for existing fires else the things gets way too hot (stovetop temps 700+). With a nice active fire, as I'm about to close the bypass I throttle the primary back to about 20%, then close the bypass. It really gets a lot of air rushing in via the secondary intake which is essential in preventing 'the stall'.
ecocavalier02 said:
Two interpretations on that one depending on what your dealer was referring to. "Insulation" implying that you want to make sure your stack doesnt ignite any combustible surfaces inside a wall and cause a fire is of course a very good thing.
Your stack is like mine in that it's mostly indoors and not exposed to outside air except at the peak. My garage and the other floor it passes through are well insulated w/ good windows, walls, etc as its new construction. My stack is a single masonry block chimney with two separate clay lined flues, the other one being for the oil furnace whose operation and the woodstove are mutually exclusive. That's a whole lot of mass to heat up as it has to indirectly heat both of them. As a result, mine takes two sometimes even three hours to heat up sufficiently before I can even attempt secondary combustion. Once up to temp, it aids the draft as it doesnt cool down quickly. Insulating the stack could help it heat up/retain heat faster, but just make sure you're not adding a lot of mass that you have to first heat up else you're going to add to the amount of 'wasted' time heating up the stack.
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