Started My Leisureline Pocono This Weekend

It took a little while to get it set-up, but the thing is great!

This is my first coal stove and was much easier to get it going than I expected.
They gave me a few of their magic "starter bags" with the stove, and wow! They really work.

Everything worked great, right out of the box. The Coal Trol thermostat works just like it should, and is an awsome feature. I set my basement for 69 degrees, and it does the rest: I don't have to go tweaking the stove controls at all.
Coal comming down from the hopper is black, burning hot orange in the middle, and grey spent ash on the lower part. Looks like it is burning just right.

Great Job Leisure Line!

I got the optional "hot air jacket" with 3 8" vent pipe openings. If anyone would like to share their experiences with setting up ductwork, I would appreciate that. I will attempt to play with the ductwork over the next couple of weekends.

Mark, In NJ

Post pics of your hot air jacket, how are you moving the air? inline fans or other?
I have a hyfire and looking at getting the jacket too.
Thanks!

I have had a Hyfire II for three years now, this year I installed the jacket. I have two eight inch ducts and two six inch ducts for venting. I installed inline fans in each duct, the eight inch are rated at 420 cfm and the six inch are rated at 260 cfm. So basically, I have four times the CFM that I had with the basic Hyfire fans. My stove is in the basement, I tapped into pre-existing duct work. I use the open cellar door for return air, not the best set up for return but havent got around to putting in a return line yet.

If you are interested in the in line fans, don't go with the plastic vaned units, they are only rated at something like 120 degree, the metal bladed are rated at 266 degrees. You can look at them at
**Broken Link(s) Removed**

Thanks for the link

Did you disconnect the attached blowers?

I was looking at the attached blowers on my Pocono and the one facing out on my stove looks like it could have an 8" return pipe attached to it, by putting the pipe over the air inlet hole, and attaching it with 3 or 4 small angle brackets and sheet metal screws, being careful not to put any screws through the blower housing where they would interfere with the blower wheel.

Makes for an interesting possibility

Talked to Jerry at Leisure line and he told me to remove the two blowers on the stove, I did and just allow air to be sucked up through them.
With the booster fans running and controlled by the Coal-trol, the outside jacket is cold. The stove side itself was to hot for the touch, so it looks like I am transferring all that heat where it should be, to the first floor.

Markm4, if you can hook up a 6" or 8" return air duct to the fan, and pull air from a distant room in your house, you will creat a circulation loop that is not picking up cold air off of a basement floor. This improves effeciency greatly.
Even hooking up a duct and pulling the air of the ceiling is a huge improvement over pulloing it off the cold floor.

Hook one up and let us know how well it works.

Greg L

EWSretired,
Yes, I was told that it is best to go with duct fans and not the blowers too, and I'm sure it works that way.
I just love to tinker, and think about things, like it would be a shame to have these powerful blowers go unused, but also understand that you cannot connect the blowers and duct fans to the coaltrol at the same time. So, I am just throwing around ideas.

Right now I have it set-up with the factory blowers and no ductwork or additional fans.

LSFarm

It would be possible to attach a duct to the inlet of the right side factory centrifugal blower.
The left one is not accessable because it is too close to the stovepipe (back vent model).

I suppose if I am sucking air from a room upstairs, or even the ceiling, it will be an improvement over my current lack of any ductwork. Going down this road leads me to thinking about a full setup with supply and return ductwork, or maybe just cold air return ductwork, and no supply ductwork, which is what you are kind of suggesting. With a full setup, it is recommended to put the fans on the warm side and use "duct fans"

I will let you know if I try it, but it will probably be a while, kind of busy with other things. This is all great fun, and the stove itself is amazing.

Mark

Mark,
You can't hook up different fans to the coal trol. It receives different information from the fans, and it will screw up the coal trol. All fans must be the same watts and amps.
Jerry

Jerry, could you explain further. If you cannot hook up different fans, wouldn't that also mean you can not remove the fans.
The fans are not like some computer fans that has an extra wire to transmit fan speed information. What feedback does the coal-trol receive from the fans, and how is the information transmitted.

Thank you
Don

The Coal-trol will not be able to speed control two or more fans of different type on the same output plug. If you only have one motor hooked up to the convection output, it will be fine. But when you have two or more (such as with the Pocono or HyFire) the fans must be of exactly the same type: same wattage, same current rating, same size, same motors, etc. If they are different then what can happen is that the while one is drawing no current during a cycle of power the other may well still be drawing current, which will cause our convection control circuit to get locked open. It shouldn't damage the circuit if this happens, you'll just have to unplug the offending motors.

Yeah, I understand I should only use 1 kind of fan in the Coaltrol, and if I wanted to use two types, one of those types will need to be controled independently of the Coaltrol. The 265cfm blowers that it comes with produce quite a powerful stream of air, I guess I am exploring the possibility of using them, because they are so good. I kind of wonder if inline duct fans will be as good as these babys can. But, with the duct fans I can wash the stove on all three sides as the air jacket is designed. I should probably just get three duct fans, remove the blowers and and try it. And if I wont to mess with my return idea, I could put the right duct fan back in and control it with a seperate thermostat, but who knows, the duct fans might create enough suction on their own for the return. Any comments on duct fans vs blowers. My previous experience with a cheap 6" duct fan on a different stove produces a weak flow of air.

What goes out the end has to come from somewhere! I think you would be able to craft a return to take air from where ever. It doesn't take much to set up that loop of air flow as long as where you are puling from is a cool spot.

Sounds to me that your best bet will be to use the identical duct fans and make use of the excellent control the Coal-Trol provides. Although it will shut off the duct fans once the stove is idling for a while (Tstat not calling for heat). You may want to have one of the duct fans run all the time (maybe the one that is furthest away from the Tstat) just to take advantage of the heat that will always be coming off the stove.

Enjoy the science project.