Ready to Join The Gang - Time For a Wood Stove!

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Sounds like you're getting it dialled in. :cool:
 
Also - a block off plate is not standard (youll prob have to fight for one lol) but def worth it. demand one!

Or just DIY it afterward. Asking any contractor to do anything different than what they usually do almost always yields frustration and disappointing results.
 
So this was weird. Figured you guys would know the answer!

Loading up my stove before on a nice bed of coals. Had a few larger pieces of wood to throw in.

I did not realize that my bottom layer of wood was slightly angled up at the back, and what I went to slide a large piece on the second layer, It hit the baffle. At that point, I don't know if I was distracted or what, but I felt like this piece of metal fell from the top? Maybe it didn't, maybe it popped up from the bottom? No idea. Can't for the life of me figure out where it came from or where it's supposed to go!

Embarrassed to even ask, but after staring at my stove, watching install videos on youtube, and scouring the manual, I'm still clueless.

[Hearth.com] Ready to Join The Gang - Time For a Wood Stove!
 
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Ah, I thought it might be that!

[Hearth.com] Ready to Join The Gang - Time For a Wood Stove!

#21 at the bottom.

The reason I hesitated was because the stove is full of ashes there, and if it had popped up, I feel like I would have seen this imprint of where it was. And it seemed quite clean too. Still very confused how it could be that, but I supposed it makes the most sense. Picture also shows to sets of holes which does match.

What does this piece do?
 

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"What does this piece do?"

Distributes air to the front of the fire, especially when air valve is opened most of the way, to get the fire going good -- one of the reasons the fire burns front to back (w/the air wash system).

Needs removed & cleaned occasionally as can get plugged up with ash.
 
Make sure to orient it properly. That is the exact piece that another local sweep put back into a customers stove flipped 180 so it was effectively blocking off all the primary air. The poor customers were new to the home with no previous experience with this stove. They called me in six weeks later, chimney nearly plugged and about ready to give up on the stove(they had successfully burned for years at their previous home). I checked their wood, good. I checked their chimney setup, ideal(straight up double wall to class A. I was stumped until I was vacuuming out the stove and was like, wait a minute?

It was an alderlea t5, gorgeous stove and capable whole home heater for their scenario. I haven't heard back from them at all so I assume alls well now.
 
Figured I'd revive my old thread with a new question!

For the past week, I've noticed a little bit of a different odor outside. I used to either smell nothing, or a nice wood smell. Now, from time to time, I'll get a whiff of wood smell + almost some sort of burning plastic or something? Can't put my finger one what it smells like, but it's certainly not just burnt wood smelling anymore.

Any ideas?
 
A little creosote, maybe? Is it stronger some times than at other times, or about the same all the time? My guess is that there may be a small of creo that gets deposited toward the end of a burn, then burns off when stove and flue temps go higher at the beginning of the next burn. IIRC, your wood is marginal dryness; Have you gotten up there yet to take a look at the top of the flue to see how clean you are burning?
 
A little creosote, maybe? Is it stronger some times than at other times, or about the same all the time? My guess is that there may be a small of creo that gets deposited toward the end of a burn, then burns off when stove and flue temps go higher at the beginning of the next burn. IIRC, your wood is marginal dryness; Have you gotten up there yet to take a look at the top of the flue to see how clean you are burning?

Last December I got a delivery of some seasoned and some kiln dried wood, so I'm only using the good stuff now. Throw a spark at the kiln dried stuff and it'll erupt in flames.

With that said, could be creosote I suppose? I'll keep my eye on it during this burn. Just started the burn and it's very very hot and I definitely caught a whiff of the odor outside. As the heat drops down a little i'll check again to see if I smell it.

I was up on top of the roof at the end of December, but have not checked since. It was in pretty good shape at that point.
 
As I continue to watch this, I have another question.

Are there any ways to restrict airflow even more? I regularly choke this thing down 100%, but I still feel like I have too big of a flame and it's burning too quickly, especially the kiln dried wood.

Maybe I need to purposely start mixing in some unseasoned.
 
Figured I'd revive my old thread with a new question!

For the past week, I've noticed a little bit of a different odor outside. I used to either smell nothing, or a nice wood smell. Now, from time to time, I'll get a whiff of wood smell + almost some sort of burning plastic or something? Can't put my finger one what it smells like, but it's certainly not just burnt wood smelling anymore.

Any ideas?

... or perhaps a metallic, almost chemical like smell? If so ... that is most likely the smell of the secondary burn. It's not as fragrant as wood smoke ... heck even that heavy smoke smell of creosote smells better in my opinion ... but nevertheless that is the smell of a clean burn.
 
One of these days the internet will have a way to bottle up a smell and reproduce it online, right? :p
If I ever run out of Black Cherry to burn, I'll have to look online for some of that fragrance...I will just miss it too much! :)