most efficient way to burn wood?

[Lawless]

It is really exciting to see my wife and daughter learning how to tend a fire and keep the house toasty.

Today I'm working downstairs in the basement, the wife is working upstairs by the fire. I told her to just text me when the fire is getting low and I'll come restock it. She said something along the lines of "I've watched you enough, I know what needs to be done". Guess my work is done now... once I get her to gather/split/stack all the wood!

Let me know if you can get them to process firewood.....LOL

 

[Rode Hard and Put Up Wet]

This is such a great thread. I have never had wood stoves before. Grew up with a fireplace, but never really used it as an EFFICIENT heat source. It was mostly to set a mood or stare into for hours while in an altered state of consciousness.

We have an old EFEL stove which is amazingly efficient. It will heat the whole house (and this is over 3200 square feet, where we are). The damper system is just way way cool. We also have another one in the living room which has been running constantly the past few days. It has no dampers (other than adjusting the doors) but still puts out a surprising amount of heat.

I am always astounded at the huge variety of topics about which I know zero, zip, zilch, nada.

I sometimes get discouraged at all the stuff there is to know and think. "if the grid went down, I might as well just off myself, as I am going to die a slow, excruciating IGNORANT death anyway".... Would not really do that, but the amount of respect grows daily that I have for people who actually know how to do stuff, rather than depend on a network of people to supply services.

It is really exciting to see my wife and daughter learning how to tend a fire and keep the house toasty.

it is a Kamina. No catalytic converter nor recirculation stuff. Still an amazing product. Hard to believe people who gave us such a superior instrument could also give us the EURO, but there ya go.

 

[Don]

Before and after a 12-13hr burn from last night to this morning.
With an average Cat temp of 1000F and blowers at about 75%.
Oak wood.

Notice the air channel at the bottom of the stack in the first picture so that the fire can draw air from the inlet control. If you've got a side loader, you need to do the same thing. It's not as important if you have a stove with grates in it that draws up through the grates. If it doesn't draw through the grates, you still need the air channel.

 

[Don]

This is such a great thread. I have never had wood stoves before. Grew up with a fireplace, but never really used it as an EFFICIENT heat source. It was mostly to set a mood or stare into for hours while in an altered state of consciousness.

We have an old EFEL stove which is amazingly efficient. It will heat the whole house (and this is over 3200 square feet, where we are). The damper system is just way way cool. We also have another one in the living room which has been running constantly the past few days. It has no dampers (other than adjusting the doors) but still puts out a surprising amount of heat.

I am always astounded at the huge variety of topics about which I know zero, zip, zilch, nada.

I sometimes get discouraged at all the stuff there is to know and think. "if the grid went down, I might as well just off myself, as I am going to die a slow, excruciating IGNORANT death anyway".... Would not really do that, but the amount of respect grows daily that I have for people who actually know how to do stuff, rather than depend on a network of people to supply services.

It is really exciting to see my wife and daughter learning how to tend a fire and keep the house toasty.

I've got one of those. It's nice to be able to lay the hood back and cook on the top of it.