First Cool Morning......here it comes

[kevinlp]

Hey Hey,
I'm in too!! Yesterday, it was down to 71 in the house when I left. My wife said it dipped to about 68 or 69 when she got up so she turned the heat on for a bit just to take out the chill....

So today I was prepared. I prepped the stove last night so I didn't have to get up too early to start it off.

I got it going alright. It about twenty-five minutes it raised the main portion of the house from 70 to 75. At that, I forgot about the smoke from the curing paint..... SO at 6:20 the smoke detectors began going off waking my wife and our little one. You can tell my wife is used to me being a pyro as her first thought was not "oh my god, a fire" but rather Kevin is still home.... So she gets the little one and I open three windows to help get some fresh air in. That and fanning the detector with a brook wasn't working so I quickly got the ladder and disconnected that one for an hour. I stayed home for a bit to see the fire die down. My wife is not yet comfortable with operating the stove by herself. She especially gets a little stressed when the smoke alarm is blaring. We have one of those interconnected systems where all the units go off so you can imagine the fun.

When I started opening the windows at about 6:30 (about 30-35 minutes into the fire) the house was up to 79. At the time I had some good charcoal chunks and nice bed of coals. If it was winter at that point I would loaded it up and it would have ripped for awhile. The heat output is amazing!!

Oh and I did check the chimney when the fire was at its peak and I couldn't see anything coming out. That wood was nice and dry, the fire had plenty of air and it was hot in the firebox....

I'm going to have to fire this thing up during the day this weekend to get this paint cured so I don't this problem again.

Our installation is amazing, absolutely no smoke leakage whatsoever. The draft is incredible. When I leave the door open an inch, the flames absolutely start racing. I went through five 9" splits in about 1 hr 15minutes. I still gotta figure out the primary air control. Those first ones were needed to burn quick I guess to establish a good coal bed.

 

[kevinlp]

I have found that with our first child around, it is tough to find time to get outside during the daylight hours to split wood.. I am a night owl so I am usually up till 11-12 every night. My wife on the other hand is going to sleep around 9. I had been thinking about bringing out the worklight and splitting at night.

Well, I tried it last weeked and worked out great. So tonight, I'll go out for 20-30 minutes during the daylight and cut up and bunch of rounds. Then at 9PM, I'll head out with the worklight and backhouse lights and split everything up. Using my wood grenade and sledgehammer I can get through about 20 12" rounds in a hour. That's just spltting. I'll do the stacking during the daylight..

 

[MountainStoveGuy]

We have snow forcasted for the next 36 hours, nothing to heavy, just lightly coming down. It was a beautifull drive into to work this morning, the aspens trees are all gold, and the high peaks were freshly dusted. Saw some big horn sheep licking the snow off the road, it was just a nice trip in. Good way to start the day. But i did forget to make a fire

 

[begreen]

It sounds beautiful. Bring a camera next time and grab a shot. We're in dense fog here, right around 50 degrees. The heat pump system started up yesterday, so no fire today. I'm trying to observe the system and get it tweaked before they finish up today.

 

[wg_bent]

I have found that with our first child around, it is tough to find time to get outside during the daylight hours to split wood.. I am a night owl so I am usually up till 11-12 every night. My wife on the other hand is going to sleep around 9. I had been thinking about bringing out the worklight and splitting at night.

Well, I tried it last weeked and worked out great. So tonight, I'll go out for 20-30 minutes during the daylight and cut up and bunch of rounds. Then at 9PM, I'll head out with the worklight and backhouse lights and split everything up. Using my wood grenade and sledgehammer I can get through about 20 12" rounds in a hour. That's just spltting. I'll do the stacking during the daylight..

I use one of those cheap clip on reflectors you get at Home Depot, and clip it on the end of the kids swingset. Just the right height, and about 8' from the chopping block. Night is perfect since it's cooler, and sometimes I'm also splitting around 10pm. It's quiet (I live near a fairly busy road), solitary (no kids), and it's a very primal sort of task that, after a day of work, is relaxing. At the moment I don't have much to split though. My latest supply is already split...just too long, so chainsaw work is needed on it. Not good at 10pm!!

Kevin, you have to get a maul. I'm sure that the combination of the WoodGrenade AND a 6 lb maul would be really good.