Kent Tile Fire (and Sherwood) stoves

[jumby181]

wow, lots of good info. i'll make this as brief as i can. early 80's my sister and her husband built a log cabin, jim barna kit. she researched and ended up getting a kent tile fire. they liked it so much that when friends of theirs was looking for a wood stove for a parents lake house they also got a kent tile fire. fast forward about 20 years and the one in my sisters house finally wore out. it was all they used to heat the cabin since the day it was built. when she went to get a new one found out the company had gone out of business due to a longshoreman strike in nz which meant they couldn't export their stoves and their biggest market was here in the us(as best i recall). so she got another stove. a few years ago i finally got tired of my heat pump running all winter long and started looking into a wood stove. as it turned out the one in the friends lake house was available and over the years had barely ever been used. took me a while to get it installed but last fall i did. my house is now warm and my heat pump hasn't run all winter. but i have a question...

any idea what may cause the air vent slide to bind? i can only get it half closed at best and if it really gets heated up it frequently jams and i have to smack it with a log to get it to move. any help appreciated and i am going to do my best to read all of this information and comprehend it!

EDIT - thanks to pictures on here(jpeg9.jpg specifically) i took the cover off the air vent and with the help of a large-ish flat tip bent the guides out slightly and now my vent has full travel.

will be getting some pics to add soon too. it looks like mine already has a baffle installed at the top front of the box just below the mix plate that precaud had added as a mod to his. found it interesting that mine already has one. will be looking into drilling the plate/baffle deflecting fresh air from the vent but want to be more certain of what i am doing first. thank you precaud for all the information and pictures

 

[precaud]

Greetings, fellow Kent burners! I trust everyone is well and ready for the coming winter. They're forecasting colder and wetter than normal conditions for this part of the US this winter. So even though my wood consumption has been going down steadily (only 7/10 cord in the Tile Fire last season), I've prepped a bit more firewood than usual this year. If the sun isn't shining, the solar heaters won't be producing, and the woodstove will have to make up the difference. Better to be safe than sorry.

Last year I reported that, in the prior season, the modified Kent had generated much more creosote than normal, and I guessed that one cause was burning some old pitchy pine that had been given to me. So last year I culled out all of the pitchy stuff from the pile, and the results are in. For 0.7 cords burned, creosote was 4.7 ounces. That's a huge improvement over the 16.5 oz for .75 cord burned in the prior season. So the Kent does not like the pitchy wood, which makes sense, since it does not have any secondary air feed. Keep the pitchy stuff out of the stove and it will reward you with very clean burns, almost as good as the Quad was (4.7 / .7 = 6.7 gm/cord versus 7.7 / 1.75 = 4.4 gm/cord for the Quad 2100).

The Nestor Martin X33 continues to perform well and be problem-free and a pleasure to use. So all is well in woodstove land down here. Looking forward to first fire sometime in the next few weeks.

Cheers.

 

[begreen]

Welcome back precaud!

 

[BrotherBart]

The Land of Enchantment is back!

 

[precaud]

Hi BG and BB, it's nice to see you guys are keeping things straight in the forums. We must be getting old, we haven't changed woodstoves in a few years... sigh..

 

[begreen]

Getting old?! That was the fun part, we be old now.

 

[Woody Stover]

I may be getting a new stove soon; I'll be closely following the beta tests of the Woodstock 211. I believe that to stay young, you've gotta keep mind and body active....and keep buying stoves.

 

[begreen]

We stay active. Picked and pressed over 500lbs of apples a couple weeks ago and last weekend helped pick 2.5 tons of grapes + pressing them. Drinking that nectar may not keep me young, but it sure makes retirement more pleasant.

 

[Woody Stover]

We stay active. Picked and pressed over 500lbs of apples a couple weeks ago and last weekend helped pick 2.5 tons of grapes + pressing them. Drinking that nectar may not keep me young, but it sure makes retirement more pleasant.

If you tote them back a hundred pounds at a time, that's a good workout. And I think grape juice (or wine??) contains resveratrol...you'll be a teenager again before you know it.
Normally, I'd feel bad about the threadjack but I think by now, he's probably gone until next year.

 

[precaud]

I may be getting a new stove soon; I'll be closely following the beta tests of the Woodstock 211. I believe that to stay young, you've gotta keep mind and body active....and keep buying stoves.

Looks like your TF is already gone, you've removed it from your sig...

 

[Woody Stover]

That must be another member you're thinking of; I've never had the pleasure of running one....or other exotic stoves.

 

[precaud]

Isn't the first time I've been confused! But exotic? Kents surely aren't. Really, no stove is once a few fires have been burned in them. They're all dirty beasts at that point.

 

[begreen]

We've had a couple new (old) tile fires show up over the summer. Unfortunately one recently looked like it was ready to be put out to pasture. It was a later model where they used custom refractory on the interior sides and arched baffle.

 

[precaud]

Well that sorta answers a wondering I had some time ago about the later TF's that had the refractory interior and arched baffle. They allegedly burned cleaner (passed Phase 1 EPA) but would the internals be fragile over time? Apparently, the answer is yes...

 

[Kent Tile Fire Newbie]

Precaud & Elders of Wood Stoves - What do you suggest to correct downdraft issues in a chimney?

I had a bit of a miserable first burn season last year. Prior to last year's initial firing, I had a new stainless steel liner and cap installed by a local chimney company. Every time I fired the KTF, my entire basement filled with smoke until the fire got hot enough to overcome the downdraft and create updraft. I used mostly biobricks, and I didn't get much longer than 2-3 hours burn time before I had to completely reload the stove. I experimented with different positions on the air slide, and adjusting the knob did not seem to lengthen my burn times. If I positioned the knob below half open, it seemed to choke the fire out and the bricks didn't burn completely.

After this year's chimney cleaning (which by the way had very minimal creosote), I disconnected the wood stove piping to install a magic heat unit. With the piping disconnected, I could feel a good breeze blowing in. I caulked shut the alumnimum clean out door on the exterior bottom of my chimney to prevent any air penetration from it. Now the only opening to outside air is the chimney cap. Is it possible that my chimney cap is the cause of this downdraft?

I looked into a draft inducing fan, but that's $1200 plus installation. There has to be another remedy. Anything you can suggest would be greatly appreciated. Thanks...newbies like myself greatly appreciate the wisdom shared in this blog.

 

[dougand3]

KTF - you'll get more responses starting a thread like "Poor chimney draft in basement install"

 

[begreen]

Agreed. Sounds like negative pressure. It deserves its own thread. Can you copy and paste this question into a new thread?

 

[Kent Tile Fire Newbie]

Thanks begreen! Good call! There was a topic on here already dedicated to poor drafting and negative pressure. A forum member suggested opening windows for at least 15 min to equalize pressure before lighting. I did just that, and no smoky downdraft! Enjoying my first fire of the season tonight. Happy burning everyone!

 

[KathyGibbs]

hi, y'all. We have a Kent Tile fire we bought in New Hampshire in 1985. But with several Army moves, we have lost a couple of parts, namely the two 'grates' on top that go around the exhaust pipe (if that's what you call it) and the support rails for the tiles on one side. ANY idea where I could get these parts? I tried emailing the company, but was told they won't ship outside of New Zealand. Does anyone know of anybody selling parts of old Kent Tile Fire stoves? It works fine, and we'd eventually like to sell it, so alternatively, if any one wants one in really good condition, but lacking those parts, PLEASE DO NOT HESITATE TO CONTACT US!! Or if there is a better part of the forum to post this on, please advise. thanks.
P.S. the stove is the type seen on my avatar picture.

 

[precaud]

I'm glad you liked the pic of my stove enough to use it for your avatar... (cough)...

 

[Woody Stover]

I'm glad you liked the pic of my stove enough to use it for your avatar... (cough)...

Hey, what's that fancy, modern unit in your avatar now??

 

[precaud]

Hey, what's that fancy, modern unit in your avatar now??

It's progress, Woody... progress ! No question, there is jealousy between them... so I keep them separated - one upstairs, one down - to keep them under control.

 

[KathyGibbs]

I'm glad you liked the pic of my stove enough to use it for your avatar... (cough)...

Seriously? It's a pic I pulled off the internet prior to even coming to this site since it looks exactly like our stove. Didn't mean to tread on your toes, and I'll change it if you wish, but I just need some info/parts. Can you assist?

 

[precaud]

Seriously? It's a pic I pulled off the internet prior to even coming to this site since it looks exactly like our stove. Didn't mean to tread on your toes, and I'll change it if you wish, but I just need some info/parts. Can you assist?

Yes, seriously. Look at the pic in the very first post of this thread and you'll see where it came from. No worries, you can use it if you like it. Just send me a share of the royalties.
Sorry, I can't help with Tile Fire parts. You might have to buy a retired TF that has been burned out to get the parts you need. I don't understand how, but some folks seem to be able to warp the baffle on theirs. I run all my stoves hot (its almost impossible not to burning pinon pine) and have never burned out or warped anything.

 

[KathyGibbs]

Ah, royalties. yes, of course. So far, though, the amount of royalties is zilch. I will, however, keep you informed should any come in. ;-)