How to properly heat a Russian stove: advice from experienced stove-makers. Properly heat a Russian stove How to heat a Russian stove

The stove in the house will last for decades, if it is properly used. It is important not only to comply with the ignition conditions, but also to control the combustion process. You also need to be able to use the optimal amount of firewood, so how to fire up the oven means to achieve the maximum efficiency for which it is capable. Operational safety lies in the absence of carbon monoxide and overheating of the case, and for this you need to know some rules and nuances.

We start kindling

There are different designs of furnaces, but the principle of using them is practically the same. You can also kindle a fireplace and a sauna heater. In general, any stove brings comfort to the house, and the interior is filled with a special flavor. But if you haven’t lived in the house for a long time, it is important to do the first kindling correctly, since the subsequent operation depends on it.

Theoretically, you can use any materials, but it is better to heat a classic stove with firewood. They give the least fumes and soot, and coal, for example, gives more carbon monoxide. At the same time, another furnace device is intended for coal, peat, since a conventional grate is clogged with burnt residues. However, even the preparation of firewood should be carried out correctly, since the quality of combustion and the operation of the firebox depend on their parameters.

It should be borne in mind that even slightly damp logs reduce the percentage of efficiency and contribute to the accumulation of condensate in the chimney. Soot sticks to its walls, as a result, traction decreases. The kindling of different stoves is distinguished by the laying of firewood, for example, before heating a Russian stove, firewood is stacked in a well of 10 logs, and after ignition it is shifted into the crucible. For a stove without a cooking chamber, a different technique is used: firewood is laid in an even layer, the top ones form the shape of a slide.

If ignition is carried out after a long break, use the top kindling. It provides slow ignition of the flame and gradual heating of the body. Lower ignition means that the kindling is placed under the firewood. This method is acceptable if the stove is heated regularly. It contributes to the rapid heating of the firebox and the entire body, which leads to large thermal loads.

What logs to take?

If it is possible to choose a type of wood, it is advisable to know which wood is better to kindle a cold stove, and which ones keep warm for a long time. The following varieties are the most calorific (given in decreasing order of the parameter):

This implies the conclusion that for the first operation or after a long break, it is better to take softwood firewood. They gradually ignite, warming up the firebox not too quickly. For daily use, they take alder, birch, oak. They are convenient by fast burning and heating of the case within half an hour.

How much fuel to put in the furnace?

The optimal thickness of the logs is 8 cm. Dry firewood 40 cm high is laid on the grate. At the same time, the rule is observed: the greater their humidity, the less they lay at a time. If other types of solid fuels are used in addition to firewood, its moisture content also affects the amount. For example, coal is placed 15 cm high, and peat with a moisture content of up to 30% - up to 30 cm high. It is important to know that coal is placed on a pillow of burnt firewood in order to protect the grate from clogging it with fractions.

The lower layer of firewood lies evenly on the grate - this rule is observed in any oven. In this case, there should not be large holes for the free passage of air and its exit into the pipe. Ideally, the firewood covers the entire grate, but the air passes evenly through them. If it turns out to be too much, this can be seen by the white color of the flame. If it is not enough, it will become saturated red. If, after burning, blue flames appeared in the coals, it means that carbon monoxide began to be released. In this case, they are leveled and the chimney valve is opened if it was closed by that time to save heat.

We heat the furnace according to the rules

First, the ash pan is cleaned of combustion products, then firewood (or peat, straw, coal) is applied. They set fire to a piece of birch bark, cardboard or paper, put it under firewood or put it on top of them. The grate should not be clogged with pieces of solid fuel - the air will stop passing through it, and the quality of combustion will deteriorate.

During the burning of firewood, they are stirred, turned over with a poker, since it is necessary to heat the stove in such a way that they burn evenly. This must be done at least 2 times during the entire time the furnace is fired. The first batch of firewood should be small in volume. After about 40 minutes, it is supplemented with the next portion of the logs.

Often the first kindling after a long break does not work. This can happen for the following reasons:

the oven is damp
it's warmer outside than inside
chimney damper closed

In this case, a small amount of paper is first burned, warming up the chimney, and after that, firewood is laid on the grate. It is firewood, and not other solid fuels, since it is better to heat a cold stove that has not been used for a long time. You should pay attention to the difference between the Russian stove, as it has a cooking chamber for cooking. A well-heated oven of this design allows you to cook food for 5 hours after the end of the furnace.

The following rules for lighting the stove and using it should be observed:

The body of the oven must be heated up to 70ºC.
The burning process lasts a maximum of 2.5 hours. Then you should close the dampers, otherwise the oven will cool down quickly.
Do not use other woodworking materials other than firewood, such as sawdust. They do not allow air to pass through the grate normally.

Overheating of the body must not be allowed, as this leads to cracks and its subsequent collapse. That is why it is undesirable to heat an unfinished and uninsulated house. At the end of the process, unburned firewood is collected in the center of the firebox and waited until it burns completely. They can also be pulled out immediately and put in a metal bucket.

Russian oven It has several purposes, in particular, it can be used to heat a room, it can be used to cook food, and it can also be used for drying and thermal processing of herbs and fruits. Regardless of how you use it, it's important to know how to properly heat a Russian stove.

The main advantage of such furnaces is that during the furnace, not only the cooking chamber is heated at the same time, but also the lower part of the furnace. The furnace consists of several main elements, which include a cooking chamber or crucible, a heating chamber and an additional marque. All these elements provide the furnace with high efficiency rates.

If you use the stove regularly, then there will be no problems with its kindling, but if you do not use it regularly, the stove may smoke when kindling. This process occurs due to the formation of reverse thrust. In order to avoid smoke, you need to warm up the pipe by burning paper, birch bark or a torch. It is also important to take into account the temperature of the air outside and in the room where it is located.

The thickness of the walls of the Russian stove ranges from 12 centimeters to 24 centimeters, respectively, it will take some time to warm them up. The maximum heat transfer occurs no earlier than after 5-6 hours of heating. In order to overheat the internal masonry, the stove must be heated gradually and evenly.

Before lighting the stove it is necessary to take out all the contents of the cooking furnace, clean the blower, clean the firebox from ash, and also open the valve. The stove must be fired once or twice a day in one of two ways.

The most economical way to fire The stove is burning firewood in it, which must be stacked tightly to each other. The first bookmark of firewood should be maximum, all subsequent ones are reduced by one and a half to two times. Firewood must be loaded when the first batch has turned into embers. It is impossible to heat the stove with the furnace door open.

fire up the stove can also be done in two ways, they are usually called upper and lower. The latter method is the most common and consists in the fact that the kindling takes place under the firewood, while in the case of the upper kindling, the kindling is placed on top of the firewood. Regardless of the type of ignition, the blower door must be opened 5-10 centimeters. It is necessary to ensure that the firewood is dry, and that they, coals and ash do not fall into the side holes of the hearth.

After the end of the firebox, the coals must be moved with the help of a poker into the firebox, it is also necessary to close all the valves. Regardless of the method chosen, it is necessary to heat the Russian stove for no more than 2.5 hours.

Russian stove is multifunctional and suggests different uses. So, for cooking and baking, a special cooking chamber is designed, or as it is also called a crucible. After the end of the firebox, you can cook for 6 hours. In order to bake bread, it is necessary that the oven cools down a little, you also need to close all the valves.

While cooking it is important to determine the temperature in the brewing compartment. So, if placed on paper, it turned black - this means that the temperature is above 300 degrees, which means it is too early to bake bread.

In order to cook delicious food in the oven, it is necessary to cover all containers with lids. Also, in order to make cooking less time, you can add a little boiling water to all dishes. Cookware without plastic parts must be used as they may melt.

In order for the Russian stove to serve for a long time, efficiently and functionally, it is worth knowing what cannot be used, namely:

Gasoline and other similar means for kindling the stove;
It is impossible to burn all kinds of garbage in the furnace, including construction and household waste;
Use raw firewood, as the evaporation of moisture consumes a significant amount of heat;
It is impossible to heat the stove with the furnace door open;
Burn in the oven color and glossy prints;
It is impossible to heat the stove with woodworking waste;
Cover the top of the oven with combustible materials, this may cause a fire;
Lay the space between the furnace and the wall with combustible materials;
Drying is inefficient in a closed space, in the absence of air movement;
Reheat stoves, it is better to heat the stove more often than usual than to use a forced firebox;
Stoke the stove in an unfinished house.

The cleaning of the oven also requires special attention. because it affects the efficiency and longevity of its work. Every year, before the start of the heating season, it is mandatory to clean the stove with a poker. For this, there are special openings closed with doors. It is necessary to carefully scrape the inner walls of the stove with a poker or broom, this will help eliminate soot and ash.

It is worth noting that with proper combustion, soot practically does not form, and the furnace is clogged only with ash, which can be easily eliminated.

It is known that a properly designed and built Russian stove will work efficiently for more than a dozen years. It is the poet who needs to entrust such painstaking and responsible work to professionals with many years of experience. , has established itself as a reliable, stable and experienced contractor and will be happy to help you in all matters related to the stove, bath, sauna or swimming pool. Our work is not limited to practical advice, design and construction, we find complex solutions that take into account your wishes and fantasies.

One way or another, you must remember that proper operation of the furnace will save you time and money.

Despite the widespread use of liquid and gaseous fuel stoves, the operation of solid fuel stoves is no less common today. Not every user thinks about the fact that improper firing of a wood-burning stove leads to an increase in fuel consumption by an average of 15-20%, as well as to the inefficiency of the heating process, a violation of the safety of the operation of the fireplace or stove with a reduction in its service life. The question of how to properly heat a stove with wood depends on its design and involves various approaches.

A wood-burning stove two or three times a year should be subject to preventive maintenance to clean the chimney from soot and soot, if necessary, including its repair. Immediately before starting the kindling, it is necessary to prepare the furnace. To do this, all combustion products are removed from the ash pan (ash, soot). If the inner walls of the stove are covered with soot or ash, it will warm up weakly and for a long time, burning a large amount of firewood. The grate must also be cleaned, because with clogged grate gaps there will not be sufficient air circulation to support intensive combustion of the fuel.

The right choice of firewood

Firewood must be well dried. If you heat the stove with raw wood, during their combustion a large amount of soot will form that clogs the chimney, as well as condensate, the accumulation of which on the walls will lead to the rapid destruction of the stove structure. To dry well, firewood after chopping should lie in a dry woodshed or under a street shed for at least a year. The correct stacking of firewood is considered to be a cross-wise method.

stock of firewood

Depending on the type of wood, this or that amount of heat is released during combustion. The best firewood for the stove is hardwood fuel. These are birch, aspen, oak, linden. Birch firewood gives off more heat than aspen or pine wood, gives an even, high flame and does not sparkle. When choosing oak logs, a middle-aged tree should be used. To clean the chimney from soot, it is better to use alder logs. Aspen firewood burns quickly, leaving no embers. Linden, fruit and coniferous firewood is not advisable to use for kindling a home stove or fireplace, but they emit life-giving and healthy vapors into the air, so it is better to use them for heating a bath.

For the most efficient heating, it is necessary that the logs are of the same thickness (on average, 8-10 cm).

Bookmark firewood

To ensure a good combustion process, it is necessary to responsibly approach the preparation of the primary ignition mass of solid fuel. As a rule, the volume of the primary kindling mass for ignition is at least ¾ of the loading capacity of the furnace. The bookmark for ignition should contain flammable materials - paper, birch bark, thin dry branches, dry shavings. It may happen that, after the combustion of the mass for ignition, the combustion process of the main laying of firewood will not begin. To avoid this, it is necessary to use logs with thin torches. Thus, the primary bookmark should contain firewood of various sizes.

When the ignition has taken place, you can lay the main part of the firewood, consisting of whole logs, preferably of the same diameter. At the same time, you should not lay large logs in a small firebox; they should first be split into two parts. In the process of burning large logs should be turned over for uniform burning.

beautiful oven

In order to know how to properly heat a Russian stove, it must be borne in mind that, in the process of kindling, the stove valve, or view, as well as the ash pan blower door located under the furnace chamber (firebox) are important. The valve regulates the traction force, and the blower door regulates the amount of air supplied. If the fireboxes are kept open during the process, the combustion temperature will decrease as the excess air will carry most of the heat out through the chimney. If the valve and the door are closed, there will not be enough air in the combustion chamber and the firewood will not burn completely. Therefore, in order to properly melt the Russian stove, after laying the kindling mass, it is necessary to open the valve and close the ash pan.

After the kindling has begun to burn, the main part of the fuel is laid. In order to properly heat a Russian stove with firewood, they can be laid in horizontal rows close to each other or with a gap of 1 cm. As a rule, the firebox of a Russian stove is small, so firewood is loaded in several portions. In addition, the Russian stove is usually with a stove, and it has a so-called summer and winter course. If heating of the heating shield is not needed, then the summer valve opens.

After the firewood in the firebox flares up, it is necessary to open the blower door and close the firebox. Then the blower door is covered, but not completely, and the furnace draft is adjusted with a view. To know how to properly heat a Russian stove with wood, you need to monitor the process of fuel combustion:

If the flame has a golden straw color, this is a sign of normal combustion.
A bright flame and a buzzing sound indicate an excess of air. You can fix this by covering the blower door.
If the flame is smoking, the combustion process is sluggish and with a lot of smoke, you need to add air to the furnace. To do this, a view is opened to increase traction.

When the firewood of the first bookmark has burned down to the state of large coals, it is possible to make a second bookmark, while the unburned firewood is raked to the center of the firebox. When all the firewood burns out, even the bluish flame disappears, and ash appears on the coals, after ten minutes you can close the blower door and the view.

How to heat a Russian stove with wood: precautions

In order for the kindling process to be as efficient and safe as possible, some points should be considered:

The Russian stove is heated for no more than 2.5 hours. A longer burning process can damage the stove and cause it to overheat.
It is not allowed to get into the combustion chamber products made of plastic, painted wood, bitumen, and also use gasoline, kerosene, and similar combustible mixtures for ignition.
You can not close the view before the blue flame over the firewood disappears. This can lead to carbon monoxide poisoning.
If the stove has not been used for a long time, check the draft of the stove before lighting it up and open the cleaning door.

Rules for kindling a metal furnace

Metal stoves are common both in houses and in baths. The difference between the sauna heater is that its design contains a straight-through outlet for increased safety. In order to properly heat the sauna heater, one should take into account the rapid combustion of the primary bookmark due to the abundant air flow. At the same time, it is important to quickly turn over the burning fuel so that large unburned coals do not form.

Metal stoves installed in residential buildings have a curved chimney system for long-term heat retention. The rules for lighting firewood in such stoves relate to the ban on the use of liquid combustible mixtures. For the rest, you should follow the recommendations, as when kindling conventional stoves.

A few words should be said about the peculiarities of kindling brick fireplaces and long-burning stoves. In the first case, more firewood will be required for the primary and main ignition, as well as time for kindling. In the second case, the features of the combustion chamber suggest a longer burning process than in conventional furnaces, so firewood should be laid at intervals not of 2.5 hours, but once every 4 hours.

In the cold Russian winters, both the poor and the rich warmed themselves in the same way - they flooded a large Russian stove, usually standing in the middle of the hut. A properly heated Russian stove could heat a large wooden house even in the most severe cold.

In addition, it was in the Russian oven that it was possible to cook not only delicious and fragrant shanezhki, but also a full meal for a large family.

Even today, Russian stoves are frequent guests in private houses and cottages. Therefore, according to the site www.laser-m.ru, it is necessary to know how to properly and quickly melt the Russian stove in a matter of minutes.

1) Firstly, firewood for kindling a Russian stove must be dry. Because wet and damp firewood will melt for a very long time and smoke heavily.

2) Ideally, dry and even birch logs are considered firewood for a Russian stove. They burn well and give off a lot of heat.

3) In order for the firewood to quickly take up, it is necessary to fold them correctly. The best way to lay a birch stack of firewood is considered to be laying a well. It provides good blowing of firewood with fresh air and excellent draft during combustion.

4) In order to kindle a Russian stove, kindling is still needed. There are two options for kindling - this is a finely chopped splinter or birch bark.

To chop a torch, it is better to choose a hatchet small and sharp, and the log is even and without knots.

Birch bark is the top layer of birch bark. Remove it with a sharp knife from split firewood. Birch bark can also be harvested in the forest by removing it from fallen birch trees.

5) In order for the draft to be better when kindling the stove, it is necessary to slightly open a special damper installed on top near the chimney - a view.

6) Birch bark is placed in the center of a folded wood well and set on fire from several sides.

7) When the Russian stove is hot enough and near the entrance to it, you can put cast iron with a meal being prepared. The food will perfectly "reach" without standing on a "direct" fire, due to the high temperature.

8) After the firewood burns out, smoldering coals are usually placed in the inner part of the Russian stove (the second stove in the stove), and after laying dry firewood, they are heated as usual. This saves heat and increases the heating of the house.

9) At the same time, you can bake a large number of different sweets in a mature Russian oven, from pies and shanezhkas to closed pies and, of course, fragrant and satisfying homemade bread.

10) When the coals stop flashing with lights, and turn into ash and only smolder slightly, you need to cover the view to save the heat leaving the hut. Subsequently, the view will need to be closed permanently.

In such developed countries as the USA, Canada, England, Japan, many people still do not want to give up stove heating in any way. They say - economically, comfortably, good for health. Ecologists confirm: it is much easier for nature to “digest” a dispersed emission from house stoves without a trace than a volley of the same power from a thermal power plant. But why - economically? Everyone knows that the stove is voracious. Yes, because those people know how to heat the stove. It's more difficult than brushing your teeth, but the art of the stoker can also be brought to full automatism.

The consequences of incorrect firing of the furnace can be expressed visually, see fig.:

Although, by the way, it is also possible to heat a black bath so that the smoke from the outside will hardly be visible. However, the designs of house stoves have evolved over the centuries and therefore suffer serious violations of the operating mode (kiln operation). Quite a lot of people learn to heat the stove intuitively, and it seems to work well, see for example. video:

But read also the comments to it - mostly fair. Unobvious remains, firstly, the danger of burning out. Secondly, increased fuel consumption. How to heat the stove correctly is not only and not so much an art. This is a whole science that requires thorough knowledge of heat engineering, thermochemistry and other fields of knowledge. The purpose of this publication is to provide the reader with information that will allow him to master it. The result is more than worth the effort: heating costs per season are reduced by up to 40% (!).

How solid fuel burns

To begin with, it is not necessary to strain the mental apparatus especially. It is enough to know, firstly, that the thermal efficiency of oil and gas stoves is completely determined by the design of the stove/boiler, burner and fuel properties. There are practically no opportunities to achieve its savings by violating the normal operation of the device.

However, with regard to firewood, coal and peat, it is a different matter. The consumption of solid fuel for heating significantly depends on how the furnace or boiler is fired on it. It is explained by the peculiarities of the combustion of solid fuel: when the furnace is started, it is initially gasified from heating, releasing combustible gases. This process is called pyrolysis. Pyrolysis gases burn out, releasing heat, heating the carbon base to the combustion temperature, which releases the remainder of the total heat of combustion of this type of fuel.

Note: pyrolysis gases of coal are called coke oven gas, because. under certain conditions of its combustion, the carbon base remains unburned, forming coke. Wood can also be burned only at the stage of gasification - you get charcoal. As a fuel, it is currently used only in cooking, since it is very expensive, and burning wood to charcoal is a very unecological process.

Proper gasification of the fuel is especially important if the stove is fired with wood: wood pyrolysis gases give a very significant part of the heat of combustion of wood and are able to set fire to its finely structured carbon base without additional measures. At the same time, pyrolysis gases can burn out very quickly - the furnace will not be able to take all the heat from them, it will experience a thermal shock that is by no means useful for it, and there will be nothing left for excess heat but to fly out into the pipe. The basis of a proper wood-burning firebox is to organize a gradual gasification of firewood, while at the same time preventing the temperature in the firebox from dropping below that required for tanning and complete combustion of carbon. The fact is that quite easily combustible amorphous carbon, when heated above 600 degrees, begins to turn into a modification of graphite. Ignition temperature of amorphous carbon approx. 1100 degrees (depending on its structure), and graphite - over 2000.

The following important facts:

The rate of release of pyrolysis gases strongly depends on temperature - times.
Two - graphitization of amorphous carbon is a very energy-intensive process. In an insufficiently heated furnace, a kind of looping at the pyrolysis stage is possible with the formation of a large amount of graphite soot, when the main part of the heat from the combustion of pyrolysis gases goes to the formation of graphite.
Three - the maximum temperature in the furnace at which the stove will receive and accumulate heat or immediately transfer it to the room is 1200-1300 degrees.
And the last thing: the energy release of coke oven gas in a conventional furnace furnace is not enough to ignite the amorphous carbon of coal. The temperature of its ignition should be created in the furnace of a coal furnace already when it is started (kindling).

Significant features have a furnace furnace in the bath. A significant part of the pyrolysis gases is carbon monoxide CO - carbon monoxide. Its impact on a person in the bath microclimate is greatly enhanced, because. CO is able to penetrate directly into the body through steamed skin. The concentration of CO in the air, at 20 degrees in the room causing headaches and malaise, in the bath can be fatal. In this regard, the setting of the furnace stroke and its shutdown are of particular importance, see below.

Based on this, the correct firing of a solid fuel stove should be carried out as follows. way:

Kindling a wood stove should quickly heat the fuel before intensive gasification begins;
The kindling of a coal stove should warm up the initial load of fuel (see below) to the ignition temperature of amorphous carbon in at least one place. Then the coal itself will warm up, because. its energy release and thermal conductivity are quite large;
The course of a heating house stove is set by supplying air and adjusting the draft to the maximum thermal efficiency;
The course of the bath stove is set to instantaneous combustion of pyrolysis gases or (not very desirable) to their immediate exhaust into the chimney;
The house stove is stopped before the fuel burns out into ash or, if the fuel is of poor quality, before the coals go out;
The bath stove is stopped by extinguishing unburned coals immediately after the complete cessation of pyrolysis, see below, because carbon monoxide is also capable of releasing burning amorphous carbon.

Note: furnace furnace with peat gives a huge amount of acid radicals. From a house with a peat stove on the move it carries sour for tens and hundreds of meters. As a result, the harvesting of peat and its use for fuel are prohibited in many countries, and things are moving towards a complete ban everywhere. Therefore, further features of the furnace furnace with peat are not considered. If, however, heating the stove is a matter of vital importance, and there is nothing but peat, then they heat it in the same way as brown coal, see below.

How to heat the stove

In general, the solid fuel furnace firebox consists of the following, formally speaking, production cycles:

Preparation of firewood / coal and preparation of their consumable load;
Unloading the ash pan from the ash of the previous furnace;
External inspection and current (preventive) cleaning of the fuel part;
Starting the furnace on the working stroke and setting the furnace stroke;
Additional loading of fuel until the consumable load is used up or until the furnace warms up to the required degree (furnace stoking);
Furnace stop.

Here are the basic rules, the first - starting the furnace is not lighting kindling. The furnace is started when it is already on the move, and there are a lot of subtleties, see below. Second - do not shove the entire consumable load into the furnace at once. It will not be possible to set the furnace stroke to the maximum thermal efficiency, and you can immediately sink into graphitization with enhanced soot deposition. In order for the stove to give more heat, consuming less fuel, it needs to be heated.

Firewood

Preparing firewood for a firebox is much more difficult than preparing coal. Therefore, we will talk about the latter later, in the section on coal combustion. In the meantime, let's take care of the wood. They are being prepared for the firebox. way:

Timber is sawn into blocks and logs of the required height (length), see below;
Churaki are pricked into poles with a section close to the sector of a circle or a trapezoid with a height (along the section) of 8-10 cm;
Logs with a diameter of less than 7-8 cm are chopped into halves or quarters;
Log logs with a diameter of less than 4-5 cm are left unchopped;
They put the prepared fuel in a woodpile under a canopy or (better) in a woodshed (woodshed): poles - separately, half-logs and quarters - separately, logs - separately;
Air dried for at least 2 years. In the most extreme case, you can heat with one-year-old firewood;
During the heating season, firewood is transferred to the room and dried to chamber (room) dryness in the woodshed under the stove or in the woodshed next to it;
The woodcutter or woodcutter, instead of the firewood spent on the next firebox, is replenished with firewood from the woodpile until the stove goes on the move after kindling, see below.

Churaki and logs

The height of the churaks and the length of the logs for chopping firewood should be 3-7 cm higher (longer) than the length of the grate of the furnace, but also shorter than the length of the firebox. Simply put: ready-made firewood should be placed in the firebox, slightly overlapping the grate, but at the same time not resting on the walls of the firebox.

Firewood section shape

Sharp corners and edges of firewood will provide intensive gasification from kindling, immediately heating the resulting carbon to ignition. Further, as the firewood burns, the intensity of gas emission will drop to a value that allows you to set the optimal course of the stove. Half logs and quarters are used for bootstrapping (to be used for kindling, see below), and logs are used for summer stove fires and possibly also for bootstrapping.

woodpile

In the woodpile, firewood not only dries to air dryness (less than 30% moisture). During the exposure time in the woodpile, water-soluble organic compounds of wood (simply - juices containing proteins and sugars) are bituminized, forming combustible forms. The calorific value in the reference books is given specifically for firewood of at least 2 years of aging. Compared to them, annual ones lose up to 10-20% of potential heat, and autumn spring felling of the same year - up to 50% or more (!).

Woodcutter and firewood

Air-dry firewood (absolute humidity up to 25%) will give no more than 85% of its potential (reference) heat. In addition, the cost of heat from the combustion of pyrolysis gases for the evaporation of water will bring down the temperature in the furnace by 100-150 degrees: graphitization and soot deposition will increase. Therefore, the firewood before the firebox must be dried to room dryness (no more than 12% absolute humidity); the reference calorific value of firewood is given specifically for it.

It is better to dry firewood in a pelvis-drovnitsa, pos. 2 in the figure: moisture rises through the capillaries of the tree to the upper saw cuts and evaporates perfectly. Firewood from the outer captive on the floor in bulk reaches the oven condition in 7-10 days; firewood in a firewood shed under the stove on legs (pos. 1) or trenches (brick columns - supports of the stove) for 2-3 days, and firewood in a firewood shed standing 1-1.5 m in front of the stove - for 2 furnaces, those. during the day and from evening to morning.

Ash pan and ash

The ash pan is unloaded from the ashes just in front of the firebox, so that the sparks accidentally remaining in the ash do not cause a fire somewhere. By the way, according to the law, the owner and / or the stove stoker is responsible in this case. Before unloading (simply - taking out and shaking out) the ash pan is swept into it through the grate with a whisk the remains of ash and small rubbish from the furnace. Well, and that furnace ash is an excellent mineral fertilizer, you, of course, know that.

Inspection of the condition of the oven

Perhaps you also know that up to 15 cubic meters are sucked in through a match-thick gap between the furnace door and its jamb in an hour. m of air. It will bring down the temperature in the furnace by 200-250 degrees. This in itself will reduce the heat transfer of the fuel load by 15-20%, and increased soot deposition over time by the same amount. Therefore, the condition of the furnace before starting it is necessary to pay the most special attention.

How the furnace is arranged from the point of view of the stoker, who may not be able to lay brick on brick, but who knows his business, is shown (schematically) on the left in the figure:

On the right, there is also given the purpose of furnace appliances and brief indications of the nature of routine work with them. If the stove is not running and the fuel has completely burned out, all doors and dampers must be tightly closed. The reason is dust. Burning and bituminizing, it forms a dense soot, which is very difficult to tear off without damaging the structure of the furnace; graphite soot is easily cleaned off with a golik (a broom made of twigs without leaves) on a long handle. Moreover, graphite particles, settling on bituminous soot, gradually turn into highly combustible finely dispersed amorphous carbon. Dust deposits are the most common cause of soot fires in the chimney. Therefore, during the inspection of the furnace, it is necessary to wipe the doors with their frames from dust, completely remove and wipe the shutters of the view and gate.

Note: about other devices and points of the regulations in fig. see later in the course of the presentation.

Traction and acceleration traffic jams

The process of preparing the furnace for the furnace necessarily includes checking the draft. It is most reliable to do this with a candle (pos. 1 in the figure below), when kindling and initial loading are already in the furnace. The furnace door is tightly closed, the blower is opened and a burning candle is brought in it. On the edge of the door, the flame should reach into the furnace without breaking. If there is no candle, it is not so reliable, but enough so that the waste does not immediately go, the draft is checked with a match with an empty firebox. The blower door is closed, the furnace door is slightly opened by 2 fingers and a burning match is brought to the slot with the head down, pos. 2. The flame must also reach into the furnace without breaking.

On a stagnant stove (for example, a country stove during the winter), a situation is possible when the firebox is empty, the channels and chimney are clean, but there is no draft. The same can happen if the oven is new, not dried before the first start. Then, firstly, they check the draft on the chimney cleaning door with the firebox and blower closed. There is - a steam plug sits in a damp oven. No - an airlock in the chimney. It is eliminated by burning a torch (perhaps 2 or 3) from a newspaper in the chimney through the cleaning door. It didn’t help - you need to inspect the chimney deflector, whether it is damaged or clogged.

If the cork sits in the furnace, newspapers or, better, shavings are burned in small portions in the furnace with the blower, view and gate fully open. The steam plug is squeezed out of the oven with difficulty: it will be necessary to put a sheet of newspaper or a handful of shavings on a crumpled into a loose lump more than once. However, in small country stoves it often happens that both plugs are stuck, but not tight. In this case, you can drive the vapor-air plug out of the furnace immediately from the furnace, see the video:

Note: but actually the best way to get the cork out of the oven is to keep it out of the oven. It is very simple - when leaving for the winter, plug the openings of all the oven doors and the mouth of the chimney with rags or straw. The pipe is plugged so that the plug lies on it with a cap (mushroom) and is wrapped with a film together with the plug, otherwise it may fall into the chimney until spring.

Loading and kindling

The initial loading of firewood into the oven is most often combined with its kindling. In some cases (see below), the stove is first melted and firewood is placed on the kindling that has flared up. In any case, for the successful operation of the stove as part of the oven utensils, you need to have tongs for firewood and coal. Without them, it is very difficult to correct improperly settling firewood and load new ones for stoking, and without this, the stove’s progress during the fire will go astray all the time and part of the heat will be lost.

The main error in the initial loading of the furnace is that the torch and kindling are placed on top of the firewood stack, on the left in fig. below. The furnace will start up, but the primary pyrolysis gases, whose task is to “stir up” the operation of the furnace, will burn out in vain. Worse than in vain: since the system of smoke channels (or hood) of the furnace has not yet warmed up to more than 200 degrees, intensive deposition of fire hazardous amorphous soot will occur in the structure of the furnace.

The second mistake is not knowing that the stove needs to be heated during the fire, or being too lazy to do it, they immediately give a full working load of firewood (in the center). The primary pyrolysis gases will cool down on the upper firewood before reaching the top of the furnace, and there will be no strong deposition of amorphous soot in the structure of the furnace, but until the furnace starts working, a lot of firewood will burn in vain. In the second half of the furnace time, the situation shown on the right in the figure will arise: the grate is clogged with unburned coals, the bluish color of which indicates the formation of carbon monoxide. In this case, it is impossible to bring the stove to the correct stroke with air and draft (see below): you need to thoroughly pierce the furnace and stir up the coals, immediately releasing a lot of heat into the chimney.

There are 2 cases when firewood is placed (with tongs!) on a flaming kindling (on the left in the next figure): if a cork was previously driven out of the furnace or if the furnace has to be heated with annual or annual firewood. Then kindling is best done from a not abundantly oiled rag (so that it does not drip) or a slightly oiled, loose lump of 5-6 newspaper sheets or from 3-4 handfuls of slightly oiled shavings. But what about the PPB (Fire Safety Rules), which completely prohibit the kindling of flammable stoves? Not violated, see below.

Generally speaking, one or half of a newspaper sheet, a handful of shavings or 2-3 splinter will be enough to kindle properly prepared firewood in the oven. But put the kindling immediately, before loading firewood, under the middle of its future installation. If you then slip the kindling on the side (in the center in the figure), a situation will arise similar to the initial overload of the stove with firewood (see above), only the side ones will now act as the top ones.

The next situation: you need to kindle a metal stove with a cramped firebox and a small firebox door or a brick stove with deliberately damp firewood (for example, in a taiga hut). In a cramped firebox, it is impossible to immediately lay out the initial stack of firewood, and ordinary kindling will not warm up raw firewood before gasification begins. We also assume that there are no rags and no oil to impregnate it. In this case, wood (double) kindling is done: the thinnest and driest logs (for example, from the surrounding deadwood) are pricked (with a knife) into thin sector poles. A well is laid out from the poles for 1-3 tiers in a turn of tiers approx. 45 degrees (on the right in the figure). Newspaper, coniferous, “Christmas tree” hunting and tourist, etc. are placed in the well. kindling ignited by a single match. If the kindling is newspaper, the paper tail is brought out. The well is covered with very thin poles or a torch and - be sure, it will light up like a pretty one!

Flammable liquid and oil

Let's study carefully the PPB with applications. There is enough about spontaneous combustion of oils, but many edible and technical oils are not on the list of flammable oils. We turn to the specialized literature and in the end we find a clear difference between flammable and non-flammable people. The point is not at all that a drunken fool can pour a canister of gasoline into the stove. From a drunken fool, he will hang himself foolishly. But the fact is that flammable liquid vapors: a) have a flash point, possibly even lower than room temperature (at a certain concentration; b) are capable of detonation without additional technical measures. And oil vapors: a) flare up at temperatures above the maximum tolerable by a person; b) either do not detonate at all, or it is very difficult to make them detonate. Simply put: flammable liquid vapors in an oven can explode and blow it apart; no oil vapor. But oil vapors burn, developing a high temperature and releasing a lot of heat. Therefore, starting the stove from oiled kindling (but so that it does not drip or flow from it!) Will not be a formal violation of the PPB.

Note: among other things, ovens, incl. charcoal, they also start well from kindling soaked in butter, margarine, some kind of spread, which are certainly not flammable. The ancient Chinese (they were the first to use coal) and the Greeks (charcoal) melted coal stoves with cow, buffalo and barley butter. Curiously, both of them, by no means fools, considered butter unsuitable for food.

Firewood: stacking and firebox

Proper stacking of firewood for the initial load of the stove is the most important condition for its economy. If the first firewood was stacked incorrectly, the stove will have to be put into operation for almost the entire time of the firebox (1.5-2 hours). During this time, a lot of useful heat will fly out into the pipe or be converted into soot and soot. The basic rule for laying the first firewood in the firebox is that flames should immediately appear above them already from kindling. Then the primary pyrolysis gases will do their useful work without interference. To do this, firewood is laid in a layer:

2 or more year old firewood, dried in the room - up to 30 cm.
annual dried or fully aged under-dried - up to 20 cm.
annual and wet - up to 15 cm.

“Before” means that at least 15-20 cm of free space should remain above the stacking of firewood to the vault of the firebox. This is necessary for the complete combustion of pyrolysis gases and the free exit of water vapor into the chimney.

Conditioned firewood is placed in the firebox, as it is stacked in a woodpile: corner to corner, on the left in fig. Do not worry, enough air will pass through the gaps between the logs. And along them, the tongues of the primary pyrolysis flame will immediately stretch high up, providing rapid gasification of the wood immediately throughout the mass. It is not necessary to lay the first log of the boot load obliquely, as is sometimes advised - it will be much more difficult to set the furnace stroke. An oblique log is placed when reloading fuel, see below.

Underexposed and too large firewood is stacked in a log house, in the center. A log house, as a way of laying firewood, is not a well. The middle of the wood well is wide and free, and in the tiers of the log house, the gaps between the logs are 2-3 times less than their thickness. If the substandard firewood is also dampish, then the first tier of laying is laid over the kindling for them with a well, and the next (e) - with a log house. Finally, in a stove with a close firebox, and especially in a sauna stove (see also below), the entire stack is laid out similarly to wood kindling (on the right in the figure), only logs for it can be taken larger, according to the firebox of the stove.

Firebox, control and firebox

After the stove is kindled, the gate is half-covered, the blower door is covered to a gap of 2-3 fingers, and the furnace door is tightly closed. A correctly launched furnace 10-14 minutes after closing the furnace door itself enters the working stroke. Traditionally, it is controlled by the temperature of the forehead of the stove (it should start to heat up) and the noise: all sound sources are turned off (silenced) in the room and the noise of the stove is listened to, holding the ear 5-10 cm from its forehead. Rustles - went on the move. It is muffled, like in a tank - there is not enough air, you need to check if the firewood has gone out and open the blower a little. After 5-10 minutes, repeat the control - it did not rustle, we slightly open the gate. If the stove is buzzing, in 3-4 doses, after 2-3 minutes each, we slightly open the gate until it rustles. The damper is open by 3/4 or more, but there is still no rustling - we slightly open the blower and - see before.

How to make a peeper

The course of the metal furnace is checked and set before loading the fuel, so the initial load into it should be as low as possible. A brick oven can be set to the correct course immediately after it is kindled, guided only by the color and type of flame. If the firebox door is on glass, there is no problem. But, if the door is deaf, then it is not necessary to open it slightly to control the beginning of the firebox - the air inflow will knock down the still weak operation of the furnace and you will see in the firebox something completely different from what it actually was. You can open the furnace to control and eliminate gross violations of the furnace, see below.

Furnace doors are often made from the so-called. hypereutectic cast iron - very hard, heat-resistant, heat-resistant, little subject to thermal deformation, but extremely brittle and difficult to machine. However, it is possible to make a peeper (peeper) in the blind door of the furnace for visual control of the furnace progress if there are:

A round (obligatory!) piece of heat-resistant glass 4-6 mm thick and up to 7 cm in diameter, but not more than half the height of the furnace door.
Freely adjustable circular drill (centrobor) with a victorious cutter.
Pobeditovy twist drill for drilling a pioneer hole for the centrifugal guide.
Desktop drilling machine.
Blowtorch, gas or liquid burner (diesel, kerosene, mining).

How to drill a stepped hole under the glass of a peeper in a cast-iron door is shown in fig. Two indispensable conditions so that the door does not crack during processing or afterwards: only with a drill with a pad of soft wood (pine, for example), and the center of the hole must coincide with the geometric center of the door. Then its thermal focus will remain where it was, and the door will not “feel” the peepers.

The glass in the nest is fixed with a split ring made of elastic steel wire. To fix it, the finished door is taken out (or into a fireproof room), placed on a fireproof lining face up and thoroughly heated with a flame. The steel will weld and firmly cling to the cast iron, but then it will be possible to pick off the ring to replace the glass.

Stroke violations

Now let's see how the furnace firebox goes and "pull up" the air with draft to the optimum. In general, the white color of the flame indicates the combustion of pyrolysis gases or an excess of oxygen, yellow indicates complete combustion of the fuel and the optimum temperature in the furnace, red indicates incomplete combustion of the fuel due to lack of air or draft, red indicates the consumption of heat of combustion of pyrolysis gases for graphitization and soot deposition, and blue or blue - about the release and partial combustion of carbon monoxide.

There are possible traces here. cases (see fig.):

Additional loading of fuel (fueling)

The first rule for reloading the furnace is not to open the furnace door for more than 15-20 s. Otherwise, the oven will go astray. Until you expose it again, a lot of heat will be lost. If, for example, during this time it was not possible to correct the stacking of firewood (see below), then you need to close the firebox for 2-3 minutes, and only then open it again. From here follows the second rule: to add firewood to the firebox in layers (in order). So you can load the entire balance of the consumable load at once, but at least the same 15-20 cm of free space should remain under the arch of the firebox.

The procedure for adding fuel to the furnace on the go is as follows:

After 20-30 minutes after starting the furnace, we check whether it has reached full speed. From a metal furnace, it should puff with heat (the temperature of the outer surface is not lower than 300 degrees. On the forehead of a brick one at full speed, it is difficult to hold a strained calloused palm for a short time (temperature is about 70 degrees).
We check the subsidence and burn-out of the wood-burning stack: fuel can be reloaded if the cut logs are almost completely charred, pos. 1 in fig.
If the wood stack settles loosely or spreads, we correct it by carefully prying and shifting the logs with the heel of the poker, pos. 2.
Firewood correctly loaded into the oven settles, burning out, densely, pos. 3. Then it is better to wait until there is room in the furnace for the entire balance of the consumable load, because. each additional load knocks down the oven a little.
To reload firewood, one log is laid obliquely with tongs, the firebox is closed and waited for 2-3 minutes.
Additional loading of firewood is carried out when the slanting log flares up, pos. 4. Thus, the firebox will be divided in height into 2 parts: the lower one will remain on the working course, and the upper one will start almost instantly in a hot firebox. Heat loss will be minimal.
After 5-10 minutes after reloading, the furnace progress is checked and, possibly, it is set, see above.

Note: the volume of fuel consumption in a brick oven is determined on the basis that it should be heated no more than 3 times a day for no more than 2 hours.

Furnace shutdown

When stopping the furnace, it is important, first, to prevent the release of waste into the room. The second is to prevent the brick and cast iron stove from releasing the accumulated heat into the chimney. Steel in this respect is not critical: its own heat capacity is negligible compared to the heat of combustion of the consumable load.

The sign of the formation of carbon monoxide is very clear: it is either blue flames, or a bluish coating of ash on coals, see fig. The latter is also a blue flame, only very low and all over the surface.

In order to avoid heat loss, it is not necessary to rake the coals into a pile and burn out the remaining 2-3 logs on them, to the left of the trail. rice. They will give much less heat than will be blown into the chimney from a heated furnace by draft. Leave this firewood for the next firebox.

To properly stop the furnace, the coals are smashed with a poker around the entire hearth of the furnace. The blower is fully opened, and the gate is closed. The damper is not a view, in its damper there is either a cutout or a hole, or, if the damper is rotary, a gap between the damper and the frame, providing minimal traction. By the way, the rotary gate is better in terms of safety: you cannot confuse it with a view.

Having given a maximum of air and a minimum of thrust, they wait until the blue lights disappear on the coals. If the firewood is conditioned, it will take no more than 10 minutes, and in the meantime the coals will burn to ash. In the coals of substandard fuel, yellow sparks may remain (on the right in the figure): there are still combustion centers; if you close the view, it will go to waste. The red color of substandard coals is most likely not combustion, but the color of smoldering hot carbon. There is little heat from it, and such coals can smolder to ash for hours. Therefore, substandard coals that have not burned out in 10-15 minutes are collected with a scoop and extinguished in a bucket of water. After making sure that nothing is burning or smoldering in the furnace, they close the view, the firebox, and the blower.

Note: in the heil of furnaces of bell-type furnaces, the so-called. a gas view that does not allow the oven to cool quickly. Therefore, any coals can be allowed to smolder to ash in them. But then you still need to close the view - when the cap cools down a bit, the gas view will crawl up from the furnace and the draft will pull again.

Features of the furnace of other furnaces

Separate types of furnaces have their own characteristics of the firebox. Firstly, simple Dutch women, especially summer cottages, often build without a gate. There's nothing you can do about it - the furnace will have to be set only with air and it is not always possible to achieve a minimum fuel consumption. Secondly, furnaces with a developed channel system (for example, a Swede) respond to draft and air regulation for 5 minutes or more. Therefore, it is necessary to expose their course in stages and carefully. It is best to heat such stoves with the same type of conditioned fuel. Then, once setting the move, you need to remember the position of the gate with the blower door and immediately put them on the working stroke at the next firebox.

Russian

In principle, it is impossible to put a gate in a Russian stove, and there is no need for it there: the design of the Russian stove is such that the draft and air in it adjust automatically to each other. Setting the course of the Russian stove is simple: we rake the coals to the sides, compact (possibly) the stack of firewood, and the stove will do the rest. The only thing is that firewood cannot be loaded into a Russian stove with a hut (tent): a strong flame will beat into the arch of the hearth, pos. 1 in the figure:

In addition to increased fuel consumption, this is also bad because the vault and stove bench overheat, which can cause the stove to fail. Firewood is loaded into a Russian stove with a log house, pos. 2: the flame licks the vault, and the whole log house can be gently pushed back with a couple of logs, which is necessary for cooking some traditional Russian dishes.

Note: Unfortunately, such a wonderful design as the Russian stove, at present, fully retains only its culinary significance - it is not adapted to the conditions of modern life. How to heat a Russian oven for heating and cooking in the traditional way, see the video below.

Video: Russian stove furnace in the traditional way

bathhouse

Profitability for a sauna stove is not the main thing, but in no case should it give waste. Therefore, firstly, all manipulations with the blower and damper of the sauna stove are carried out in such a way that there is no lack of air in the furnace. If, for example, you need to muffle the stove, then first cover the gate, and then the blower. It is necessary to disperse - first open the blower, and then the gate, etc. The second is that the coals from the sauna stove are scooped out with a scoop and extinguished in a bucket of water as soon as the blue carbon monoxide flame disappears, regardless of the type of fuel. For more information on how to heat a sauna stove, see the following. plot.

Video: the correct furnace furnace in the bath

coal firebox

The peculiarity of coal as furnace fuel is that its gasification begins at a temperature significantly higher than that of wood, and when heated to less than 800-900 degrees, it proceeds sluggishly. But, if the coal is quickly heated to 900-1000 degrees, it is gasified quickly and violently, developing a high temperature in the furnace. Therefore, it is more difficult to set fire to coal, and when ignited, it gives more thermal stress to the stove than firewood.

Also, the amorphous carbon of coal releases much more heat per unit mass due to its greater density. Since the heat capacity of the kiln is limited, and the thermal time constant of the brick kiln is large (these are the same 1.5-2 hours of furnace time), the loading of coal into the brick kiln should be given less, and the number of furnaces per day should be increased to 3-4.

It is impossible to heat a Russian stove with coal: it is adapted only to firewood. Very carefully, you need to heat Swedish stoves, Dutch stoves and other channel stoves with 3 or more revolutions with coal. The channel furnace has a great resistance to the flow of gases, and in weather conditions that reduce draft (wet off-season, strong wind in the opposite direction to the prevailing direction, etc.), there may not be enough air for burning coal without burning even with a fully open blower and gate. The oven of a Swedish stove will not work properly when fired with coal: it should not be covered by an excessively hot flame.

Young geologically fossilized lignite coal, which retains a woody structure (item 1 in the figure), is unsuitable for furnaces: it immediately crumbles into dust, completely clogging the grate. By the way, gentlemen rewriters-uniquelists, who came up with this - lingit? There is no such thing. Lignite is so named because it retains the structure of the mechanical basis of wood - lignin.

Brilliant black anthracite, the oldest of fossil coals (pos. 1a), emits a lot of heat, rapidly, but briefly gasifies and is difficult to ignite. Anthracite can be used to heat cast-iron and heat-resistant steel stoves, in the certificate for which anthracite is indicated as a regular type of fuel. Occasionally - bell-type and channel furnaces no more than 2 turns with a fireclay firebox. Loading into the furnace - a layer of 15-20 cm.

Brown coal (pos. 2) can fire any stove, but it is an extremely unenvironmentally friendly fuel. The extraction of brown coal in the world is steadily declining. It is impossible to store brown coal in large quantities (more than 10-15 kg): it ignites spontaneously even without wetting. Ordinary hard coal (gray, pos. 3) is certainly suitable for firing cast-iron stoves and brick stoves with fireclay fireboxes. Coal from individual deposits can also heat brick ovens without chamotte. Loading - with a layer of 12-18 cm. Thinner - will not flare up; thicker - the upper pieces are gasified to no avail.

kindling coal

Coal can be set on fire with an ordinary torch or a newspaper, but up to 30-40% of its calorific value will be lost in the furnace. For coal stoves, special lighters are produced (and made independently), giving a sheaf of strong flame, immediately warming up the load to 1000-1100 degrees. But the same effect will give oil vapor from oiled kindling, see above. Only you need more of it than for a tree: a rag with a size of a man's T-shirt or 5-6 newspaper sheets. The author more than once, while on business trips in the wilderness, had to start an old coal-fired titanium water heater with the help of newspapers and watery "Peasant" oil of that time. It enters the titanium furnace with half a shovel of coal, and this was enough for 3-4 people to wash after work. There is only one condition: it is necessary to load sifted coal for such kindling, without dust, so that the gaps between the pieces are free. You can learn more about how to heat the stove with sifted coal from the video

Video: furnace furnace with sifted coal

From coal dust mixed with water, you can fashion and dry fuel cakes, pos. 4 in fig. above. However, please note: firstly, coal dust is a strong allergen and carcinogen. Secondly, it ignites spontaneously and is explosive. Rudolf Diesel originally designed his internal combustion engine for coal dust (there was no oil of his own in Germany at that time), but it was the ease of its detonation that forced him to switch to rapeseed oil, and diesel fuel was invented only later.

How to burn coal safely

The main task when burning a furnace with coal is to avoid waste. In coal furnaces and boilers, this is ensured by design. If a wood-burning stove is heated with coal, then, setting its course, you must also monitor the state of the burning mass.

Burning coals give little visible flame. When burning a stove with coal, more air must be given than for firewood with the same draft. And everything together is regulated so that the upper pieces of the burning mass do not seem to be translucent through, on the left in fig. If all the coal seems to be luminous (on the right), then its complete gasification will end quickly, there may not be enough air for the complete combustion of carbon and waste will go.