Stovepipe detonations tonight... scary

I've got a big Harman Oakwood stove. I like the stove a lot... it has a bypass damper and burns pretty clean.

I had a good fire going in it tonight, and I let it burn down to coals before I noticed. I rebuilt the fire with some Juniper and Pinon, got it going pretty quickly, and dropped the bypass damper and turned down the air intake damper.

20 minutes later, my wife came out of the back room and said "the stove is making funny noises" http://countryplans.com/smf/Smileys/...t/shocked2.gif

I went in, thinking it was just settling from the temperature, and watched it for a minute. As I was watching it, I heard a "WHUMP" and a puff of smoke / ash came out of the junction between the stove and the pipe. Holy crap.

Doing some looking online, it appears that the stove can get into a mode where the wood outputs too much gas for the air coming in, and you can get combustion in the stove pipe itself.

I'm more than a little spooked, as previously i have built up a big fire, loaded it with wood, closed down both dampers and have gone to bed.

Not sure I fully know what happened, as this is the first time we have witnessed it. I suspect it was because I had lots of coals making gas and not enough draw pulling in air. I bet that if I don't fill it full with wood on a coal base and crank down the dampers I should be okay. Think I'll talk with a stove shop tomorrow.

Frank that is not all that uncommon. Happens mostly when the newly added wood does not ignite right away. While left smoltering it off gasses as it smolters and then suddenly ignites. When I add new wood to hot coals I leave the damper wide open or the door slightly adjar until it catches up. Best time I found to add wood is when there is a flame present. You can also add a stick of kindling to the coals and then the wood on top. Once ignition happens then I add the amount of wood that I actually need.

Not that familar with your type of stove but they all work basicly the same in many aspects. My parents bought a new Quadrafire and it has a feature where it opens the draft completely for 15 minutes and then automatically shuts down giving time for the wood to ignite. Nice feature as you don't have to go back and shut the draft off manually in case you forget.

The "whump" is probably that ignition of the built up gases. The pressure caused has to go somewhere so the joint in the pipe is the path of the least resistance if the door is closed.

Couldn't have asked for woods with more volatile gasses either. I blew the door clear across the room off of one of those old oval tin stoves by loading a healthy handful of lighter knot into it. I was basically distilling turpentine inside the stove, when it finds air enough to ignite all those unburnt gases it can be impressive.

I don't know, but I don't think so... there is a re-burn chamber, but no catalyzing compounds that I see. It has a chamber that is lined with some sort of super insulator. Oddly feels just like styrofoam and is just as light. I believe that the inside of that thing gets really, really hot and burns up all the emission gasses before it enters the stove pipe. This stove is certified for burning even on no-burn nights.