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16

General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Turning a indoor forced air wood stove into a mobile outdoor stove

« on: January 16, 2016, 11:20:51 AM »

Am in the early planning stages of using a out of service indoor forced air wood stove to heat a detached garage. The furnace is already taken out of the house and in storage in a shed. I was thinking of making a metal pallet for the stove to sit on, making a full enclosure or just a roof over it to keep blowing snow and rain off it and running the air duct through one of the windows in the garage. This whole setup would only be in place for the winter. Come spring, detach the air duct, take down the chimney and disconnect the wires, put the forks on the tractor and wheel the stove away for storage.

It would only be fired up on weekends when working in the garage.

Could possibly be powered with a extension cord which would make shutdown after weekend use and come spring easy.

Would the heat duct need to be insulated, or would the air be moving through there fast enough? If I recall the duct on the top of the stove is probably 20-24" diameter.

Is there going to be condensation issues?

The stove should be way oversized for the area its heating, it went from heating a 1200 sq ft. house with basement to a insulated area 24x28.

Anything else that may be problematic?

17

Heatmor / Re: VERY PLEASED with the Purchase of my 400 so far!!!

« on: January 08, 2016, 11:32:19 AM »

Love my stove too, only issue here was that the flapper would stick open or closed from burning too wet of wood, or having too much of a differential for warmer weather. I've noticed too that it seems to be more efficient when temps are under 30, doesn't make sense to me. What was your aquastat issue? Curious as my 4 thermometers never show above 160, yet its supposed to be a 180 degree aquastat in the stove (2 year old heatmor 200). 1 thermometer on the front of the boiler, one on supply line, one on return, and 1 on the indoor fuel oil boiler thats in different water than the OWB.

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Heatmor / Re: Restrictor Tube

« on: December 02, 2015, 09:17:53 PM »

This time of  year with lows in the 20s and highs around 40 I keep the firebox pretty empty, just incase the flapper door does decide to stick open it will be that much less wood to burn out of control. I've been trying to load the wood in a U shape. put the coals/unburned stuff in the middle and stack the fresh load of wood on each side of it going up the sides a little ways. My theory was that then the flame could shoot strait up and heat up the metal of the firebox rather than needing to burn through the wood, or around it. Then as the old coals/wood that was over the grates burned up in theory the side round wood would roll into the grate area. Just something trying the past few days.

I did stick last years wood with a tester from the neighbors, can't recall what it was, maybe in the 20's. What is moisture content should a person shoot for?

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Heatmor / Re: Restrictor Tube

« on: December 02, 2015, 03:33:15 PM »

My 200 is 2 or 3 years old, not sure if they would have changed something in that short of time or not. Is there any rhyme or reason as to where or how creosote builds up, such as by an air leek? How dry is your wood? Wood I'm using (birch) was cut down 2 years ago, but not cut up into stove length till this fall, only time I split it is if I doesn't fit through the door opening. Plus once in awhile trees that were just cut this fall mix in, I'm guessing the main reason for my creosote buildup is wet wood.

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Heatmor / Re: Restrictor Tube

« on: December 01, 2015, 06:55:01 AM »

On mine it appears that creosote builts up in the fan area just like it does in the rest of the firebox. I don't know if what was in the bottom of the cavity is from what falls off of the fan and fan tube or if it builds there naturally.

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Heatmor / Re: Restrictor Tube

« on: November 26, 2015, 08:26:27 AM »

A little off topic, but in that same area of the boil as the tube, does your boiler have a cavity between the fire box and the outer plate that the fan housing bolts to? On my 200 if I remove the fan and stick my arm in the hole the fan came out of, there is a maybe 3" deep cavity. Last fall this was probably a 1/4 full of creosote. Am wondering if holding ash/creosote in this area could rust it out quicker? I don't see any easy way to clean it out, it was such a bad angle trying to bend my arm in the right direction to stick it in there and a get a scoop of creosote, plus some of it was hard so had a chunk of wood or screw driver trying to chisel it out, wasn't a fun project.

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Re: Differential settings in mild weather

« on: November 25, 2015, 02:53:40 PM »

Having it burn less often makes less creosote? I have my diff at 5 still and temps today were in the high 30's. The flapper door stuck shut because it didn't come on enough times during the day. Got home, the fan was on, and just a whiff of smoke was coming out the stack, figured something was up, it appears that black liquid creosote ran down between the flapper and where the flapper rests, hardened up, even when the fan came on it couldn't push it open.

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Re: Differential settings in mild weather

« on: November 20, 2015, 06:49:42 AM »

First winter last year on my heatmor 200. I started out using scrap wood ( unsplit birch and balsam) that had been laying around for probably 3 years. It was border line to use as it was almost rot. With in the first two weeks of running the flapper door stuck open from all the creosote built up on it, didn't loose any water, but it did get hotter than the normal cut off temp. Every week or two I'd take the fan out and make sure creosote wasn't getting built up on it, sometimes it would, sometimes not. Could tell when buildup was happening... when the light switch was turned off a "tink" could be heard as the fan shut off and the flapper closed. If that noise couldn't be heard it usually meant something was up.  I didn't mess with the differental until spring last year and brought it down to 5 hoping that more frequent firings would help keep the creosote scraped off the flapper and flapper hinge area. I think it did help. Its still set at 5 but when high temps are in the 20s F will put it back to 15.

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Electronics / Re: Cold in house, honeywell V8043F1036 zone valve may have quit working

« on: October 19, 2015, 09:35:13 PM »

The alignment was correct as it slipped all the way on until the dowel pins came through the two holes I guess is how to explain it. Your new one works with no issues?

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Electronics / Re: Cold in house, honeywell V8043F1036 zone valve may have quit working

« on: October 19, 2015, 07:11:24 PM »

When the whole electronic part is removed from the mechanical valve, the mechanical valve does move by hand. Its when the two pieces were separated I tried moving the lever on the electrical part of the zone valve to open it manually and the teeth on the gears would slip because the shaft wasn't in the hole to help support the mechanism. Since the teeth slipped I don't know if they need to be "timed" like timing on a gas engine, or if the motor in the zone valve will keep trying to open it until it hits the end switch.

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Electronics / Re: Cold in house, honeywell V8043F1036 zone valve may have quit working

« on: October 19, 2015, 03:57:16 PM »

Switched two zone valves and the first time turning up the non working zone's tstat the stopper arm didn't even get close to end switch, so there was no clicks or noise at all, tried the other zones tstat and it worked just fine, went back to the original non working tstat and it worked.

Is there anyway to verify that the valve inside the copper is opening all the way. When I had one valve off I was moving the manual lever on it and the gears would strip out because it wasn't being supported by the shaft. Not sure if these need to be timed like a gas engine or not?

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Electronics / Re: Cold in house, honeywell V8043F1036 zone valve may have quit working

« on: October 19, 2015, 02:32:15 PM »

Took the two screws out that holds the body to the valve, looked things over and didn't see anything wrong. Put it back on and turned up the tstat. Boiler came on just fine and heated up from 60 degrees to 190 without shutting off. Tried the tstat off then on again and it worked, but inside the aquastat relay on the front of the boiler it clicks two times very quickly before it turns on and fires, none of the other zones make the aquastat relay do this.

I'm really procrastinating removing all the wires on each of the valves to troubleshoot for fear of not putting it back the way it was, but guess thats the next step.

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Electronics / Re: Cold in house, honeywell V8043F1036 zone valve may have quit working

« on: October 18, 2015, 09:36:57 PM »

Cutting on the wood pile all day so didn't get a chance to look at this other than try turning up the bad t-stat this morning and it fired up the boiler a couple seconds, then it quit by its self.

Being an intermittent issue should I still swap out zone valve parts with the known good one from the living room valve or does the problem lie elsewhere?

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Electronics / Re: Cold in house, honeywell V8043F1036 zone valve may have quit working

« on: October 18, 2015, 06:35:19 AM »

After a little more messing around with it, when the problematic thermostat is turned up the zone valve opens and only sometimes does the aquastat relay on the front of the boiler make a click, other times it will not. Would getting a video of this happening help troubleshoot at all?

The other zone kept the house warm all night.

Update: tried turning up the thermostat, boiler started for maybe two seconds then quit on its own

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Electronics / Re: Cold in house, honeywell V8043F1036 zone valve may have quit working

« on: October 17, 2015, 05:05:26 PM »

Sounds good and thanks for the info. I've had the heat on maybe a total of 3 times this fall on that zone that's having the issue and it has worked good so far, but that doesn't mean something didn't break. When I was watching the valve open I tried pushing on it with my finger after the motor quit moving it and it didn't want to go any further. Might get some time to mess with it tomorrow.