Back in Black

well, after spending all winter paying propane bills to heat with, I found and picked up
a used Channing 3. I had burned with a Harman 3 for 8 years, but moved a year ago to this
house with no masonry chimney or means to vent the Harman, so I left it in the other house.
Last weekend I picked up this channing, and will install it over the summer for next year.
I will be putting it into the basement, it is direct vent, and attempt to connect the
stove into the home's forced air furnace system to use the fan in the furnace to distribute
the heat.
i will post more on that later, but I did start the stove yesterday to see how it ran. before i
did, I replaced the hopper gasket , but everything really looks to be in great condition with
this stove.
a few questions
the gasket that was under the hopper had an extra length (making it double) on the stove
side of the housing. there seems to be a 1/4 inch recess in that area, where the hopper sits.
i ended up putting a strip of gasket there first, then put gasket around the entire area of
the opening. upon further review, I bet the gasket could be put on the bottom of the hopper,
with it's adhesive tape, but, it wasn't like that when I took it apart.
so after I changed the gasket, I stuck a drop light into the bottom of the hopper, and I could
see a few areas where I saw light, but pushing the gasket a bit seemed to close off most of
the gaps. it just doesn't seem like a nice machined fit, maybe a double row of gasket would help?

2nd, it took me a while to light the stove, I didn't read here like I should have, but I have a friend
with a similar stove and I found out that I wasn't piling new coal ontop of my starter fire, hoping
it would catch being next to the charcoal I was using. after I realized that, and moved my starting
fire up the grate a bit more, I finally started to get the coal running and soon had a nice burning
bed of coal.
here are some pictures of the stove, and gasket job.
great to be back in black!

here are a few pictures

and a few more, including some with the stove going.

Nice job and congratulations.

Had a few minutes last nite to try to light the stove again, and this time I used the
little bag of charcoal (prior owner gave me 3) and a few briquettes of regular
charcoal, then covered the bag with rice coal the best I could,, lit it with my
torch while the combustion fan was running, and within 5 mins I had a glowing
bed of coal burning!

Everything seems to run great with the stove. I let it run for about an hour,
and then shut it down, will clean it out and put it aside until I get the room
in my basement ready for it over the summer.

tons of great tips to start a stoker here, really is a piece of cake!

my goal was to start the stove by thanksgiving, but i'm a day late!
fall was busy at work, and I took 2 weeks of vacation earlier in November,
so I put off this stove install longer than I had anticipated.
but, today I finally got the vent pipe in and started the stove!
i had to take down a wall, and then a section of sheetrock that
was against the basement wall, and I put the stove in the basement
as hoped. direct vent with 2 90's out to the stainless termination
cap that came with the stove.
i started it and it seems to be running fine. sure brought the basement
temps up quick!
as the afternoon went on, I noticed the burn pattern seemed to be more
of a "V" than a smile, so I will watch that close over the weekend. I did
see a few burning coals drop off the chute, but, I was tinkering with the stove
and may have bumped it a bit causing things to jostle a little.
i am running on 2 setting for now, and will see how that goes. tomorrow I hope to
finish installing a heat duct tie in into my furnace cold air return (which is just above
where I put the stove). my goal is to run the alaska fan and furnace fan continually to circulate
the heat thru the house,, esp the bathrooms at the ends of the house and a bedroom
on the 2nd floor.

Looks real good dutch:) Nice job.

thanks Fred
i did get some vent pipe going into the furnace cold air return, and we
ran the furnace fan all weekend, what a difference in the house, it kept
all of the house at a much more even temp! I had the stove on 2.5 friday nite, (lows
were near zero) but burned a whole hopper of coal in a day, and it seemed to be burning quite hot.
i have been reading here about all of the calibration issues with the controller, and will be
trying to get that figured out. we have since had the setting down between 1.25 and
1.75 on the dial, and things are better, it should save on some coal.
i'll take some pics of my tie into the cold air later and post those.

here are a couple quick pics of the hookup to the cold air duct. still need to
get a proper collar for the stove top, but it works!

Way to move the heat!!

Just curious how close to the drywall paper that duct is? I have metal duct on the stoker in the workshop and I made sure to leave an air gap of about 2" between it and the ceiling drywall because of how hot it got.

the duct was much hotter than my exhaust flue pipe.

i looked at that wall, and the pipe is about 2" from it. I can do a few things
there if I need to, it will be above a drop ceiling.

the stove is running fine, the house is very comfortable, we like
it around 70-72. our bedroom is above where the stove is, we have
all heat ducts shut off there, and it still gets warm enough that
SO ends up opening a window at night while we are sleeping.
i don't mind as we don't like it too warm there.

the 2 bathrooms are warm, not hot, but warm, and the
upstairs bedroom is much more comfortable than it used to be,
having continuous airflow with the furnace fan really makes things
comfortable.

i have the stove dialed down now, temps are going to be in the
40 range during the day and 20-30 at nite this week, so not all that cold, and
i am between 1 and 1.25 on the alaska control dial. as we get colder,
i'll have to dial up to 2 or so. it looked like 2.5 would be too much (used it
friday nite as we went to single digits) and a few hot coals would drop
into the ash pan.
so far so good!
paid my propane bill today and hope to not have another fill up till spring!!!!

Hey - I recognize that door there!

Nice job. just curious do you have a power vent or is this a direct vent? If its a direct vent (blower) does it have enough power (ass) to keep good vacuum? (-.02, -.04). I also have a channig 3 with a power vent. My stove is in the basement, (ranch house) and I put a 7" cold air return from furthest bedroom upstairs back to stove and hooked it up tp convection blower on stove. I also hooked up a 350 scfm booster blower prior to covection blower at stove (265 scfms). And I also have feed control at about almost 1 to maybe 1.25 on feed controller. I am running -.04 (manometer, baro damper).

Good job! I like how you figured out how to get the heat where it needs to be. I like the looks of that stove. They're sweet!

One thing..... did you set the draft with a manometer? It's possible with a direct vent to have it pull too much draft. That will waste fuel. If it calls for a .04 draft & you unknowingly have it pulling .07 the only result is wasted heat up the chimney. If you can I'd see about getting or borrowing a manometer & checking draft.