Fireview performance issues

[MacPB]

Here is a great resource for catalytic combustors:

http://firecatcombustors.blogspot.com/

This is the company that makes the cat in the Firewiew.

 

[rickw]

Well, it seems to be a dog-pile at this point; so I might as well add my 2 cents.
It is cold and the stove isn't real big, if you've got 250 deg temps and a big pile of coals after 12 hours then its not a surprise that the house is cool. Stuff it full, and let it rip near the end of the burn. Thats what I'm doing right now, came home to a 300 deg stove and a bunch of coals - set the air at 2 for the last couple hours and the stovetop temp is just now falling through 350. I'll let it go for maybe another hour and stuff it before bed. It is true that you've got to complete the burn cycle before reloading to keep getting high heat from this stove (just to make room). Don't be scared to open up the air, it runs just fine. It won't run for 12 hours at a high output however.

 

[fire_man]

I'm attempting to heat roughly 1500 sq ft but 400 sq ft of it is cathedral ceiling 24/7 as near to 100% as possible. I could do it with a Resolute, so I figured this should be able to do it unless WS is fudging their BTU numbers. I don't think it is the wood. Takes off easily, no hissing, cat fires off, etc. I can cut the air back to about .75 before I lose a flame. I may have too much draft for the stove which is certainly lowering my temps but I'm not sure how this would be creating a coaling problem? You would think that too much draft would consume the wood completely, not just to cinder. Right?

I've got to jump in on this one 'cause I can relate. I used to have a 1979 Resolute and replaced it with a Fireview last year. The house is about 2100 sq ft but the room with the stove is 440 ft sq cathedral. The Fireview heats the cathedral room to 66 degrees with an outdoor temp of 23 degrees (and lots of wind), and the oil heat comes on towards the end of the burn cycle. The Resolute ran pretty close - but it really clogged the flue pipe with creosote badly - no such issues with the Fireview. There is more of a coaling issue with the Fireview - you can't reload too often without burning down the coals or you end up with too many cinders. But the only way I would get too many coals with the Fireview after a 12 hour burn was if I reloaded 2-3 times before the original load burned down. I can't imagine getting more than an inch of ashes after 12 hours, even if I left the draft setting on 0.5 for the entire burn. The Resolute was nice because the air intake was directed right at the bed of coals, so they always burned down nicely.

If your wood is lighting quickly with no hiss it tells me it really is dry - I could never get unseasoned wood to light easily. Too much draft, I think, would make it burn down quicker with less of a coaling problem. So what can possibly be going on? Dumb question but is your flue lined all the way up to the top with a 6 inch SS Liner? The flue lining with the Resolute was probably less of a concern than the Fireview's since the Resolute had a much higher flue temp. I am trying to figure out why your Resolute ran so well but the Fireview does not. Another thing - try putting a thermometer on the cast iron part of the front of the stove (upper right corner above the window). I get temps 400-500 after a couple hours of burning. This gives you a better idea what is going on with the wood. The stovetop temp is only half the story. You can have 700 degrees stovetop and less than 300 on the front of the stove. Its not till you start getting some good secondary combustion and/or firebox flames that the internal stove temp really climbs. Hope this didn't ramble too much, just hate to see you give up on the new stove just yet! :-S

 

[Jack33]

Fellas, I've read the posts with interest and this is making me very curious. I'll state right up front that I indeed had some of the same problems when I first got the Fireview. The coals was perhaps the biggest problem but although I looked for help, I ended up having to find the answer on my own.

Most of the time when someone is having too many coals it is because the wood is not as dry as thought and/or they are simply adding wood too soon. In our case, we were adding wood too soon and the coals simply kept building up. To stop this we turn the draft up and burn them off. Before the wood is totally down to the coaling stage we'll turn the stove up at least to 2. Once it is all coals, we open the draft full, rake through the coals to loosen the coals and ash, rake some of the coals to the front and let them burn. Surprisingly this does not take long to burn those coals down. I am trying this and it does help burn them down. I have tried a couple of smaller loads with improved results in burning the coals down. I can only assume becuase it is less wood for the same amount of air resulting in a better burn down.

Now to get higher temperatures. First, if you are not there to watch, how do you know that the stove is not reaching those temperatures? The reason I ask this is because many times I go to bed and the stove top is perhaps 500 degrees and no flame is present. Later I get up (normal for me) and naturally check on the stove and find a beautiful rolling flame at the top and the firebox looks like the pits of Hell itself and the stovetop temperature is over 600. If I had not got up, I'd never have known it got that hot. I have swore at the stove enough on the weekends to be fairly certain....but no I can not say for sure.

Slow mentioned settings and he is right that every installation can be different. At present we are finding that we have to set our draft at zero (that's right. zero) else we get overfire in the stove. It will take a while, maybe 2 hours before the stovetop gets that high but it does happen. Perhaps some is because of the wood we are burning at present or even perhaps some because of the weather. But the point is, we adjust to the situation. I also chat with one of the good people at Woodstock from time to time also and would not hesitate to call them with any problem. For now I'll keep hunting for the perfect setting.



As for draft, our chimney is actually shorter than it should be and it is a SS running up the side of the house. Everything you read says our setup should not work and for sure we should not need a damper in the flue but we are close to needing one.

More to come.

 

[cycloxer]

Why don't you try calling Woodstock and see if they can walk through your problems and at least help you get the stove burning to the proper temperature. They sold you the stove and they stand behind their products. I'm sure they want you to be happy with the stove rather than see it returned.

 

[Jack33]

Jack, it does sound to me like you have a couple of problems. For sure you should be able to get a higher temperature on that stove. If the draft is set too high then more heat would escape out the chimney but the fire would be roaring. I'd suggest to not engage the cat before 20 minutes and make sure the stove top is at 250+ and/or the flue is 500 degrees or thereabouts. Once you engage the cat, try the setting on 1.5. After 10-15 minutes try it on 1 or if there is lots of flame, go below 1. Try to get it so that you have just a little flicker of flame; if you turn the draft down and the flame dies, give it a little more air. Would it actaully roar like a "normal" stove? I'm just thinking that the air intake is so small that the fire is only going to get so big before it is out of air.
Before you do this though, you probably need to clean out your firebox some. I can picture what you have and that is coals above the bottom of the firebox door. Tons of coals and no place to put much wood. That has to be remedied else nothing you try will work. So even if you have to scoop some coals out, do it so that you can start with lots of room for wood. I have been but it keeps coaling.

I do not know what wood you are burning but that has a lot, I repeat, a lot, to do with the type of fires you get. For example, at present we are burning a combination of ash, elm and soft maple. The maple and elm burn much faster than the ash, so that is our primary daytime wood. Rarely do we burn ash during the day. However, come night, after burning the coals down, I like to put a large ash in the bottom rear of the stove. That baby is the key to longer burns. Front bottom gets a maple or elm. The rest is filled with ash. After about 10 minutes (it varies) the cat gets engaged. It is at this point that I will determine where to set the draft. Right now it is ash, black cherry, silver maple, sugar maple, and a touch of birch.

That is correct. I do not go by a blanket setting every time because every fire is not the same. It is close, but there are just too many variables, from wood type, size of the wood, weather, etc. If I have lots of flame, the draft usually goes right to .25 (1/4 of the way to 1). Sometimes that is too much draft and sometimes it is too little. Regardless, once I am ready for bedtime, the draft gets set low and at present we are finding we have to go to zero. I'm not new to stoves...just this one and cats.

So how warm does our stove get with these settings and the poor chimney that we have? Zoom! The stovetop temperature zooms right up to at least 550 and an hour or so later will be over 600 with ease. However, let me caution; not everyone can go by the same setting we use. Check with Todd and you'll find he sets mostly at .5, but with our stove that is too high unless the weather is warm (fall/spring) or a storm coming.

Jack, please do try emptying the stove so you have only an inch or so of ash and only enough coals to get the fire going good. Leave that draft full open until you are ready to engage the cat. Then turn it down to (I'm guessing) 1 or 1.5 and wait for 10 minutes to see what happens. Judge further action by the flame you are getting.

When your stove is down to coals, rake the poker through them; don't be gentle. Shove some to the front so there is more in the front than in the back. Leave the draft open full and those coals should burn down fairly quick. I'd also leave the cat on at this point. Not that the cat will help, but the heat has to go through the top of the stove before reaching the flue so you gain the benefit of the heat. If you bypass the cat, then pretty much any heat there goes right up the chimney (hope Santa isn't on his way down then!). So I can open the door with the cat engaged and rake the coals? Or re-engage the cat even though it wont light off?

I don't know what you have for wood but I would suggest something like pallet wood to mix in if only to see if indeed most of the problem is with the wood itself. I would also highly advise you to call the good folks at Woodstock. The toll free number is in the manual you received.

 

[Jack33]

You state above that when you get home 12 hours later the box is 1/2 loaded with cinder. That is very difficult for me to picture having the box half full. How would you be able to open the door at all? And if you have that much cinder after 12 hours, that means you probably loaded when there was already a big bunch of coals.

I may have exaggerated a bit with the 1/2 full. But there is too much and a heaping pile diminishing back to front.

 

[Jack33]

[My spilts are all medium to large. You numbers are similar to mine when I can actually get a full load in the stove. I am not home to babysit or fiddle with the air all day. I fill it in the morning and when I get home 12 hours later the box is still 1/2 loaded with cinder and the top is about 200-225. In my old cast stove, a box full of cinder would still be 400 or so stove top. Obviously, not 12 hours later however. I bet my ash can is more than 1/2 full of chunks. I have no choice but to dig out cinder just so I can get wood into this thing. Wood is all 1-2 years old. Much of it has lost its bark plus it get a couple days near the stove.

I think your splits are too big? How many splits can you get in the stove? If only three, they are too big, I usually have no problem stuffing 5-6 splits inside. Bigger splits will burn slower and cooler. Also, don't be afraid to give it more air, there will be a good amount of flame with higher air settings, but it will slow down after about an hour or so. I don't think the flame will damage the cat unless you have a roaring steady flame sucking right through the cat which would be a very high air setting like #3. Perhaps they are, old stove needed em big to get longer burns. I can only get 3 cause of the coal build up.

I'm on my 3 load per day schedule and my temps almost always get up to 650 with a full 5-6 splits and after 8 hours the temps is down to 300 with plenty of coals for the next load, air setting just under #1. I'm heating 1800 sq ft and the house is always over 70.

 

[pinewoodburner]

I think the problem is the fuel source. I started off this season burning oak that was 2.5 years old. Burned great. My next pile was seasoned 2 summers and is not quite two years old. It was not covered and we had tons of rain in Nov. I can not get the stove above 350 right now and I am getting tons of coals. I am going to buy some 2 x 4s at Lowes and cut them up and see what the stove will do. That way I will know if it is my fuel, cat problem or something in the flue. My bet is it is the fuel. I may have to burn some of my pine that I know is seasoned.

Try burning different fuel and see how your stove does.

 

[wendell]

Jack, yes, you can get this stove to roar. Although I wouldn't recommend it, I can get to an internal flue temp of over 1200 in less than 15 minutes of a reload. (Of course, not that I would have ever gotten busy reading posts on hearth.com and forgotten to look up and see how the stove is doing.) :red:

 

[Jack33]

[quote author="cycloxer" date="1261458097]

imho, you have bought the absolute minimum sized stove, but that is your call and you're the one who has to operate it. The Fireview is a great stove and I almost bought one myself, but you can only fit so much fuel inside of 2 ft³ and then transfer that heat at 75% efficiency over a 10 hour period to your home. With a 3 ft³ box, you can simply reload your stove roughly 1/3 as often. Can you get this stove to work for you? Sure, if you are willing to feed it often enough. The soapstone will help you smooth out the temp fluctuations, but it does nothing to help extract more heat out of the wood. The stove body is a heat sink, not a power source.

I agree that the stove is border line....especially now. So I will defend my choice to buy the stove. First, I was OK with what I had before and not in the market for a new one but knew there was better available. Second, I have a ridiculously low thimble, just happens to be the exact height of the Fireview outlet. That's right, I have no vertical stove pipe just straight into the thimble. Third and fourth, they were on sale and Obama was giving away money. Finally, I was replacing a Resolute rated at 40k BTU (I think, maybe it is 45k) and this is 55K BTU. So I figured I could increase my output by at least 25%. So the Fireview seemed like a no-brainer. It was like the planets aligned for me....come to find out I think they may have just crashed together and I was blinded.

So I need to have my thimble moved up 1-2 feet so I can put in a fire breathing beast.

I think the issue between the 2 stoves is that with the cast iron stove I could roast the house to make up for heat loss while I was gone/asleep. This stove is running mild and steady. My house is just to drafty and wide open for it.

 

[Jack33]

Jack, from reading your post it seems like the old stove heated the place just fine. Is the fireview much smaller than the old stove? How is your insulation? The longer, slower burn is going to put out less heat so maybe you have to load that puppy more frequently to keep up with demands or get a bigger stove.

It was a Resolute I. About the same size but rated at 25% more BTU? House is drafty post and beam. Obviously insulation is an issue and always has been. I agree, I don't think this stove is going to cut it.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Jack, to answer your question when raking coals, I do bypass the cat before opening the firebox door but then engage it again. You can do that without worry and you will get more heat by doing so even if the cat does not light off.

One more thing, are you absolutely sure that the draft is working properly? Perhaps it became disconnected during shipping? I've read that it has happened to a few folks. Also, again, please call Woodstock for their input in addition to everybody's input here.

We just want you to get some heat and that Fireview is very capable of giving lots of heat.


For what it is worth, late yesterday my wife put in 3 splits to hold over until the fill up for the night. Less than an hour from the time she put those in, we had to bypass the cat because the stove top temperature was at 700 degrees. When I say 3 splits, they are small splits. She put in 2 small elm and one extremely small soft maple. Yet the temperature almost got away from us. This is what this stove is capable of doing.

What did we do when the stove got that hot? First was to bypass the cat and second was to make sure the draft was all the way off. In less than 5 minutes (probably 3) we once more engaged the cat and the temperature settled in just a tad over 600. Yes, it got a little toasty in here for a time!

 

[Jack33]

I'm attempting to heat roughly 1500 sq ft but 400 sq ft of it is cathedral ceiling 24/7 as near to 100% as possible. I could do it with a Resolute, so I figured this should be able to do it unless WS is fudging their BTU numbers. I don't think it is the wood. Takes off easily, no hissing, cat fires off, etc. I can cut the air back to about .75 before I lose a flame. I may have too much draft for the stove which is certainly lowering my temps but I'm not sure how this would be creating a coaling problem? You would think that too much draft would consume the wood completely, not just to cinder. Right?

I've got to jump in on this one 'cause I can relate. I used to have a 1979 Resolute and replaced it with a Fireview last year. The house is about 2100 sq ft but the room with the stove is 440 ft sq cathedral. The Fireview heats the cathedral room to 66 degrees with an outdoor temp of 23 degrees (and lots of wind), and the oil heat comes on towards the end of the burn cycle. The Resolute ran pretty close - but it really clogged the flue pipe with creosote badly - no such issues with the Fireview. There is more of a coaling issue with the Fireview - you can't reload too often without burning down the coals or you end up with too many cinders. But the only way I would get too many coals with the Fireview after a 12 hour burn was if I reloaded 2-3 times before the original load burned down. I can't imagine getting more than an inch of ashes after 12 hours, even if I left the draft setting on 0.5 for the entire burn. The Resolute was nice because the air intake was directed right at the bed of coals, so they always burned down nicely.

If your wood is lighting quickly with no hiss it tells me it really is dry - I could never get unseasoned wood to light easily. Too much draft, I think, would make it burn down quicker with less of a coaling problem. So what can possibly be going on? Dumb question but is your flue lined all the way up to the top with a 6 inch SS Liner? The flue lining with the Resolute was probably less of a concern than the Fireview's since the Resolute had a much higher flue temp. I am trying to figure out why your Resolute ran so well but the Fireview does not. Another thing - try putting a thermometer on the cast iron part of the front of the stove (upper right corner above the window). I get temps 400-500 after a couple hours of burning. This gives you a better idea what is going on with the wood. The stovetop temp is only half the story. You can have 700 degrees stovetop and less than 300 on the front of the stove. Its not till you start getting some good secondary combustion and/or firebox flames that the internal stove temp really climbs. Hope this didn't ramble too much, just hate to see you give up on the new stove just yet! :-S

Creosote was a problem with it but other than that it worked ok given the size of it. Ash isn't a problem but the cinder is. Not a dumb question, no liner. Big and tall chimney, just barely with WS specs but probably too much given the height. I'm pretty sure this is most if not all of my issue. If I have to spend money on liner to use the stove, I probably won't. I think I'd rather move the thimble and but in a bigger box.

 

[Flatbedford]

I am having similar problems. I think it is a combination of me letting too much coals build up, and a drafty old house. My old smoke dragon was such a beast that it made up for the draftiness, but it didn't make the heat long enough to keep the heat off for long. I haven't given up with the Fireview, but I am not completely happy yet. I'm gonna shovel more coals out and see what I can do about drafts in the house. I think that the next tax return including my 30% credit on the new stove will go into a major insulation project. I can't make up for a drafty house by burning more. I have to deal with the draft.

 

[Jack33]

Jack, yes, you can get this stove to roar. Although I wouldn't recommend it, I can get to an internal flue temp of over 1200 in less than 15 minutes of a reload. (Of course, not that I would have ever gotten busy reading posts on hearth.com and forgotten to look up and see how the stove is doing.) :red:

What do you think this would be with a magnetic thermometer right after the flue connector on the stove? I have 1 stuck on there and it will hit 500-600 within 15-30 minutes or so of reloading before engaging the cat.

 

[wendell]

What do you think this would be with a magnetic thermometer right after the flue connector on the stove? I have 1 stuck on there and it will hit 500-600 within 15-30 minutes or so of reloading before engaging the cat.

To compare apples to apples, you would have to have it 20" above the collar which you can't do so not sure what the exact figure would be but they say that the external reading is half the internal. I think Dennis also goes straight back on his stove so maybe he could put a thermometer there and tell you what number he gets.

 

[cycloxer]

Well if you think the stove is too small, then send it back. They have a 6 mo return policy. Get a big cast iron stove like a Jotul F 600 or a VC Defiant and I bet you will be a much happier. If I were buying for 24/7 burning, I would buy the biggest freakin stove I could fit in my house.

 

[Jack33]

I am having similar problems. I think it is a combination of me letting too much coals build up, and a drafty old house. My old smoke dragon was such a beast that it made up for the draftiness, but it didn't make the heat long enough to keep the heat off for long. I haven't given up with the Fireview, but I am not completely happy yet. I'm gonna shovel more coals out and see what I can do about drafts in the house. I think that the next tax return including my 30% credit on the new stove will go into a major insulation project. I can't make up for a drafty house by burning more. I have to deal with the draft.

Sorry to hear that, but releived to hear I'm not the only one struggling with the Fireview. I will have to seal and insulate next summer but for now I will have to try to over power it.

 

[Slow1]

The thing I wonder about here is whether your stove is performing to spec and it isn't enough or your stove isn't performing up to spec. If it is the first then insulating or replacing the stove is your only option. If it is the second then perhaps folks here or at woodstock central can help you get the performance out of the stove that it is supposed to deliver, then you can decide if it is the wrong stove or not. It may be both - the wrong stove for your situation and you aren't getting the performance it can deliver. Just really hard to tell from this end of the keyboard.

 

[gyrfalcon]

[My spilts are all medium to large. You numbers are similar to mine when I can actually get a full load in the stove. I am not home to babysit or fiddle with the air all day. I fill it in the morning and when I get home 12 hours later the box is still 1/2 loaded with cinder and the top is about 200-225. In my old cast stove, a box full of cinder would still be 400 or so stove top. Obviously, not 12 hours later however. I bet my ash can is more than 1/2 full of chunks. I have no choice but to dig out cinder just so I can get wood into this thing. Wood is all 1-2 years old. Much of it has lost its bark plus it get a couple days near the stove.

I think your splits are too big? How many splits can you get in the stove? If only three, they are too big, I usually have no problem stuffing 5-6 splits inside. Bigger splits will burn slower and cooler.

Not to mention they take a lot longer to season.

 

[Flatbedford]

The thing I wonder about here is whether your stove is performing to spec and it isn't enough or your stove isn't performing up to spec. If it is the first then insulating or replacing the stove is your only option. If it is the second then perhaps folks here or at woodstock central can help you get the performance out of the stove that it is supposed to deliver, then you can decide if it is the wrong stove or not. It may be both - the wrong stove for your situation and you aren't getting the performance it can deliver. Just really hard to tell from this end of the keyboard.

From everything I have read here I know I have the right stove. I have to learn how to get the most out of it and my house should be tightened up no matter what stove I have. Even with the "issues" I am having I have already saved a few hundred dollars over last years fossil fuel bills. While I am not getting optimum performance, The house is warm enough for the heat to stay off most of every day unless the temp goes below 20 °F and the winds kick up. I am not disappointed, I am challenged.

 

[Jack33]

The thing I wonder about here is whether your stove is performing to spec and it isn't enough or your stove isn't performing up to spec. If it is the first then insulating or replacing the stove is your only option. If it is the second then perhaps folks here or at woodstock central can help you get the performance out of the stove that it is supposed to deliver, then you can decide if it is the wrong stove or not. It may be both - the wrong stove for your situation and you aren't getting the performance it can deliver. Just really hard to tell from this end of the keyboard.

At this point it is both. I know that I'm not hitting the temps that you guys are, not even close. Even if I do max it out, I'm not sure that the long extended 300ish burn will be enough since I will have to wait so long for the coals and cinder to burn down. In my old stove, I was reloading at 300 not waiting a couple of hours to reload. With a cast stove I can reheat the house so much faster. But I will try tonight with some super dry oak pallet wood and see what happens.

 

[wendell]

Good luck, Jack, I hope it gives you some answers. As I mentioned earlier, I was having a ton of coals also burning some hickory that could use 6 more months of seasoning but have switched to elm and have much less coals so wood definitely has something to do with it.

 

[wendell]

Nice collection of saws BTW!