Outdoor Wood Furnace Info
Outdoor Furnaces - Manufacturers WITH EPA-Certified Models => HeatMaster => Topic started by: lasor1 on October 08, 2012, 06:21:36 AM
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Hello I got a heatmaster mf 5000 and I just fired it up yesterday for the first time and this is my first owb and I need a little help it heats the house great and hot water! I notice before I went to bed the fire looked like it was almost out but I stoked it and it started up good again Anyway I woke up this morning to a nice warm house and I notice air was a little cooler comming out of vents so I went to check stove and temp read 130 I the thermostat I have it set at 165 with a 12 degree swing anyway I open fire box and no fire just some smoke rolling out of box it looked like it wanted to pickup again but couldn't so any suggestions on what I need to do to get this thing running smoothly. The temp was only in low 40s last night didn't know if it was taking to long between burntimes or what thanks!
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Drop your differential from 12 down to about 5 until it get colder. That should help a lot.
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Thanks yoder I will give that a try.
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Welcome to the owf family, keeping it going it warmer weather can be a pain, these things wanna make heat if you house is not calling for heat the fire will not stay lite , please there is a fine art to loading it, it is something that takes a while to get the hang of, I call it owf voodoo
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I dropped differential swing down. And is working great so far!
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What do you have your settings at? Mine died so I just set it to 30 second burst every 22 minutes
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165 8 degree swing
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U won't have that trouble once you get a bed of coals developed..
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Hopefully someone else will chime in but 165 might be low I think most of use have them set 180+ mine is at 187 seems to hit 189-190
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Hopefully someone else will chime in but 165 might be low I think most of use have them set 180+ mine is at 187 seems to hit 189-190
Ahh, heatmasters new model shuts down at 190, I don't like that but oh well... I've got a neighbor who runs is at 125 and 10 degree swing and has no trouble going out. I know he's destroying his stove and all that but u can't fix stupid sometimes lol.
His problem is most likely not having a bed of coals established, however when burning wood I'd reccomend a 175-180 with a 10 degree diff, maybe less in warm weather
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Running mine at 180 with 15 differential.
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A heatmaster going out at night??? That's weird.
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I haven't had any problems with it at 165 with diff at 8 do you recommend running it higher temp what are the pros and cons of running higher temps?
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I have run mine as low as 150 and as high as 180. Im burning green pine right now so I have my differential set at 3 because green pine is a major pain to burn during warm weather. I run the differential at 10 or 15 in normal burning during cold weather.
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I haven't had any problems with it at 165 with diff at 8 do you recommend running it higher temp what are the pros and cons of running higher temps?
Go higher, def not lower..
I was ignorant to this for a long time. If you run your stove at 150-160 and you pull off 20-30 degrees at times, your return water comes back to cold and it really impacts the life of the boiler, because, moisture from burning wood will gather on steel cooler than 140. If u have a spot on your stove where the return water is cooling the steel down to below 140, moisture will develop there, and run down into the ashes
I don't reccomend to anyone to run less than 175
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For an extra piece of wood you can sure improve the life of your boiler, how is that not worth it?
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I'm not trying to start a big argument but it seems to me that just because the return water would be 140 doesn't mean the inside of the firebox would be that cold. If the return temps are cold the furnace would kick on and the firebox would be much hotter than the water temps. And the other thing I wonder about is when the furnace isn't being used, then its cold all the time and could be sweating on cool damp days.
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Yoder if the furnace isn't being used then the there is no moisture being released by the burning of hydrocarbons, it's just a simple part of the equation, you burn wood or anything like that and the moisture has to go somewhere.
It's scientific fact that moisture will gather on steel that's cooler than 136 degrees, wille even pored some links from the candaian govt I beleive about to never slow your boiler to see temps that low..
The steel can only get as hot as the water on the other side of it, I can hold a cutting torch on a paper cup and can't burn the cup until the water jumps out of the cup.
So if you have return water coming back at 110-120 or whatever where that water encounters the firebox it makes a cool spot where moisture can gather.
Central and Empyre aren't making folks install boiler protection because they want to, it's because it's very important, they don't want to have to add cost to there products but by doing so, there protecting the boiler.
All boilers have Primary and secondary loops no matter if it's wood, gas, oil, whatever, ite been done that way for decades, the owb industry is just now catching up to that however.
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Getting technical here, me man man cold fire hot me burn make fire done
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Getting technical here, me man man cold fire hot me burn make fire done
Dont your boiler have a a thermostatic valve?
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I got mine last year it did not come with one, but my buddy got a CB a few months ago and they come with it and have to have it installed or the warranty could be voided
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I got mine last year it did not come with one, but my buddy got a CB a few months ago and they come with it and have to have it installed or the warranty could be voided
Yep all new empyre and cb gassers require it as valid warranty, it's coming to all boiler models at some point.. It's just the conventional market is a different group of buyers there looking to stay on the cheap and it's hard to push an idea that most can't grasp
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Im set at 170 w/ 15 deg swing right now been on since september 15, lows in 50s, I havent had it go out at all, but like scott said you need to get a good bed of coals. After reading this post i may go ahead and turn my temp to 175.
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I've already had a couple members email me and say hey, I moved my temp from 150-175 and now my stove is much dryer/cleaner inside. That's one of the benefits as well
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Yeah I been running mine on 175 now and it has been running great I guess I just need to get a bed of hot coals going and it has run great ever since. I thought it may have went out a time or too but if you run good seasoned wood it burns hardly any smoke only time I see it smoke is when the furnace gets up to temp and damper closes and blower shuts off I see a little cloud of smoke for a min or two the. It is barley noticed anymore. These furnaces are way more efficient than my old indoor furnace!