woodstove catalytic combustors: What causes my stove to back puff?

Friday, November 2, 2012

What causes my stove to back puff?

When the combustor has an exhaust temperature over 1400° F. (760° C.) it can act like a glow plug (spontaneous combustion ignitor).

Usually the wood gas-to air mixture is either too lean or rich to form a highly flammable mixture. There are times when this mixture is just right within the firebox during the normal burning process.

If the combustor is running at or above the ignition temperature of the mixture, spontaneous combustion will result, causing the stove to vent puffs of smoke.

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About Tim Cork

Hi, my name is Tim Cork and if you are visiting my site for the first time, I want to thank you for stopping by and hope you will return again soon. I will have new postings every 2 to 3 days.

Just to give you a brief background on myself, I have worked in the woodstove industry for over 27 years. I am retired now and have had many wonderful years of working with catalytic woodstove manufacturers around the world. In addition, I have had the pleasure of working with dealers, distributors, chimney sweeps, consumers and environmental agencies like the United States Environmental Protection Agency.
Over the years I have gathered a world of knowledge from these people and with the help of this site I hope to share with you many interesting articles and perhaps helpful information related to catalytic combustors, catalytic woodstoves and the industry itself.
Again, please visit with me regularly for new topics and what I hope to be very informative articles.
I hope you will feel at liberty to share with me your experiences, comments and questions as well.

Know what you're shopping for

Look for the FIRECAT brand. It's a name you can trust.

Need a replacement combustor? http://www.appliedceramics.com/
You will have Applied the best.

Over the last 20 years I have seem several brands of catalytic combustors available to the woodstove industry.

Only the FIRECAT catalytic combustor was available in the early 80's and still available today.

FIRECAT's quality and committment by it's producer is second to none.

FIRECAT catalytic combustors are available for any catalytic stove model ever built.

FIRECAT has been the choice of most catalytic stove manufacturers for the last 15 years.

FIRECAT catalytic combustors are made to the stove manufacturer's specifications. Their catalytic stoves were designed to perform based on the combustor's size and cell density. (cell openings)
This is why FIRECAT catalytic combustors are manufactured in 16 cpi, 20 cpi and 25 cpi (cells per square inch)
Cell size and thickness of the combustor, controls the flow rate and residence time for the gases to burn while passing through the combustor. This is very important.

The FIRECAT brand is sold by more distributors and dealers than any other brand on the market.

How do I know this, because I sold the FIRECAT brand for the last 20 years to distributors, dealers, consumers and to the catalytic stove manufacturers.

FIRECAT Warranty Information