Struggling a bit with my new wood burner - any suggestions

[Katymac]

It's got a back boiler and I don't know if this is affecting it

It never really gets up to temperature - it sort of sulks at around 100-120 degrees when it should be up around 300

I light it fine ...it does the woosh thing
Then 30 mins later it is going out...with loads of wood unburnt

What am I doing wrong??

do you keep the draughts open for longer than that first 30min?

It's got the one at the top - which should be open all the time
The one at the bottem which should only be for lighting (apparently)
& a thermostat which we put at high, at about half way, at low - we can't get it right

I'd be tempted to keep the bottom one open for a bit longer - have never had one with anything so sophisticated as a thermostat though.

also depends how your chimney draws as it heats up...

We've had problems with ours too and after lots of fiddling seem to have got it about right now.

Despite what the brochure/sale rep said, it does not appear to be capable of doing the radiators AND hot water, so we've had to not do the water and just leave it to do the rads.

Is it purely a woodburner or is it multi-fuel? We had multi-fuel and in the end took the grate bars out (which we had paid extra to have put in, just in case we wanted to burn coal etc) and then piled in loads of wood. That, and reducing the flow of the pump and playing about with the flap in the chimney (damper?) seems to have got us there now.

Well we don't have a thermostat either but DH has it down to a fine art, start with lots of kindling and newspaper, then when it starts to whoosh add a few small logs, then when it builds to a nice hot glow start adding some bigger logs. Even with this it needs more or less constant attention for the first hour or so - you need to give it a good poke (oooer missus) every so often to shift the logs around and let some air in. This usually gets it going again. Don't be tempted to put the big logs on until there is a good bed of red hot ash as well as flames - you need this to keep the temp up.

oh yes, damper is a rich source of fiddly adjustments
I found this quite handy for understanding what bit does what and what fiddling with it will change.

I guess the damper is the one at the top....hmm I never fiddle with that

I reckon its duff wood.
Does it feel heavy? Does it hiss or ooze when burning.

See if you can get some dry seasoned stuff and see if its any better. Failing that chop it small and stack it in a warm place to dry out quicker.

All of a sudden it really went - I don't know what was wrong

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