My first "OH SH.. MOMENT" Over Fire Very Hot Stove

[Huntindog1]

So I got the stove going good , it was a full load of white oak, 1 year seasoned.

Secondary burn got to going very well, temps where up, so I closed the air control all the way.

Later on went back down and the top of the stove was pegged at like 900 and stove pipe temp was at 500.

I look at the fire inside and the secondary burn was going really good. So since the stove air was already fully closed, I went to my manual stove pipe damper and closed it all the way. I waited for a couple minutes and the stove pipe temp was going towards 550 and I couldn't tell about the stove top as it was already pegged at 900.

I tried opening the door to let cool air rush in but it seem to make the fire roar even harder so I shut the door that made me nervous. So I grabbed some aluminum foil and plugged the air inlets in the back of the stove bottom at each corner. Then there was small hole up front on the bottom that I put a piece of aluminum foil tape over it.

So after the stove air was shut off all the way , the stove pipe manual damper closed completely and all the other holes plugged, the stove settled down to 400 stove pipe temp and 750 stove top temp. I watched it for like another half hour and it maintained those numbers so I left everything closed off for the night and when I got up this morning had a bed of coals like 3 inches deep for a 8 hour burn.

But it was scary for a little while.

 

[WellSeasoned]

That does sound a bit scary. Lesson for me to find the holes myself in case I need to plug as well, but I have no damper. Good you got through it ok tho

 

[oldspark]

Sounds like your wood is dry enough :cheese:,

 

[Battenkiller]

Sounds like your wood is dry enough :cheese:,

:lol:

When I saw he did that with white oak only seasoned for a year, I kinda figured you'd show up soon. ;-)

 

[Wade A.]

Backwoods.....bottom rear, directly below the connector inlet. You'll have your moment soon enough, I'm betting . The Castine will really take off if you've got wood stacked in the front of the firebox up near the level of the top secondary burn perforations. I've learned to not stack the wood higher in the front of the firebox than what you can load towards the back (that is, unless I want to). It just turbo-charges the secondaries like you would not believe.

 

[shawneyboy]

All I can say is....... GULP !
Glad you got out of the situation without really bad thngs haappening.

 

[pen]

Other than the wood is dry, what's the plan so that doesn't happen again?

Some things to think about:

Did you load on a lot of hot coals?

Did you have the coals spread out or moved near the air intake on the stove?

Were the spits pretty small in size?

Was the air left open too much and too long at the start of the burn?

Glad to hear it came out OK. That's pretty hot.

pen

 

[seeyal8r]

2 recommendations.
#1. Keep a bucket of cold ash nearby. Open the door throw a couple shovels on the hot burning wood.

#2. Keep a cold log sitting outside that you can throw on the runnaway.

Both of these have cured me of "OH SH*! " moments.

 

[Jager]

Later on went back down...

Is your stove down in the basement, HD? I've always wondered how guys who have their stove in the non-living part of their house manage their burns. Especially since most stoves I've ever seen will often "pick up" an hour or more after they've been throttled. Just the fuel load getting to a critical combustion point and taking off.

One thing that hasn't changed with my new stove - despite it's being dramatically better and safer than my old one - is the need to let it "settle down," before I leave the house or go to upstairs to bed. That's pretty easy for me to do since it's in my living room. Worst thing, even if I stoke it late into the evening, pushing towards bed time, is I just have to lay down on the couch for awhile.

I'm still learning my new stove, but my protocol right now is to turn the fan on low if there is the slightest chance it could "pick up" when I go to bed or leave the house - i.e. if it hasn't had a couple hours to settle down and/or the t-stat is halfway up or more into the active zone.

Glad it all ended up well for you.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Have you checked the thermometers? Are they relatively accurate? Some are so far off they make you think you have an overfire but in truth it is not.

 

[Huntindog1]

I have checked the thermometers with a digital thermocouple I have. they checked out pretty good at reading what the inside temp of the pipe is as I had a small hole drill in my pipe when I had the old buck saver stove hooked up and the surface temp thermometer seemed to reflect the inside temps rather than the surface temp. I have heard on this board that what ever your thermometer reads its hotter inside the pipe but it seems they have been set to be more what the inside temp would.

As far as what I did to get it that hot I think was loading that additional log up front on top of a log already there so there wasnt alot of space up by the secondary tubes , I think it may have blocked some of the secondary burn from escaping as fast up and around the front side of the baffle plate as some who posted early mentioned. Plus it was a full load of white oak that I hadnt done before.

THe stove may have been ok but it was burning so good it looked like it was going to get hotter and the stove top was already pegged up to 900 as high as it would go.

But what really scared me was I shut the stove completely down plus shut the manual stove damper completely and it wasnt slowing down not unitl I plugged the other holes in the stove with aluminum foil did it slow down and cool off a little but still with all that it still kept going at a 400 pipe temp and 750 stove top temp and stayed there so I left it like that after watching it for half an hour.

 

[Hass]

I'm pretty sure that when you open the door, the fire is suppose to blaze away. But huge amount of cold air rushing in sends all your heat up the chimney and cools the stove... Even though your flames look blazing hot and far more intense. someone please correct me if I'm wrong though! So I'd imagine your chimney temp would sky rocket...

I hope the stove survived the battle undamaged. Did you give it a look over after the load burned down?