Very Little Heat With Glacier Bay Wood Stove

[Jman44]

Hopefully this is the right forum. We purchased an old log cabin in the mountains of colorado. It was built back in the 1940s. The centerpiece of the cabin is a large rock fireplace. When we bought it, it was pretty much a mess inside and I have been slowly restoring it. Everything is pretty good now, but I have an issue with the wood burning stove. There as an old Glacier Bay stove insert in the fire place but it was just kind of sitting there and the shield (not sure if that is what it is called) was not sealed at all. When I first tried to use the fireplace I couldn’t even get it to burn and I figured it was due to nothing being sealed up between the stove insert and the fire place. Well, I got everything sealed up and now it burns really well, it starts up easily and I can get it to really roar by leaving the doors open a crack. Now my problem is, that even though it burns really well it really doesn’t put out any heat to speak of. If the doors are closed then it basically puts out no heat. I can put my hand right in front of it and it barely feels warm. If I open the doors, it does put out a lot more heat and it gets uncomfortably warm if I sit right in front, but it still doesn’t really heat the room much at all. I’m really at a loss, I had a large pile of good dry pine wood to burn and I am just going through it so fast but with little results. Anyone have any ideas if there is an adjustment that can be made or is it just the nature of it being an insert? Is there anyway to put a blower on this type of stove? Any help or advice appreciated.

Thanks

 

[EatenByLimestone]

It looks like your insert is sitting outside the fireplace. How hot is the stove getting? Are you opening the dampers below the door? What is the wood sitting on? It looks like it’s on a platform?

 

[RockyMtnGriz]

I might be reading too much into the two pictures you posted but the piece of wood I see in the stove doesn't look like dry lodgepole to me. (I'm assuming the wood is lodgepole pine since you're in CO.) The char and the lack of flame with the door open, plus the smoke staining and lack of visible cracking on the end grain all scream "not dry" to me. If I provide plenty of air (open door) to a piece of dry lodgepole with that amount of heat underneath I would expect it to be immediately engulfed in flame.

When I lived in the CO mountains it tended to rain A LOT in the late summer and fall. If the wood wasn't covered, well...