permaculture

["John Schinnerer" <john@eco-living.net>]

Aloha,

> all good advise, especially adjusting the damper.  Stoves are all
> basically  regulated by manipulating air flow and fuel size.

Ideally using the vents on the stove and not a damper in the flue.  A good
airtight stove doesn't need a flue damper (in my personal experience,
anyhow); using a flue damper can increase the likelihood of indoor air
pollution (CO, etc.) because it's restricting the flow of outgoing gases
coming *from* the firebox instead of restricting the flow of air into the
firebox.

> true again, though frankly you can cheat a little, get the fire
> temperature  up and then retard it a bit once the fuel is hot during the
> day if you  can't be home to tend it.

Or so you don't have to get up at 2 AM to feed it ;-).  You can load it
up, get it good and hot and then close it down and it will burn slowly but
still quite hot.  Good coals are a lot hotter than all those dramatic
flames in a 'roaring fire', where most of the heat is going up the flue...

> This is an excellent point.  Perhaps if one wanted to try providing
> combustion air from one location you could box it in or shelter it from
> the  wind to prevent problems.

It's not the direct effect of the wind, it's the change in pressure
outside relative to the pressure in the house, which a box or shelter
won't help.  My girlfriend's cabin (wood stove heated) has this problem
due to how it's situated relative to slope, trees and certain wind
conditions.  Wind gusts will at times result in a momentary high-pressure
zone at the end of the cabin where the flue is.  Meanwhile the pressure
inside the cabin is about the same - not so quickly affected by a gust
outside - so it's suddenly lower pressure inside than outside where the
flue exists, and some smoke is (or was) puffed backwards into the cabin.

We just replaced her oversized oval top/front-loading unsealed leaky
'smoke monster' with a smaller front-loading airtight 'box heater'.  It
drafts much better (on same flue), loads without smoking out the place,
and when closed down, even the occasional strong backdraft pushes little
to no smoke back through it.  Plus no need to risk using the flue damper
any more.  Will also burn slow and hot all night - no 3 AM reloading
needed! :-)


John Schinnerer, MA
-------------------------
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