© 2021 United States Stove Company
11
OPERATION INSTRUCTIONS
5. Waste petroleum products, paints or paint thinners,
or asphalt products;
6. Materials containing asbestos;
7. Construction or demolition debris;
8. Railroad ties or pressure-treated wood;
9. Manure or animal remains;
10. Saltwater driftwood or other previously salt water-
saturated materials;
11. Unseasoned wood; or
12. Paper products, cardboard, plywood, or particleboard.
The prohibition against burning these materials does
not prohibit the use of fire starters made from paper,
cardboard, sawdust, wax, and similar substances to
start a fire in an affected wood heater.
Burning these materials may result in the release of toxic
fumes or render the heater ineffective and cause smoke.
Deadwood lying on the forest floor should be considered
wet and requires full seasoning time. Standing deadwood
can usually be considered to be about 2/3 seasoned.
Smaller pieces of wood will dry faster. All logs exceeding
6” in diameter should be split. The wood should not be
stored directly on the ground. Air should circulate through
the logs. A 24” to 48” air space should be left between
each row of logs, which should be placed in the sunniest
location possible. The upper layer of wood should be
protected from the element but not the sides. A good
indicator of if the wood is ready to burn is to check the
piece ends. If cracks are radiating in all directions from
the center then the wood should be dry enough to burn.
If your wood sizzles in the fire, even though the surface
is dry, it may not be fully cured and should be seasoned
longer. It is EXTREMELY IMPORTANT that you use DRY
WOOD only in your wood stove. The wood should have
dried for 9 to 15 months, such that the humidity content
(in weight) is reduced below 20% of the weight of the log.
It is very important to keep in mind that even if the wood
has been cut for one, two, or even more years, it is not
necessarily dry, if it has been stored in poor conditions.
Under extreme conditions, it may rot instead of drying.
This point cannot be overstressed; the vast majority of
the problems related to the operation of a wood stove is
caused by the fact that the wood used was too damp or
had dried in poor conditions. These problems can be:
• ignition problems
• creosote build-up causing chimney fires
• low energy yield
• blackened windows
• incomplete log combustion
Do not burn manufactured logs made of
wax impregnated sawdust or logs with
any chemical additives.
Manufactured
logs made of 100% compressed sawdust
can be burned, but be careful burning too
much of these logs at the same time. Start with one
manufactured log and see how the stove reacts. You can
increase the number of logs burned at a time but make
sure the temperature never rises higher than 475 °F
(246 °C) on a magnetic thermometer for installation on
single wall stove pipes or 900 °F (482 °C) on a probe
thermometer for installation on double wall stove pipe.
The thermometer should be placed about 18” (457
mm) above the stove. Higher temperatures can lead to
overheat and damage your stove.
TESTING YOUR WOOD
• When the stove is thoroughly warmed, place one piece
of split wood (about five inches in diameter) parallel to
the door on the bed of red embers.
• Keep the air control fully open and close the door. If
the wood ignites within 90 seconds from the time it
was placed in the stove, your wood is correctly dried. If
ignition takes longer, your wood is damp.
• If your wood hisses and water or vapor escapes at
the ends of the piece, your wood is soaked or freshly
cut (green). Do not use this wood in your stove. Large
amounts of creosote could be deposited in your
chimney, creating potential conditions for a chimney
fire.
TAMPER WARNING
This wood heater has a manufacturer-set minimum low
burn rate that must not be altered. It is against federal
regulations to alter this setting or otherwise operate this
wood heater in a manner inconsistent with operating
instructions in this manual.
EFFICIENCIES
Efficiencies can be based on either the lower heating
value (LHV) or the higher heating value (HHV) of the
fuel. The lower heating value is when water leaves the
combustion process as a vapor, in the case of woodstoves
the moisture in the wood being burned leaves the stove
as a vapor. The higher heating value is when water leaves
the combustion process completely condensed. In the
case of woodstoves this would assume the exhaust gases
are room temperature when leaving the system, and
therefore calculations using this heating value consider
the heat going up the chimney as lost energy. Therefore,
efficiency calculated using the lower heating value of
