Need help with Encore 2040-C

[Turbo89]

forgot to reply.

6inch double wall chimney, 18.5ft straight up. no key damper

Honestly it sounds like we have almost the exact same setup! I’d focus on wood / loading and see if that gets you somewhere.

If the stove were new I’d be calling the company and making them diagnose it! Another thought - is the bypass closing all the way (seems like a long shot since you can turn the flames way down)?

If it’s not new, I'd re-gasket everything and make sure it’s sealed up tight (include in the flue adapter section and bypass gaskets). This is probably $40-50 in material and a few hours if you have the skill.

 

[Mebenal]

This is the wood I have

 

[Mebenal]

This is the bed of coals I load on

 

[Mebenal]

This is what I would consider my stove to be 3/4 full

With this amount of wood, I will get about 2.5-3.5 hours

 

[Mebenal]

Here's an example of the backpuffing I often experience when the air is at 0%.

This specific case, the air has been at 0% for about 1.5 hours now, and suddenly it decides to start backpuffing. (it did not backpuff until 90min into the burn time)
The stove will do this every 20-30 seconds until I turn the air up to 10%.

This would be slightly on the mild side, when the backpuffing is more aggressive, I can visually see/smell a small amount of smoke come out of the front door. (since i fixed the leak, i dont see the smoke come out)

 

[Turbo89]

If I put that much wood in my stove (hardwood), I’d get 6-7hrs no problem, but if I pushed all the coals to the back (built a little wall near secondary intake holes) I’d get 10+ hrs. When I’m loading it, the wood in the front literally using touching coals (I try to make it only one so only one piece is in direct contact with the hot coals.

Those splits look smallish too, i typically burn much larger pieces overnight. Usually I’ll but a couple of the largest pieces at the bottom, so they take a while to burn off/ propagate the flame up to the top.

That back puff looks a lot like secondary ignition (smoke burning), and by itself isn’t concerning. The fact that’s it’s pushing smoke into the room is though.

I run mine fully closed usually, but sometimes I close the air control all the way down and just crack it (say 1/8th).

 

[Mebenal]

If I put that much wood in my stove (hardwood), I’d get 6-7hrs no problem, but if I pushed all the coals to the back (built a little wall near secondary intake holes) I’d get 10+ hrs. When I’m loading it, the wood in the front literally using touching coals (I try to make it only one so only one piece is in direct contact with the hot coals.

Well, I tried this last night. Made a massive pile of coals against the back wall, no coals probably the front half of the box.

Woke up 6.5 hours later and I still had enough coals/heat to restart with some kindling. stove was like 275-300, CAT was 450, Flue was pretty low.

Thanks alot! (huge improvement from what I was dealing with before) Still not 8-10hours but maybe thats the type of wood I have.

@Turbo89 what temps does your CAT get to during the cycle of the burn?

 

[Eman85]

Very interesting. I have almost the opposite. My Pine, measured at 9-11% moisture(on average) will cause my temps to go crazy if I fill the box and dont closely monitor my air settings. My fir, measured 17-22% (on average) with a full stove, I can leave my air 100% for the full burn and it wont make me nervous. This is why I have been mixing them half/half. the pine gives me heat, and the fir kind of balances the stove and makes it less volatile while still getting 3-4hours of burn time.

You say you can run with the air open 100% for the full burn? I can't do that in any way of burning, bypass open or closed. My flue temps would go way high with the bypass open and my cat would go ski high and flue temps high with the bypass closed.
Someone mentioned grocery store wood for hardwood, that's probably not dry wood, it says kiln dried but it's only heated to kill bugs not dry for burning.

 

[Mebenal]

You say you can run with the air open 100% for the full burn? I can't do that in any way of burning, bypass open or closed. My flue temps would go way high with the bypass open and my cat would go ski high and flue temps high with the bypass closed.
Someone mentioned grocery store wood for hardwood, that's probably not dry wood, it says kiln dried but it's only heated to kill bugs not dry for burning.

Yeah, I can do this ONLY with the Fir. If I left the air 100% open with the Pine, my stove would also go nuclear.

Adding the fir to the mixture seems to calm the stove down alot, but not necessarily extend the burn time.

 

[Turbo89]

Well, I tried this last night. Made a massive pile of coals against the back wall, no coals probably the front half of the box.

Woke up 6.5 hours later and I still had enough coals/heat to restart with some kindling. stove was like 275-300, CAT was 450, Flue was pretty low.

Thanks alot! (huge improvement from what I was dealing with before) Still not 8-10hours but maybe thats the type of wood I have.

@Turbo89 what temps does your CAT get to during the cycle of the burn?

Great!!

With the dry hardwood I burn, I typically see 1100-1400, this morning I kind of rushed it and saw 1550. I’ll try to take some pics when I go out to reload the shop stove, right now it’s cranking because I’m trying to warm the shop up.

 

[Turbo89]

Just reloaded from this morning (cold stove lit around 9:30, kindling and 2 splits).

Here’s the coals - about 4 hours, stove was on high for the fire 1-1/2 hrs or so.

here’s the coal rake:

Here’s the reload, 4 big splits of maple / oak:

2 pieces are very dry, sub 10% and two pieces are 15-18%. I loaded about 45 min ago, and turned it down to about 1/8th. CAT is settling around 1460 right now.

I’ll report back later!

 

[Turbo89]

Update about 3hr 15 min in, CAT temp still above 1,000, stove top around 600 and I can still see all the logs. I’m going to let it go 3-4 more hours, then maybe refill it for the night.