outside air

Outside wood stove air

For a rocket stove to work correctly, you need a good air supply. That means a solid stream of air equal to what goes up the stovepipe must enter the house. If your stove burns better when you open a door them you need a better air supply. I live in Alaska where the temperature gets down to -30f sometimes. Most houses do leak some. For the stove to work correctly, you need a collumn of air equal to the exhaust of the stove. I use a 4 inch stovepiupe and a 4 inch collumn of -30 air coming into my 12x16 cabin mans the stove has to heat that air while it heats the room.

My first attempt at curing this was to use an outside air source directly to the firebox. -30 degree air kept the firebox from heating properly resulting in poor secondary burn and low temperatures.

My best source of heat to cool the incoming air was the stovepipe to build a heat exchanger. air will come by the easiest rout. That means air come through the heat exchanger rather than uncontrollable leaks that bring cold air into the house.

I came out the back of the stove with a 6" 90 and the a 6x4 reducer and 4" from the and on out of the house.

I put a 6" T over the 6x4 reducer and a 2 foot length of 6 inch pipe on up the outside of the 4" pipe. At the top of the 6 inch pipe, i put three 1 inch bolts and nits to center the 6 inch pipe equally over the 4 inch pipe. The bolts do not fasten to the 4 inch. only lean against it. Another 4x6 reducer is inserted into the leg of the T and then 4" to the outside.

Within 1 minute of lighting the stove I have 100 degree air coming into the room even before the stove gets hot. I also change the air in the room every 5 or 10 minutes as well as additional heating from the heat exchanger.

With this setup I am able to heat the house in half the time it took before cutting the already low wood demand in half.
https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipMXj1xz4M3H3g5yLGbx_RAo9azMU9RrZuwd7WydzdrcedCCmLjrv-lWxYh1bVgI-A/photo/AF1QipNEaqTSuUAS0flpxa-j8pbHIWw4nhwmZWxcAyFa?key=Slp1Y3J2ZjRHb3llTnE5Z1F5dDRqak0xZm1BcGl3

Note the off grid version of the the electrically heated toilet seat.

Hello I got question I have a brick house where is insanely hot even with Windows unit what you guys recommend?
Thank you

Lucie Gerber wrote:Hello I got question I have a brick house where is insanely hot even with Windows unit what you guys recommend?
Thank you

INSULATION is your friend. I have 12 inches in the walls and floor and and 18 inches in the ceiling We don't use air conditioning here much but I only use 1 cord of wood a winter while my neighbor uses 10 to 20.

I used to live in Florida in a house without air conditioning or insulation, I painted the roof white in the summer and black in the winter and I took and installed a 20 inch reversible window fan in a window on all four sides of the house. and filled in around them with plexiglass so you could still look out. the fans on the sunny side blew out and the ones on the shady side blew in. I didn't need air conditioning.

Thank you,
Do you think whole house attic solar fan would help with blowing outside/inside air?