Stratford eb20 log burner Please Help

[Jblakes]

Good afternoon, 

 

I'm really struggling to keep this thing going with smokeless, plus get it upto temp. This fuels out central heating and we wake up to unburnt coal and fire out in morning. 

 

Can somebody tell me if the eaay boost slider the primary air and should be left open with coal? 

 

Also what is the job of the thermostat thing on the side? And how do i use it? 

 

Kind regards

James

[MikeSharp01]

Welcome to THE forum for people like us! Someone will be along shorty to help I am sure Although I know a bit about steam locomotives I am not sure that experience will help however putting air in above the fire sounds like a no-no for over night running. If we want to keep a fire in over night, not a frequent occurrence, we tend to shut the damper, below the fire, right down to almost closed and if the wind blowing hard we close it down even more but avoiding shutting it completely. Locomotives don't have dampers above the fire. Unburnt coal sounds like a lack of air to keep it burning too much air and you will be left with ash and too little and you will be left with coal!

[MikeSharp01]

PS have you checked that the thermostatically controlled flap is actually moving - we have a log burner where this happened and it roared away all the time, until I fixed it, maybe yours has gone the other way.

[Jblakes]

Oh, good point. Fire in at min but will have a look and sweep it out and see if it's blocked

[ProDave]

The general principle with a stove is you want air in at the bottom (primary air) when burning coal, and you want air in at the top (secondary air) for burning wood.  so once going in your case top vent shut, bottom vent open, and regulate it by opening or closing the bottom vent.

 

This stove has a thermostatic system, presumably (it does not say) it regulates the burn to regulate the water temperature?  If so then you need water flowing and the heat from it disappointed somewhere.  Otherwise could your problem be the water has reached set temperature, nothing is cooling the water down, so the stove is shutting itself down?

 

Most stoves with boilers like this are optimised for water heating, not room heating.

 

 

[Jblakes]

So the thermostatic system is just to heat the water? 

 

What about radiators? Is that thermostatic system or just heat from log burner? 

 

Still getting my head around the stove

 

Kind regards

James

[ProDave]

When I say "water" the stove only know about the water that flows in and out of it's back boiler. It does not know where it goes or what it is used for.

 

I only put that forward as a possible reason why it is shutting down that perhaps the water flowing out of it's back boiler has reached and staying at it's maximum temperature.

[Jblakes]

Hmm, don't t that is the case as the rads are luke warm. Maybe need a full clean out and sweep.kind regards

 

James

[ProDave]

If the rads are only luke warm perhaps there is a blockage or water flow problem so they are not taking heat away from the stove properly.

 

When it is in that state with luke warm rads, is it possible to feel the temperature of the 2 pipes out of the back of the stove? BE CAREFUL they might be VERY hot indeed.

[Jblakes]

I think I'm just crap at getting it going. I did one other day and it was so hot I nearly sat in my pants. 

 

Just need to get better. I'm trying anthracite stovees with not much luck ?‍♂️

 

Regards

James

[TonyT]

Don’t boiler stoves normally utilise 28mm copper pipe and run at an angle  to allow for thermosyphon?

 

More info on the pipework, any pump, pipe stats etc

[Jblakes]

No idea. It does have 28mm pipes then 16 (I think) coming off, going to rads

[crispy_wafer]

Unburnt fuel in the morning, I'd open the bottom vent a touch more.  Like said above, with Solid fuel air from the bottom will help with combustion.  With our Dunsley we tend to turn the vent down to 3 or 4...  But each stove is different and have their own characteristics in terms of burn rate. 

 

What are you burning?  Is it solid like anthracite or an ovoid type.  We always had an issue with solid anth, it burns when fresh but requires fully open vents later on and even then it leaves lots of clinkers behind, I had to burn it with a log or two to get the most out of it.

 

Also check around you may have pipe stats somewhere that control the CH pump operation, I'm no heating engineer, but i'd expect you'd have one to set the pump going when water reaches the desired temp, and one which shuts the pump off when the water temp drops below a certain temp.