A Place for a New Stove (Pics)

Let's see if this works.

Here's a picture of a wood burner that will be modified for secondary combustion and then replaced, hopefully, with a new coal burner.

I need to change that pipe from a 90* to a 45*. I'm told it will draw better. Where that pipe goes into the thimble, there's another at least 20"and maybe 24"...I really need to measure it just to be sure, of horizontal pipe before it goes up the chimney. Not exactly a perfect set-up. In fact, there's no clean out that I've found. The stove you see was a replacement for the original wood burner and when they put this one in there was soot all the way to the floor...and they didn't have enough sweeper hose to go into the crawl space.

Needless to say, I have some work to do, as well as getting an inspection done before I use it...for insurance purposes. The home is 1300sq.ft. and we may add on to it later to about 2000-2400. As is, it's a fairly open floor plan with about 750sq.ft. being an "L" shape one room.

Pictures do not show the new roof I just put on.
Chimney pics...

I've been looking at modern coal burners like Legacy (used to be Harman I guess), D.S., Hitzer, etc...

...but I'd really like to get a base heater if it would fit and work out.

Not a lot of water in the picture below, as the picture was taken over a year ago. Today there's lots of water going over my waterfall.

I don't know your chimney height above the thimble but that is the ideal setup for an antique to run as the stove can be vented vertically as opposed to venting onto a fireplace flue. Any of the base heater style stoves will do well there as long as your chimney drafts well. It needs to be able to pull at least .02 draft on warm spring and fall days.

Nice setting for a stove, thats for sure.

Looks like an excellent setup. Stove pipe should not be an issue.

Hearth looks very nice.

I forgot to measure the chimney today while I was working, but if I had to guess on the chimney height I'd say it's 10ft. minimum above the thimble. House sits in a small valley that's only about 50yards wide with a hill behind the house and in front, both being about 70ft. above the house. Pap never had any issues burning wood there.

Also, that chimney may have seen only 1-2 fires in the last 25-30 years. Pap had to quit using it because of grandma's lung conditions.

Anyone ever heard of this brand of wood stove in the above pictures? I can't find any tags on it, but below the right door it says, "Solarwood". I've attempted several searches trying to find more information, but the only thing I can come up with is that this company started in the early 80's and by about 83-84 had been bought out. I don not know if that information is correct because I can't find anything else.

About a week ago I decided to light the wood stove since I felt like it. First time in a long time this chimney has seen a fire. I removed the thimble cap, removed the insulation I had stuffed into the thimble, then I took a mirror and looked up through the chimney to make sure there were no obstructions. None were found. However, just above the thimble I did notice a couple of good sized cracks in the clay liner. I then hooked up the stove pipes and lit a small kindling fire and let it burn out. The next day I started another fire and this time added one log and let it also burn out. I did this because this particular stove was a replacement for the stove that my grandparents had...and this one had been painted before being put into the house, so I wanted to burn it off a little at a time. Since then I've had 4 good fires on different days and have made the determination that for certain this stove will be replaced with a coal burner...for one the doors are leaking some and I have some things I want to do to this stove with regard to giving it a secondary air supply which it does not have now. It's an old stove and it's okay, but certainly isn't efficient. I've also decided that even though it was above 40 degrees on all 4 days I had a fire in it, this stove would have no issue heating the house even at 0degrees. In fact, I think it's too big probably.

That said, scroll back up and take a gander at photo number 6. Notice the black soot on the north side of the chimney brick? That photo was taken several months ago and keep in mind that at the time I took the photo this chimney hadn't had a fire in it in decades. If Pap burned it at all during the time after grandma's passing it was only a couple of times...but I don't recall him mentioning it, so we'll take it as 0 fires in all those years.

Over the last week and 4 burns with this stove each day we had a good amount of wind with moderate outside temps from 40F to 60F. Obviously, she smoked a bit until I got her hot enough at which time I left the MPD wide open and controlled my burns with primary air supply on each side of stove. Once she was warmed up good, from a top down fire(s), I'd slow the primaries down to control the burns. No issues.

What I did notice though was during start up and when she was getting going and smoking as only a wood burner can do I noticed the wind was wrapping the smoke around the front side of the chimney real good making it contact the brick like you see in the above photo. Wind was typical, out of the wsw and hitting the roof at an angle in the above photo moving smoke from right to left in that picture. Of course when she got hot there was hardly any smoke. When there was no wind everything going straight up like it supposed to.

That said, I have a couple of thoughts...perhaps a concern or two.

1. I have a hill in front to the north about 70' high, a hill to the south about 70' high, and a hill to the west about 100' higher than where the house sits.

2. I'm now wondering if my chimney is high enough?
Sure it's worked flawlessly for years before it finally wasn't used for a few decades. It's only about 2 1/2' above the crown of the roof. So, I'm almost certain during windy conditions I'm getting a lot of swirling from wind moving up and over the roof, as well as funny currents from the 3 hill surrounding the house. Again, unless it's windy the draft seems excellent.

3. Would a manometer help me determine if my draft is good enough, chimney high enough, etc.? I don't know anything about them and I assume they can be used with a wood burning stove as well as a coal burner.

4. Do you have a preference as to which manometer to buy or which works best?

Keep in mind I only lit this stove just because...

..It was relaxing.
I plan on replacing this stove with a nice Glenwood coal burner, so I'll likely need to get a manometer anyway.

Here's another view of the chimney's before the roof was replaced. Brick chimney is the wood burner.

So many variables that anyone here can only make a guess. I think the best way is, on a windy day, make a real smoky wood fire and go outside and observe what is happening up at the chimney. Taking notes on wind direction, and some video you can study later for comparison, will help.

You can also slip a piece of stove pipe over the chimney liner sticking out and see if extending it some more helps with draft and smoke path away from the chimney.

A mano will let you "see" the draft rather than guess what the draft is, or isn't, doing.

As far as what type of mano, they come in the sight glass type, like the Dwyer model 25 that most use, or the analog type gauge if you prefer to look at a needle moving. Both are more than accurate enough and both get hooked up the same way to your stove pipe between the stove and the MPD. The sight glass model is much less expensive than the analog model.

Paul

I can't help with every question, but I'll try with a few and ask a question or two of my own.

Hoytman wrote:What I did notice though was during start up and when she was getting going and smoking as only a wood burner can do

Hoytman wrote:Over the last week and 4 burns with this stove each day we had a good amount of wind with moderate outside temps from 40F to 60F. Obviously, she smoked a bit until I got her hot enough at which time I left the MPD wide open and controlled my burns with primary air supply on each side of stove. Once she was warmed up good, from a top down fire(s), I'd slow the primaries down to control the burns. No issues.

Was the stove smoking inside the house, before you got a good fire going? If so, this could cause you a problem idling a baseburner where some of these guys are getting flue temps of 110 degrees or so as you may not be able to keep a draft.

And if the MPD were to be closed some, it would keep more heat in the stove as opposed to sending it all directly out of the chimney.

Hoytman wrote:4. Do you have a preference as to which manometer to buy or which works best?

Most on here use this:
https://www.amazon.com/Dwyer-25-Manometer-Inclined-Vertical- ... i+model+25

Although this one uses no fluid:
https://www.amazon.com/Dwyer-Magnehelic-Differential-Pressur ... elic+gauge

A cap on your chimney may help. They sometimes create a draft where one wasn't previously present. A cap helped with my occasional downdrafts.

I had a bunch more stuff here, but I saw that Paul posted before me and I deleted everything that was doubled up.

I bought 2 used Magnehelic gauges from Moses B. Glick for $53 for the pair including shipping. Catalog # 2000-00 with the scale reading from .00- .25

Carbon Monoxide detector ?? Smoke alarm ?? I didn't see any in your pics.