Puff the Magic Glenwood No. 8

NO.8 puffer,

Im at work in Alaska right now and the wife just called up with an issue. I havent burned long enough in this stove yet to tell her what the issue is.

She is burning wood right now and the very top of the stove where the crown connects (at the little hole it sits in) is puffing out smoke every 5 seconds or so. I told her to take it out of baseburner mode and open up the damper controler all the way. She said it still puffs even after she did all of that. The stove does have the wood plate in facing the correct direction and I have a magnehelic on the way so I can tell. I know the stove normally pulls too strong because I burn through wood and coal fast and really need to crank down the damper to slow it down. Its acting like it doesnt have enough draft today.......i know the weater just changed but the pipe is hot and its about 20 ft tall. I have a chimeny guy coming tommorow or the next day to clean the stack out.

Any other ideas? all the plates are in place she said, the primary damper is open enough to keep her rolling and she even tried the secondary because wood does like secondary air better.

Blue

H'bout this.......it's NOT cold wherever she is, it's probably 50's to 60's, correct?. When it's 'warm', your chimney doesn't draft like it does when it is cold outside. You need to run it open for a spell and get some good heat in the chimney before you put it in BB mode.

After you get heat in the chimney and get it in BB mode, DO NOT choke the fire down with the damper like you would if you were burning coal. On my stove, with coal, I completely shut the damper. With wood, it's about 60 degrees from horizontal (30 degrees or less from vertical....you'll need to determine where your chimney/stove combo needs to run at).

Lastly, if she is running it when you aren't around, make sure she is burning ONLY properly seasoned wood.

Let me know if I can further help.

Sounds like it's starving for secondary air.

I agree with Pancho. It sounds like weak, or overly restricted draft in the chimney system. My range does the same thing with wood - puffing smoke out the tiny gaps in the plates of the cook top surface, if I give it too much air in. Decrease the air in, then open the MPD to get the flue gases out, and the back drafting stops instantly.

She may be giving it too much primary and secondary air, combined, in relation to how much opening the MPD is set to, ....or the weaker warmer weather draft can handle ? Don't forget there is also additional secondary air coming in through the gas ring feed holes, too.

Wood wants to burn so fast that sometimes, it'll burn faster than a weak drafting, or overly choked by the MPD, chimney can remove the flue gases. Cut back on the incoming air and it stops trying to back draft.

What happens when she closes the primary, and opens the MPD more, and then only uses the secondary to make the flames calm down ?

Paul

That makes total sense, she kept adding more and more air trying to remidy the problem. I will have her lower the air down, she was using mostly the primary air damper control then when it started puffing she added more air to it by means of the secodary damper probably compounding the problem.

Blue

BlueMountains wrote:That makes total sense, she kept adding more and more air trying to remidy the problem. I will have her lower the air down, she was using mostly the primary air damper control then when it started puffing she added more air to it by means of the secodary damper probably compounding the problem.

Blue

The settings of your primaries and MPD will vary with outside temps. I don't use the secondary air at all for wood and only for startups with coal.

I run my stove up to 500F+ on the barrel and try to get the chimney up over 250F for a period of time before I put it in BB mode and put a little MPD to it. If you rush it, it'll smoke.

I thought that maybe it was "puff-backing" like bit coal can do if its hungry for secondary air. But, more likely that the capacity of the flue path wasn't able to keep negative pressure in the fire chamber (due to MPD or otherwise) like Paul suggested.

Lightning wrote:I thought that maybe it was "puff-backing" like bit coal can do if its hungry for secondary air. But, more likely that the capacity of the flue path wasn't able to keep negative pressure in the fire chamber (due to MPD or otherwise) like Paul suggested.

Luckily, it was not the, KA-BOOM type of puff backs.

Paul

I had her run a series of tests with the stove, she throttled it back more with the primary and secondary until the point it was almost closed off. The stove still rock and rolled so I think our draft is too strong.

BM, your draft is fine as is everything else, you are suffering from cuffitis (the shoulder season blues). Generally S AK is running at 40-55* now as it is just unusually warm. That is why our Kenyan idiot was there recently proving that climate change is a reality. If you search this board there are many ills such as puff backs etc. etc. These stoves work best when they are hauling a$$. When the winter starts off I have the same issues. I have come up with a system of throttling down that giant coal air leak called the gas ring. I just stuff in SS bolts that just fit the secondary air intake. Now my Wings Best (a 16" firepot BB) will cruise nicely. I even tried gasketing the door but the bolts work best and the gaskets will now be removed when I light the stove.Then when the time is right I just remove them as they are just a loose thread fit. Nuclear reactors like to be out of first gear. It means a little CO does not get burned efficiently and the suspended pot design works better under these conditions (my Our Glenwood #9 for example). All will be well when winter comes and the #8 is just the best in its class.

Is she running in baseburner mode? If so take it out of that and go to direct draft.

What condition is the fire in? If it's basically in start mode, you need to open the flue damper, go out of baseburner mode (if in it) and get the fire going nicely. This often happens when starting up with wood or if the wood in the fire is not really caught yet.

Generally with burning wood and getting little puff backs like that, you need to open up the flue damper, lower the primary air and add more secondary air. It usually happens when starting up wood when there is a lot of smoke being generated.

If the fire is actually going pretty well; you know, nice bed of coals, haven't added new wood recently - then you may simply lower the flue restrictions - e.g. take out of baserburner mode, open flue damper more, that sort of thing. But this kind of thing more often happens when you have added new wood or the fire is still young... That's my 2 cents worth...

dj

UPDATE: The wife found the back elbow piece was disconnected from the back elbow. She reconnected the pipe to the elbow. Problem solved....except for last night we had a quick puff again from the high rate of burning.

Blue

how is it that the exhaust doesn't have screws securing the joints ? or is this a connection i'm not really understanding ?

steve

BlueMountains wrote:UPDATE: The wife found the back elbow piece was disconnected from the back elbow. She reconnected the pipe to the elbow. Problem solved....except for last night we had a quick puff again from the high rate of burning.

Blue

Whoa.....yeah, I'd get after that as sooner than later. Not something you want coming apart in the middle of the night.

Time to admit something here,

so.......I may have added some liquid to a hot bed of coals that didnt ignite. I watched Wiliam's video and decided to try to get the coal to burn by using Kero. Poof!!!!! Thats probably what did it among other things. The top lid, cleanout and baseburner plate jumped off. Thats when it happened im sure.

All is good in the world again.

Blue