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Woodburning Stoves
Hi everyone,
I have a catalytic converter in my Kuma wood stove, and have found out the best way to run them. Kuma stoves are sold on the west coast, and will heat a 3500 sq. ft. house. I have never had to replace the catalytic converter, and its six years old. The first thing you need for a catalytic converter stove is a Rutland wood stove thermometer. Place this on your stove pipe, 12 inches above your stove. I bought mine at wall-mart for $6. This is a must for a catalytic stove! If you run your stove to cold you will coat your glass, catalytic converter and your pipe with creosote. To hot and you will damage your catalytic converter and could damage your stove pipe. When you over heat your stove pipe, you will get a nasty smell from the paint on your stove pipe. Never run your stove pipe temperature over 500 degrees very long, 350 to 400 degrees is best.
I clean my glass with that orange cleaner in a bottle from Sam’s club every time I start my wood stove. It’s a lot easier than waiting a week or so to clean. I then bypass my catalytic converter when I start my stove, and let the heat go straight up the stove pipe. Also I open any air inlets all the way. It’s best to use the white printed news paper and kindling with some dry split wood in 3” to 4” thin pieces that will burn faster than large pieces of wood to get the stove pipe to 400 plus degrees. I crack the door a little bit till the stove pipe reaches 400 plus degrees. I then shut off the hot air going directly up the pipe, so it will go thru the catalytic converter. If all goes right, your stove pipe temp should keep climbing, or stay a little over 400 degrees. If it gets close to 500 degrees, shut off some inlet air to keep it around 400. If your pipe temp goes down to 325 degrees or lower, crack the door, and open the catalytic converter bypass to get your stove pipe temp back to 400 degrees. If your stove glass gets black, your stove is to cold. On a good startup, your glass should stay clean. It takes a little practice to get the hang of it, but it does works great! When my stove is at the right temp, and some flames going into the catalytic converter it glows a bright orange color, and I try to keep the stove pipe temp around 350 to 450 degrees. After two to three hours or so, you can run it a little cooler. If I run my wood stove pipe at 450 degrees for more than two hours, it will get 88+ degrees in my house. Sometimes I need to open some windows to cool it down.
Jeff S
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Woodburning Stoves
Catalytic converter stoves do two things. They combust unburned gases that would normally go up the stove pipe. They take the extra btu's, and boost the heat output of the stove. On my wood stove, their is a cool air intake duct in the front that runs under the fire box, up the back of the stove, and across the top of the fire box, just above the catalytic converter, and out the front of the stove. When the catalytic converter gets bright orange from burning the gases, the air in the duct above the catalytic converter gets super heated, and flows out the top side of the duct, sucking cool air in the lower duct inlet. After 30 minuets my stove is blasting out hot air like it had a big fan running. The air is so hot that you can't hold your hand in front of it for more than a few seconds. For my stove to really put out the heat, the catalytic converter needs to stay bright orange, and the stove pipe temperature needs to stay over 400 degrees. If I run the pipe over 500 + degrees very long, it could damage the pipe. Well, that’s the way I got it figured any way.
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It’s a Kuma K-400 free standing wood stove. Not the prettiest stove, but heats my 3000 sq. foot two story house with ease. But the winter temps here in Fresno, Ca is 38 degrees average. It drops down in the high 20's at times. Here’s a link to the web site:
http://www.kumastoves.com/
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