New guy with an Alaska.

xracer390 · Post by **xracer390** » Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 10:25 am

Running a power direct vent straight out through the wall I can feel it sucking air when I open the door.

Pauliewog wrote: ↑
Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 10:14 am
Did you set your barometric damper with a manometer?

On that Alaska you should be reading a negative .04 inside the stove.

Can you post pictures of your
chimney?

Looking at the pic of when the fire went out, it appears you had adequate feed and air.

I have an Alaska 140 with two feeders the same style as yours. I run the second feeder when the OAT drops into the single digits. Your picture is exactly what my second feeder looks like when the OAT is in the double digits and I unplug it .

Is it possible you have a slightly positive pressure in the firebox and its starving for oxygen ?

Paulie

Spacecadet · Post by **Spacecadet** » Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 2:25 pm

xracer390 wrote: ↑
Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 7:25 am
I pretty much took the stove and fans apart 100% and cleaned it.
That is how I have mine wired.
Your exhaust fan is plugged straight into an outlet?
The plug your blower motor is plugged into is 120 v right?
Seems to be plenty of air through the coal and the holes were cleaned 100%

Mine came with an exhaust fan but I don’t use it. I don’t need it. I have a chimney and I don’t need to direct vent mine out the wall.
I have 6” pipe out the back and up past the baro and it continues into a stainless double wall insulated chimney that runs 4 feet above the peak of my garage.

xracer390 · Post by **xracer390** » Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 6:14 pm

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She's running now and I think maybe the controller is goofy. If I turn it CCW it goes well past 1. If I turn it CW it goes dam near around to 1 again. I found another thread about how long the feeder will run at what settings and I took my knob of and adjusted it accordingly.

xracer390 · Post by **xracer390** » Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 6:16 pm

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I guess what I'm saying is when I thought I was on 3 or 4 it was probably too low. This is my new 3.

Spacecadet · Post by **Spacecadet** » Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 8:44 pm

xracer390 wrote: ↑
Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 6:14 pm
20210112_170927.jpgShe's running now and I think maybe the controller is goofy. If I turn it CCW it goes well past 1. If I turn it CW it goes dam near around to 1 again. I found another thread about how long the feeder will run at what settings and I took my knob of and adjusted it accordingly.

Awesome. I didn’t know the knob was adjustable. Glad you got it figured out.

xracer390 · Post by **xracer390** » Wed. Jan. 13, 2021 9:07 am

IDK about adjustable. I just took out the set screw and turned it.
So what's the best way to shut one of these stoves down?

Spacecadet wrote: ↑
Tue. Jan. 12, 2021 8:44 pm
Awesome. I didn’t know the knob was adjustable. Glad you got it figured out.

WNY · Post by **WNY** » Wed. Jan. 13, 2021 5:22 pm

Glad you got it working, I figured it was something with feeding correctly or not enough to keep it going.

To Shutdown, just unplug it. it'll go out pretty quick, may stay hot deep down inside for a while, but with no combustion air to the coal , it will burn itself out. approx 30mins-1hr or so should be good. just don't dig into coal grate with your hands, it still could be pretty warm deep down in the burn grate. if in doubt, leave it off overnight.

xracer390 · Post by **xracer390** » Wed. Jan. 13, 2021 9:58 pm

Got this stove from my brother in law and he said the same thing, just unplug it. I did that last night and was still working on the shop to keep an eye on it. The fire traveled way up towards the hopper still glowing bright red. I ended up pulling the hot coals down into the ash pan. I did still have the exhaust fan on because it was glowing so hot.

WNY wrote: ↑
Wed. Jan. 13, 2021 5:22 pm
Glad you got it working, I figured it was something with feeding correctly or not enough to keep it going.

To Shutdown, just unplug it. it'll go out pretty quick, may stay hot deep down inside for a while, but with no combustion air to the coal , it will burn itself out. approx 30mins-1hr or so should be good. just don't dig into coal grate with your hands, it still could be pretty warm deep down in the burn grate. if in doubt, leave it off overnight.

WNY · Post by **WNY** » Thu. Jan. 14, 2021 5:45 pm

Thats is why shutting it completely down. It'll go out. Leaving the exhaust blower on, it pulled air thru your hopper and made it burn back farther. just unplug everything, what little fumes are left will dissapate thru the exhaust pipe. might take a little bit, but should got out pretty quick.

I've never had a problem. Just make sure you have good working CO detectors. Mine usually runs 24/7 from about Nov to April.
except for occasial cleaning, sometimes, I can vacuum it out and blow it out while running. sometimes.

Spacecadet · Post by **Spacecadet** » Thu. Jan. 14, 2021 7:21 pm

xracer390 wrote: ↑
Wed. Jan. 13, 2021 9:07 am
IDK about adjustable. I just took out the set screw and turned it.
So what's the best way to shut one of these stoves down?

Just un plug it. The fire will go out itself. If you leave the exhaust fan on it will suck air through the hopper which could lead the fire to burn back into the hopper. Unplugging the all will eliminate that. The coal will go out. It may take up to 30 minutes. There’s only a cup or so of coal burning on the grate. When you shut it down it may stink in your room. Because the smoke / burned fumes will have to go somewhere. If you had a conventional chimney it would draft it self out.
Since it’s in your garage or shop - like mine is I don’t worry about it stinking.

xracer390 · Post by **xracer390** » Fri. Jan. 15, 2021 6:26 pm

I know there are a lot of variables but anyone have a picture of a minimum burn? How low can you go? Without it going out.

xracer390 · Post by **xracer390** » Fri. Jan. 15, 2021 7:17 pm

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I guess a better question is does this look like the flame is to far back? I have it turned down quite a bit. Doesn't even look like the coals are burning over the holes??

nepacoal · Post by **nepacoal** » Fri. Jan. 15, 2021 7:25 pm

If that was a keystoker, it would be a hopper fire and would have likely already melted the nylon screws and feed motor puck. I think you better increase your feed to make sure the fire stays over the air holes

nepacoal · Post by **nepacoal** » Fri. Jan. 15, 2021 7:35 pm

Not an Alaska, but here's my keystoker at idle. For most stoves you should have several inches of fresh coal, then 1 to 2 inches of burning coal, then all ash during long idle periods.

nepacoal · Post by **nepacoal** » Fri. Jan. 15, 2021 7:54 pm

As mentioned in previous posts, you should be setting your power vent with a manometer and then setting your over fire air also using a manometer. Hopper fires are much more common when using power vents and using a manometer to adjust air settings helps prevent them

New guy with an Alaska.

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