Ever Done This?

Thjis morning I tried to rush things with my Harman TLC-2000 & ended up jamming the shaker grates (by being to agressive with it) with hot coal. (The Harman has a verfy nice shaker mechanism that opens very wide to allow you to dump alot of coal ash at one time when you are cleaning it out) Unfortunately, if you are just trying to shake it down a little (to add more coal) you have to be careful not to shake to hard or you will dump so much hot coal into the ash pan that the grates can get stuck in the full open position. I probably could have saved the fire by working at it for a bit (to dislodge some coal from the grates so they could close) but it's going to be warm today & almost 70 deg tomorrow so I closed the damper & out it goes!

I know that feeling!

Last year I came home from work to find the shaker lever all the way back. My wife (who is an experienced wood-burner) shook the stove and pushed the lever a little too far. She has a good grasp of how to operate the stove now, but I'm such a pain in the a@% about it that she usually leaves it for me, and she's in charge of the woodburner.