First Burning

Well I got it all hooked up last night and had my first burn. I cant' say it has gone to well, and i'm not sure what the problem is. The stove temp only made it up to at most 300 degrees and that was with the damper wide open. The chimney right above the stove was over 300 degrees so I have a suspicion that I am losing to much heat through the chimney. I don't have my barometric damper installed yet, so that probably is the culprit. Also if I open the ash door it really doesn't do anything for the fire, only if I open the main door does it help, actually last night it was causing the fire to die down if I opened the ash door.

Its a learning experience.

Yikes....stove temp 300 and flu temp 300? According to that you are shooting close to 100% of the heat up the chimney.

Lots of stuff to ask on this. I assume this is the stove you refurbished in your other thread? First what type of coal are you using? Are you filling the firebox all the way up? It also sounds like you have some sort of restriction in the gas passes leaving the stove. If you open the ash door it should make this stove roar. You say it will try to go out if you open the ash door?

I am sure others will chime in with some questions in a bit. Hang in there and strap yourself in because the questions are going to start.

Yes this is the stove I bought used. I am using anthracite nut coal, I filled the firebox all but clear full after I got the fire going. At one point when it was at its hottest point I cracked the main door open and it was sucking air in through the intake so fast that it was whistling.

After I had started the fire when I opened the ash door the flames would die down until I opened the main door further. Later once the fire was going decent, if I opened the doors it helped perk up the fire a bit. I tried to open the door this morning to get it build up this morning but it didn't really respond.

I"m not sure if the lack of the baro has something to do with this, I am getting a manometer tomorrow so i'll be able to check the draft.

Basement only made it up to about 73-74, and it should have been much warmer down there with that thing running wide open.

Open the ash pan door and see if the grates are glowing bright orange. If not shake them and poke from the bottom as needed to clear the ash. If no under fire air no fire.in the stove.

The grates are not glowing, I tried shaking and poking but the grates seem open as far as I can tell.

As mentioned, it sounds like your heat is going up the chimney rather than staying in the stove. What is your chimney set up - masonry, insulated SS pipe, height, inside or outside house envelope?

The info in your other thread mentioned you were using this as a top vent rather than a rear vent. There was a pic from the top where it appeared you could see right down into the firebox from the top vent. Is that really the case that the exhaust port on the top of the stove looks directly into the firebox with no baffle plate at the top of the firebox? Or was I misinterpreting that pic? Can you take a pic of the inside of the firebox at the top?

Where are you measuring the 300* on the stove and what did you use to measure it with?

Does this stove have a blower on it to help wash the heat off it?

When you shake it down , are you seeing glowing coal? if not you may have the mother of all clinkers all up in there which might also explain why you get no response from opening the ash door. calling the handfed crew ........ stand by

title, it is an exterior masonry chimney, you are correct about the top vent, and in that picture you are correct about being able to see right into the fire box, I had the baffle plate out so it wasn't in my way while installing the chimney, I put it back in before using it. Measured the stove with a magnetic stick on thermometer, right above the loading door. Yes the stove has a blower.

Waldo when I shook down this morning I didn't see any glowing coal, but could have missed them. I am wondering if there is a clinker in there, I visually checked the grates and vacuumed it out, but they could be lodged down in there. It looks to me that they had been burning wood in there before I bought it.

can you poke something up from the ash chamber and feel something solid? you should be seeing serious glowing coals falling through grates when you shake it down....

I tried poking around, but I couldn't really get a visual so I was just guessing and poking at random.

I have to put my head on the floor to see mine. Try a mirror if need be. If all else fails poke like crazy then pull out the ash pan to see what is in it.

Okay, well the fire went out when I tried to reload, so i'm going to clean the stove out when I get home to see if I can maybe see stuff lodged in the grates, and then try again. We are in a cold snap right now, and would really like to have the coal stove going good.

Being that it was a brand new fire, it didn't have time to ash up or generate clinkers. I suspect the primary air is bypassing somehow. As mentioned, opening the ash door should send it into nuclear mode. Another puzzle is that a restriction somewhere in the flue/chimney system should have the same effect as a manual damper which would show better stove vs pipe temps.

Without a manometer we can only guess...

I'm getting a manometer today so I'll be able to check draft, I don't think its a lack of draft issue, you can put your hand up to the stove pipe and feel it pulling air from the stove.

was just thinking about something, I was having a really hard time getting the stove temp up above 250-275, I then opened a window because smoke was accumulating in the basement from having the load door open and starting the fire. In the time of having the window open, the stove temp was up over the 300 degree mark, if I remember correctly this happened at the time of opening the window, when I shut the window it seemed to die back down again.

Maybe my basement is to tight?

Also another thought, maybe the load and ash door gaskets need replaced