Morning folks,

Just had a wood burner installed yesterday. It’s an Ekol Clarity 8KW.

I’m just looking for some guidance regarding the various air controls on it. I’ve read the manual and it’s not particularly helpful!

We’ll be burning wood only.

It’s got a primary air inlet at the bottom of the door. A secondary inlet at the top (air wash) and one underneath that controls airflow to the back of it (small holes into the firebox).

It’s probably trial and error but just wondering if someone could explain when I would shut one down, open it up etc etc etc.

Cheers

Bugger wrong section of the forum, again! Mods please move it if you would be so kind

Open everything to get it going. Once all the wood is charred shut the bottom one(s). Use the top one to let in just enough air that there is a gentle (as opposed to roaring) flame. When you put more wood on open up the top one again until that wood is charred, then go low again. Getting the wood charred quickly minimises the soot build up, getting the gentle flame thereafter maximises the heat.

That’s what works on ours anyway, going by the stove thermometer and minimal amount of soot the sweep gets out. I guess every stove is different and there will be varying advice.

Haven’t a clue about the one below, but I’d assume it’s just another primary vent to get the fire going?.

Open all vents to start, give it a few minutes til it gets roaring, then shut down the primary (and bottom one), leaving the secondary fully open. Once fire settles into a good burn, use the secondary to regulate the burn – what you’re looking for is ‘secondary’ burn, ie the flame sitting just above the actual wood.

Someone once mentioned to me that it takes a good few months to get to know your stove and use it accordingly, and that is bang on. Lots of factors such as draw and how the wind direction affects your particular stove. Frinstance – I can sometimes struggle at first with a northerly wind.

Happy burning.

Is it a multi fuel? If you’re burning coal/smokeless fuel you use the bottom vent more and close off the top and vice versa for wood, this is what we were told with ours, and both vents wide open to get it started,

i’m still confused with mine after a couple of months of running it (maybe half a dozen times in that period), and it has the same vents as yours! main problem for me is that i burn stuff way too quickly, but based on the above advice that’ll be because i’m not shutting down the primary vents once it gets established. i’ll give that a go later!

It does take time to get the knack, guy at work has got one in the Autumn and he is still asking questions.

Start off by not clearing the ash from the ashpan, for wood only you can let the ashpan fill right up to the grate and just scoop out anything above the grate…wood burns best on a bed of ash. Get a cheap flue thermometer. Ensure you are using good seasoned timber.

For a cold stove, at least 4 sheets of scrunched up newspaper in the bottom with 9-12 bits of good dry kindling (currently working my way through a chopped up pine wardrobe) criss crossed over the paper. You want some nice small bits, less than 1cm across on the first layer. Unwaxed cardboard such as toilet rolls/egg boxes help, and shredded paper is also very easy to get going.

Light it up, all vents open and door cracked, the aim is to get a good amount of flame as the hot air from the fire will need to push out a plug of cold air from the chimney before it starts to draw properly. Once the kindling is burning, you might be able to shut the door, but if it smokes up keep the door open, just a crack.

After a few minutes the kindling should be alight, now time for larger kindling such as broken up pallet wood (or split down softwood). You should definitely be able to shut the door at this stage.

The key here is to get heat into the stove, its very easy to chuck on logs but you’ll find it will go out as soon as you reduce the airflow, and you won’t get much heat from the stove. If its windy outside I sometimes reduce the top/airwash vent to stop the fire trying to blow itself out.

Now small lumps of firewood are needed, but don’t swamp the flames. Partially close the bottom vent, you will get to know your stove but on mine I’ll move it from fully open to 25% open, this limits the air and allows the stove to start getting up to temperature rather than sending it all up the chimney. Flames should still be fairly lively but not roaring.

Once thats settled in, add more moderate sized firewood, shut the bottom vent (you may need to keep it cracked open a tiny bit) and fine tune the top one, I set mine to about 75% open, any less and the fire slumbers and the glass starts to blacken.

The first year I had mine, it would frustrate me that I couldn’t get a lot of heat from the stove, the problem was I was adding logs too soon, so had to leave the vents open, which meant the air just rushed through the stove and took all the heat up the chimney. Close the air, the fire would go out. If you follow the steps above and get a nice hot but relaxed fire, you can add the biggest chunks of firewood without risking it going out, the main problem being to work out what angle and orientation is required to get the huge bit of trunk through the door 🙂

With practise I can now get the stove up to temperature within 20-30 minutes, and it only needs fussing over for the first 5 minutes until the larger kindling goes on. Often you can add the small bits of firewood on top of the second bunch of kindling to speed things up.

Bring tomorrows wood into the house today too, so it has a little while to loose some moisture before you use it (assuming it’s come in from a dry, well ventilated ‘shed’ anyway).

It does take time to learn your stove – I make a lot of use of my [chimney] top vent to really slow the draw down once it’s going, but then need to leave the bottom door vents >50% open. I live on the top of a hill, and have a big volume chimney which is uncapped, so get pretty ferocious draw in anything more than a breeze. My pal lives in a sheltered river valley, and needs to work hers in a completely different way.

Hot and relaxed is a good way of describing what you are aiming for.

Wow spooky that sounds like quite a bit of a palaver. From cold my procedure is to shovel out some ash if required, then chuck in some screwed up newspaper (and other scrap), then a bit of kindling, and some logs on top. Light the paper, shut the doors with open vent and 5 mins later turn down the air a bit as required. It’s easily roaring inside 10 mins with no attention. The only time I had any problem is when I had no newspaper or similar and was trying to use shiny magazine paper instead…that doesn’t light very well from cold.

Flat out, all vents open at all times.
I may have an interest in the firewood market 😉

Blimey 4 bits of kindling. 1 firelighter, a few logs on top light her up open all the vents until its well lit and then shut them all down. The top vent only gets opened when I put more wood on. No palaver at all.

Ours is our only heating source for 9 radiators it takes about 5 minutes to light up and get going.

He makes it sound so hard been lighting mine since I was 10 goes a little something like

1. Screw up some news paper put in the bottom add some dry small crappy bits light with long matches or long stove lighter.

2. Have all vents open on doors and close the doors.

3. As the dry crappy stuff starts to really go add logs dry ones at first.

4. As fire really starts to take hold close the bottom and if needed top ones to stop it roaring.

5. Once you have some good heat coming out of it you can add greenish logs it won’t hurt and they burn slower so less need to to keep chucking more on!

Now if your really clever and you have a back boiler like on my villager 440 and you have gas combi boiler you can valve it and run your radiators off the back boiler system when the fires going and save a fair few quid over winter.

As canodale mentions above, don’t ball your newspaper to tightly allow space for airflow and stack your kinderling like a jenga game again with loads of air gaps, see my pic below 🙂

Whats with all the kindling ?

Exactly, way too much kindling, 4 bits maximum, and a couple of skinny logs on top.

There’s no hard and fast rule you’ll learn how your own stove works, as for lighting it’ll depend on the fuel your using on how much kindling you’ll need but using a good bit gives you a bed of embers which is what you want.

The whole point is using free wood, I’m not going to splash out on half a firelighter or more kindling than I can get away with 🙂 Picked up a free newspaper yesterday, that will keep me going for a while.

Buying kindling? Naaaaa!

Top tip – if you live near a beach like me, use one of those big blue idea bags or similar, and take the kids a walk after a wind like we had yesterday. Tell them it’s a game and you’ll have it filled with kindling in minutes. It dries out real quick too.

Old girl next door to me brings all the newspapers from the pensioners club, I’m never short. Daily mail seems to be the best to get a roar going. Unsurprisingly!.

Wow spooky that sounds like quite a bit of a palaver. From cold my procedure is to shovel out some ash if required, then chuck in some screwed up newspaper (and other scrap), then a bit of kindling, and some logs on top. Light the paper, shut the doors with open vent and 5 mins later turn down the air a bit as required. It’s easily roaring inside 10 mins with no attention. The only time I had any problem is when I had no newspaper or similar and was trying to use shiny magazine paper instead…that doesn’t light very well from cold.

Pretty much what I said, I was just being descriptive for the OP and Xherbi who are looking for advice, and drew attention to how to avoid common issues such as overloading it or failing to get the stove hot enough. Its basically three steps for me…light it, add some intermediate fuel, add some big fuel, and adjust the vents a couple of times.

Bookmarked for new house (hopefully!).

Well not really spooky, you talked about coming back to the stove and adding some more stuff several times. I just chuck everthing in, light it, and come back when I want to turn it down. I’ve got one of the electrowhatever fans on top which tells me when it’s up to temperature (no glass in the door so I can’t otherwise tell from a distance). No problems with overloading so long as the paper and kindling catches ok. But of course some stoves may be more temperamental. I’ve only had the one.

A new stove owner no doubt is going to come back to their stove several times, as you know there is a knack and at first they may even struggle to get the kindling going properly, loading larger stuff on top will just make it a ball ache when you realise it’s not going to plan and it goes out.

Step by step to begin with is surely the best method, I wouldn’t suggest an expert needs to follow any guide. I spend three-five minutes lighting my fire and pop back 15 minutes later to check it and reload. A lot of 5kw stoves don’t even have enough space to get a decent amount of firewood inside when the kindling and paper is stacked up.

well i think i’m doing okay lighting it, i just wanna figure out how to control the burn a bit. but today is better- this was about 5 minutes after lighting it, with the first log just gone in:

Thanks all. Some real good info!

How long are you guys getting between refuelling?

I’m probably getting 1hr – 1hr 20 at which point I’m left with just red embers. That’s with all the air controls shut down

A good couple of hours with hardwood in a 5kw stove. Softwood will go quicker. You shouldn’t have the top airwash control shut all the way, the glass will go black and you’ll suffocate the fire. (unless its got a non-adjustable airwash thats always open perhaps)

It’s an adjustable air wash but when I say fully closed, it still lets a little in. Just enough to keep the glass clear