mass heater not burning hot enough?

hi , built my first mass heater but hav'nt insulated it with anything and it is allways smoking .
is it loosing to much heat, or not getting hot enough.
is it best to line the fire area to the barrel with fire pruf insulation or brick up all around it to get it hotter?
getting flame back in this pic think this is to the wind blowing down the chimney but hav'nt had it since .
any help would be great, thanks.

If you're not getting a good draft it could be too large or too small of a flue. The cross-sectional area should be fairly consistent throughout the stove.

What do you have for insulation now?

Don't give up. Time to start fiddling. There's lots of subtle things that can make the stove work or not. See Aprovecho's research findings.