Top-Down Fire Laying: What Am I Missing Here?

[Wade A.]

Think about this though Pen. I have a radiant/convection oven in my house. The convection feature, when activated, substantially reduces the cooking time for food. In other words, it becomes more efficient when air is introduced to circulate the radiant heat coming off the hot elements. My wife's hair drier uses both to move heat faster. My point being, why not have BOTH working for you? Again, I'm just talking nekkid theory here, not allowing for the peculiarities of anyone's set up....

 

[pen]

oh absolutely!

That's why some people find that a modified method where there are big splits on the bottom then paper, then a mix of kindling and med stuff above, works best. I run about 1/2 dozen different stoves regularly. 2 of them are identical stoves: mama bear fisher. My old fisher was a grandma bear. An old convective scary heater thing and a barrel stove as well as my englander. None of them light exactly the same.

That's what's so fun about a wood stove to me. Always something to experiment with.

pen

 

[Wade A.]

That might be exactly what most of us here find so compelling about wood heat. There is no "right" way, all the time, for everyone. Let's a body stake a claim to their own reality, don't it?

 

[Wade A.]

"Lets", not "Let's"... A pet peeve of mine I should be more careful about!

 

[pen]

"Lets", not "Let's"... A pet peeve of mine I should be more careful about!

Dear god, please don't over analyze my grammar. Especially after I've had a few cocktails!

pen

 

[Battenkiller]

"Lets", not "Let's"... A pet peeve of mine I should be more careful about!

Their are whey to many weighs that smell chick cane bee beet. Ewe half too prove reed awl the thyme when your dun wit yore riding.

 

[firefighterjake]

I've found top down doesn't work in every stove. I had a smaller 1.7 cf insert that made it impossible to get a good top down fire in.

I have a larger firebox now and top down are the way to go for me. It's not the fastest way to get the stove up to temp, but I'm having draft issues, so the top down is the best way to avoid smokey starts. One thing that I do that I haven't seen anyone else mention when starting a top down i keep the bottom (largest) splits elevated a little bit. I prop them up on the lip of my firebox and clear away some of the ashes to allow air to get under the large splits. This helps get the bottom going. Hope that helps. Good luck.

I agree . . . while I use the top down method to start a fire in my Oslo very successfully (after a few less than spectacular attempts) I have never been able to use the top down fire to get a fire going in the old Ashely smoke dragon at the snowmobile clubhouse . . . of course it probably doesn't help that it has rusted out single wall stove pipe that you can actually see through and its attached to a Magic Heat . . . and yes . . . I have suggested the snowmobile club replace the pipe and Magic Heat.