Author Topic: New E-Classic owner (Read 9528 times)

stumper · « **Reply #20 on:** December 18, 2009, 05:54:54 pm »

I have cut my wood the length of my Husky 372 for years. I think that it is 18 to 19 inches but I am not good with lengths. I have spent so many years lying to my wife I am starting to beleive it.

I will say you dont skimp. I also installed underdrain below my thermopex as I did not want any water near the pipe. I just put wire in my slab, but your rebar will do the trick.

ken999 · « **Reply #21 on:** December 18, 2009, 11:40:48 pm »

Haha...yeah...I've been purposely misleading my better half for years too...

I take it you are loading in between the airholes on the sides without blocking the flow? I'm not sure I can load my 2ft'ers that way without causing trouble. I'm holding the wood towards the door in hopes that I at least keep the back inlets open. Our stove seems to burn from the front as others have noted, so I'm still getting a gob of 'stuff' in the back 1/4 of the firebox...more than I'd like to see anyways.

Tomorrow, I'd like to get things burned way down and give the boiler a good scraping and cleaning.

Got the mother of all fireballs this afternoon...phew...worst one yet...thought of you when I did it.

Managed to keep my eyebrows though, so I didn't score too many bonus points.

I must have looked like the former President Bush ducking a hurled shoe when that baby came screaming out at me...kinda glad my wife didn't see that one.

rpote · « **Reply #22 on:** December 19, 2009, 12:52:53 am »

On my EC2300 I found the scraper works well to clear along the side holes each time before I fill it. I get the back ones when the wood burns down and there is not much in the firebox. Otherwise, I just keep the side holes clear. Sometimes I'll poke thru the ash bed if I don't hear the "roar" of the combustion chamber indicating gasification is going on. Shortly after I do this, I get rapid temperature increases and the boiler performs well.

I think you'll develop techniques that work for you and eventually settle into a pattern that works to keep your boiler working up to your expectations. I find mine only takes about 10 minutes per day of my time to check it, scrape the ashes away from the holes, load the wood and close it up. About every 2 weeks I clean out the ashes and monthly pull the tubulators and clean the "flour" ash out of the back side near the stack. This seems to be the ticket for good operation on my unit. Probably every one of these things is a bit different. I also find that if the temperature drops a lot (when really cold and heat load in house is high), I sometimes find turning the wood ignition gas on for 30 minutes jump starts the wood in the fire box and brings up to temperature quicker - I also sometimes turn on the gas backup in the reaction chamber if I am in a hurry to bring up temperature. Works well - you can run both burners at the same time, but the lower burner is a propane hog so not much on that one.

Good luck. Let me know if I can be of help in any way.

Highlander · « **Reply #23 on:** December 19, 2009, 07:26:26 am »

Im with rpote, i just scrape the side holes everyday with an ice scraper and dont worry about the back holes until the wood load really burns down. I load my stove side to side, i guess my wood is about 20 inches long and i have no bridging problems whatsoever. I also found that when i clean the stove i open both the reaction chamber and the turbulater doors because when you clean the turbulators you put all kinds of ash down into the reaction chamber. So i clean the turbs first then the reaction chamber. As much as i have tried to not have the stove smoke it still does. Sometime alot, sometimes not at all, but i still feel its 200 percent better than the smoke that use to come out my chimney when i was burning inside.

ken999 · « **Reply #24 on:** December 19, 2009, 09:35:09 am »

Things are looking a bit better the last couple of days. I've been loading the heck out of it and letting the wood get good and dry in the stove before it get's down to the coal bed. This seemed to have helped all the way around. I get more coals, the wood is dryer when it gets to the coal bed, all I have to do is knock it around on occasion. I'm still geting a bit of bridging, mostly with the pine. Alot of that split kinda funny with the limb knots, so the majority of it has an irregular shape.

Today will finish up the 9' x 4.5' row of 2' wood I started on the 14th. 2/3rd's of that was pine. I was going to work around that pine mixing it in some with the 3 rows behind it, but the more I thought about it the more of a PITA that was looking to be, so I've just split it real fine and dealt with it. Not too bad...6 days, 6/10th's of a chord. We've been below 0 the last 2 nights, with the first part of the week being pretty chilly to, so we've had a pretty good heat load.

Up next, a row of SOLID maple, no pine. Behind that are 2 rows of mostly oak.

The one thing we did notice this week with the cold weather was we couldn't push the programmable t-stat above 71 for some reason. Our t-stat was 2 modes, weekdays and weekends, with 4 programming periods, morning, daytime, evening and night. We had is set to jump up to 75 in the AM before we get up and evenings before we get home. The first floor is mostly open and 830 sq ft. We've got 48' of 3/4" baseboard, fed by a 007 Taco. The boiler is set at 185.

Any thoughts?

I'm thinking that we have hit the limit of what our FF is capable of and I need to bump the basement zone up 5 degrees to help with the FF.

JJ · « **Reply #25 on:** December 19, 2009, 10:17:46 am »

Hi Ken,
I snap a picture of my boiler running, with only little steam cause it is 2 degrees outside when photo is taken.

When it is warmer out, I hardly see any steam.

Logs I am using are 20" long, so I do not load any cross wise.
For advoiding bridging, I do not overload firebox, and load the wood with bark down (so logs roll little). I also do not load firebox wall to wall, but stack up towards one side, or other. try to avoid interlocking the logs when loading, and I do not load against back or front of firebox, staying in middle over reaction chamber (without blocking with new wood) which I think lets air move better.

I think a little more time and you will get the hang of it.

JJ

Highlander · « **Reply #26 on:** December 19, 2009, 11:26:05 am »

ken, i run a 009 taco pump at 120 feet away from the house. How far is the owb from the house? Are you pushing enough volume with the 007?

ken999 · « **Reply #27 on:** December 19, 2009, 01:03:13 pm »

JJ- My smoke looks alot like that. Very reasonable and it certainly thickens up when I pull the bypass. I just got back from town and the boiler was looking pretty good when I left...ditto when I got home...'course I had to go out and fiddle with it

. I had stuffed it full of pine for the day and things looked real good inside. The load seems to be sliding down correctly as it burns. Nice. Pulling the bypass produced thick grey smoke, closing it cleared it back up pretty good for a foot or so above the pipe.

Funny thing is, I closed it back up, as it was calling for heat and started back for the house. I looked over my shoulder and there was NOTHING!!...just heat waves. Then after 10 seconds the steam/smoke slowly builds back in and it looks 'normal'.

Hhhhmmmm.....

I walked back over and pulled the bypass...the smoke rolls, I open the door and let the fire climb back up again in the box, then shut it and close it back down. I step back and watch while the residual bypass smoke clears, followed by SUPER clear heat waves for 10 seconds, then slow build up of steam/smoke until it normalizes again.

I do this two or three more times until I'm satisfied that it's not a fluke and sure enough every time, I can get the perfect exhaust, but only for a few seconds.

I'm beginning to think that this thing is starting to enjoy screwing with my head...

...

I wonder if I'm lacking enough air for complete combustion???...thoughts?? I've already set the Primary solenoid air up to the top holes in the back of the boiler. I've got just a hair over 3/4" when open.

Highlander- The 007 is downstairs, one for each zone, I've got an 009 or 011 onoutside on the boiler.

I think alot of my temp issue is due to the programmable t-stat only cycling 6 times an hour. I don't feel that is enough to hit the temp we had it set for. There is an Override mode which should let us call for constant cycling. That should certainly help. The other thing I want to try is bringing my 'set-back' temps up a few degrees, not letting the house cool as much in between the jump up cycles.

dva · « **Reply #28 on:** December 19, 2009, 02:14:51 pm »

Here's a video of the eClassic working properly.

Dave

MudBud · « **Reply #29 on:** December 19, 2009, 03:01:48 pm »

Today I burned up a main door gasket on the hinge side. While doing some work around the unit and cleaning out the reaction chamber the door was open. The fire inside started with the extra air and was roaring pretty good. I then noticed some creosote on the main door was smoldering, then I noticed that I could smell rubber, it was the gasket as the fire was roaring. Closed the door and can't get a good seal in the area. Opened up the door and the area of the gasket where its allowing smoke to escape is now white. I tried adjusting the door camlocks and no luck. Time to order another one.

ken999 · « **Reply #30 on:** December 20, 2009, 07:58:27 am »

That's what I'm looking for Dave!

Is that your boiler?

firechief · « **Reply #31 on:** December 20, 2009, 09:15:55 am »

Nice video Dave, that's how this boiler should work !!

Jim

ken999 · « **Reply #32 on:** December 20, 2009, 09:43:24 am »

Just loaded the stove at 9:00. I packed it right full of hardwood, it'll be interesting to see what kind of burn time I get out of this load. Up coming temps for the week look cool, but not too bad. These next few weeks will give me a real good check on my hardwood use/performance. I'm not going to burn any pine until I burn up these next few rows of hardwood. We are headed right into the meat of the heating season, so tracking/documenting things over the course of the next month or so will help me better plan for next winter.

dva · « **Reply #33 on:** December 20, 2009, 02:21:12 pm »

Yes, that's my 2300.

Dave

ken999 · « **Reply #34 on:** December 20, 2009, 07:24:00 pm »

10 hours into the load and it looks like 24 hrs will be no problem. I've been gone all day and just checked it a few minutes ago...the load has settled a foot or so...there's lots left for the night. It's still smoking a bit when the blower kicks on and the 'opening the door' trick doesn't seem to temporarily clear things up like yesterday, so I'm not sure more air will be the answer.

I think my stove is one of the 'phase II' stoves with 2 rods on the top of the Fusion chamber. I noticed the middle solenoid was open on the low burn. Where does this air go? Firebox? Reaction chamber?

Tomorrow I'll clean the turb's and the Reaction chamber to see if that cleans things up a little.

superwd6 · « **Reply #35 on:** December 20, 2009, 09:57:09 pm »

KEN999 your thermostat will run steady ON when you have a 4 degree differential between set and room temp. the 6 times an hour cycle only kicks in at matching numbers. Most have a smart setting now that cycles the stat OFF as it approaches the set temp , say 75 setting 74 room so the stat doesn't overheat the home. I think you have other issues. Did you put rads in for the boiler or a heat exchanger set up from an exsisting boiler in the house. 185 boiler temp will only give you around 165 after heat exchanger witch cuts radiator BTU output in half.
I find my e classic burns the cleanest when I stop playing with it

ken999 · « **Reply #36 on:** December 21, 2009, 07:09:35 am »

superwd6 - That is what I was thinking on the t-stat cycles. I still couldn't raise the house above 73 even when I locked a temp in. I'll monkey with it more when it gets cold again, but I think I'll need to crank up the heat in the basement to bring the first floor temps up as it appears that 48' of baseboard isn't quite enough. I have the boiler hook directly into my furnace downstairs, no heat exchanger.

What kind of temp drop should I see in the basement between the supply and return line?

I had plenty of wood left in the boiler this AM...the boiler probably would have made 30-36 hrs with our current temps.

ken999 · « **Reply #37 on:** December 21, 2009, 06:41:36 pm »

Lotsa smoke tonight when I got home from work and went to load it...I cleaned the RC, checked the turbs...I noticed more smoke than usual when all shut down, so I scraped what I could off the bypass flue from the loading door side. It looked a little better a few minutes ago, no smoke while idling. I'm letting it burn down some more before I put anymore wood on it for the night.

Just when I think I'm getting somewhere with this thing

...

ken999 · « **Reply #38 on:** December 22, 2009, 06:03:12 am »

Things look better this AM. I think there were too many coal from overloading it Sunday.

Looks to me like both the stove and I will be much happier sticking to the 2x a day loading schedule.

ken999 · « **Reply #39 on:** December 22, 2009, 09:08:36 pm »

Yup...too much coals.

Came home tonight to the stove running and perfectly clear stack. It's getting to be a ritual, pulling in the driveway and looking to see what temp the stove is at. Today it was at 181 and I thought...

"Good it should be coming on soon and I'll get to see if it is STILL smoking."

I cocked and ear and hopped out of the truck to be welcomed be the sound of the fan.

Saaweet!!....

.... It was ALREADY running...

I opened her up and saw a substantial bed of coals so I let it run until 7:30 or so....figgered I better let the coals burn down as much as I could before the nightly loading. I went out and rooted around BIG TIME in the firebox with my custom bent 5/8" rebar hook, as the back was caked in pretty good. I made good and sure the back airholes were open and the air was free flowing before I put another charge in it. I've got a bit of oak mixed in this row, which I thought was all maple.

Just for grins I measured the load in the wheelburrow before I loaded it. 22"W x 23"L x 12" D. That is a level load in my WB. The weather looks like it is going to warm up a tick until the first part of next week, so I'm going to just load that amount 2x a day and see what happens.

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Author Topic: New E-Classic owner (Read 9528 times)