Wood stove test in camper (failed)

[Hillmann]

There have been several threads on the forum about heating a teardrop or small camper with a small wood stove. I put one in my 10 foot scotty camper a month ago but this weekend was my first real overnight test.

I don't know what the low was on Friday night but there was frost on everything but the ground in the morning so I assume it got to just below freezing so not a very good test.

The stove is about 9 inch by 9 inches by a foot and surrounded by brick to absorb the heat from the stove to keep from over heating the camper and then once the fire dies out to radiate that heat out into the camper.

I wanted to make sure I wouldn't burn the camper down when we were sleeping so for about four hours before going to bed I had the stove going full blast. The entire stove and the bottom two feet of chimney were glowing red, the bricks on top of the stove started to glow red and there was a two foot flame coming out of the chimney outside the camper.

In that time I was constantly feeling the surfaces of the camper around the stove and chimney to make sure they weren't getting dangerously hot.

Once I was satisfied it was safe-ish to go to bed with the fire burning I filled up the stove as full as I could get it with wood. To get the last few pieces in I had to use a hammer to tap them in. Then I closed off all the air to the stove to cause it to burn as long a possible. Then went to bed.

About 2 1/2 hours later I woke up to it being cold and restocked the fire and then every 2 hours after that all night long and in the morning the fire was out cold and had to be restarted so took much longer to get warmed up then I would have liked.

The second night I just stocked the fire way up before going to bed, took a couple hot bricks from around the stove and slept with them and and extra blanket and didn't do anything with the fire until morning.

So, I would recommend to anyone who is thinking of heating a teardrop with a wood stove to skip the hassle and get more blankets. Even though I plan to keep the stove in my camper but, that is because I plan to use it as an ice shack and a warming house/cabin when hunting,.

[absolutsnwbrdr]

I plan on creating some sort of wood stove for my teardrop, but had no expectations of it burning all night. It would just be to take the chill of when going to bed or waking up.

What kind of wood were you burning?

[Hillmann]

a combination of 2x4 off cuts an maple.

[droid_ca]

I'm looking at putting a wood stove in my trailer, but I know it wont run all night long ...so here is what I'm going to do (1) I want to build a hearth out of soap stone as it is the best for radiating the heat back that it has absorbed (2) ceiling fan that blows the heat down so it doesn't just go out the top (3) Extra insulation up top to prevent heat loss (4) And last but not least a Propane furnace as a back up heat source set at a certain temperature..soon as it starts to get cold it kicks in....Those are just some of the ideas that I have in mind and will be going into my build

[Vedette]

I'm looking at putting a wood stove in my trailer, but I know it wont run all night long ...so here is what I'm going to do (1) I want to build a hearth out of soap stone as it is the best for radiating the heat back that it has absorbed (2) ceiling fan that blows the heat down so it doesn't just go out the top (3) Extra insulation up top to prevent heat loss (4) And last but not least a Propane furnace as a back up heat source set at a certain temperature..soon as it starts to get cold it kicks in....Those are just some of the ideas that I have in mind and will be going into my build

Hopefully my e-mail will clear up your heater delema?????
Brian

[droid_ca]

Hopefully my e-mail will clear up your heater delema?????
Brian

[Bogo]

X2 on coal. Also figure out how long the coal fire will burn, and set an alarm for that minus some amount of time. At that point refill the stove and finish sleeping the night.

BTW, if you were getting things red hot, you were running a way too hot of fire. Slow the combustion down. Use the air inlet dampers to do that. I suggest reading up on proper care and feeding of a wood stove.

[Mikka]

Bet you all that original poster was burning soft wood like scrap of 2x4 which flash burns with extreme heat but has no capacity to produce coal. If like said, hard wood had been used, that stove would have been full of hot coal with no room to add more wood in no time.
As well poster does not mention type of bricks if regular house bricks they are too porous to absorb heat well, it is like trying to heat soil. What is needed is fire bricks specially made for fire place, stoves etc. and available at places like HD

[bobhenry]

I have had my little potbelly out on 2 January shivarees. Unfortunatly the 1st was a trial without the full chimney and the puff backs flooded the teardrop with smoke. The stove did raise the inside temp 40 degrees in less than 12 minutes so I called it a limited success.

The 2nd outing was the following season and I was very pleased with the results but my nervous bed partner insisted I let it go out.

I built a neice that mounted outside of the trailer and after removing the window I clamped it to the trailer that way in the event of a catastrophic problem it could be quickly jetisoned as a last ditch cure. I

I burned a mixture of pine and hardwood blocks all about the size of a childs abc wood blocks. A loading will last approx. 2 1/2 hours with the damper tightened a bit and the draft just cracked open.





The radiant heat from a wood stove is much different than a hot air delivery system. The folks that have heated with wood know it takes quite a while to warm the "things" in the room. It is a softer slower delivery system but it runs moment to moment until the fuel is exhausted, unlike the off and on, off and on ,of a thermostaticly controlled heating system.

The single best thing I have learned about winter camping is to pre heat the trailer in the drive at home the night before. I toss in a small ceramic heater and let it run.
Now the bedding and cabinets and interior paneling ect are pre warmed and not sucking up the heat when I arrive at the site.

[bobhenry]

9" in diameter and 14" tall if memory serves me well

[Hillmann]

BTW, if you were getting things red hot, you were running a way too hot of fire. Slow the combustion down. Use the air inlet dampers to do that. I suggest reading up on proper care and feeding of a wood stove.

I realize that was way to hot but I did it to make sure nothing flammable in the trailer near the stove would get to hot. I figured, if after four hours of burning as hot of a fire as I could possibly get and nothing in the camper got dangerously hot, that it would be safe-ish to let burn a much cooler fire/coals when I went to sleep.

I had thought of coal but the difficulty of lighting it without smoking me out, not knowing where to get small amounts of it and the shape of the firebox all made me give up on the idea.

[mj1angier]

check out the small stoves here http://ammocanstove.com/. They may work for some of you.

[Hillmann]

Bet you all that original poster was burning soft wood like scrap of 2x4 which flash burns with extreme heat but has no capacity to produce coal. If like said, hard wood had been used, that stove would have been full of hot coal with no room to add more wood in no time.
As well poster does not mention type of bricks if regular house bricks they are too porous to absorb heat well, it is like trying to heat soil. What is needed is fire bricks specially made for fire place, stoves etc. and available at places like HD

Pine during the time I had it glowing red, and stoked it up with maple before going to bed, after waking up in the middle of night; a combination of pine and maple.

Also fire brick doesn't absorb heat, they are meant to be installed in high heat areas to act as insulation.

[droid_ca]

check out the small stoves here http://ammocanstove.com/. They may work for some of you.

This is who I might be getting my stove through unless I let my friend build me one

[absolutsnwbrdr]

I wonder how wood pellets would burn in a small wood stove like the ammocans