aga wenlock multi burning stove a couple of things need help with

philious

Hi
just installed our Aga little wenlock multi stove and very new to this trying to get to grip with getting it started and finding the glass blackening up after a couple of hours.
Firstly any tips for lighting the stove and any ideas why the glass in blackening up and lastly how to clean the bloody black off the glass :mad:?
thanks

muckybutt

We always use fire lighters to start our stove, put two fire lighters in then cover them over with dry kindling, over the top of that then place some nice dry bits of wood only smallish ones to begin with until it gets going or use a small amount of coal, make sure there is a good draught through the stove that is one pointer to it blackening up as its not drawing properly.

As far as cleaning the glass if its really mucky and sticky then get a proper cleaner from a stove shop or type in stove glass cleaner on google and theres plenty to chose from.

One other pointer ! dont burn wet / damp / unseasoned wood, always burn dry seasoned hard wood, if you have a flue liner attached to the stove then burning wet wood or even soft sappy wood for that matter can block the flue in a matter of weeks. And please remember to get it swept regularly.

philious

Hi
Thanks for the reply, We kinda thought to go with fire lighters as they will burn longer to ignite the wood kindling, at the moment we use knotted paper which takes 4-6 knots to get it going.
Do you have any idea how I can improve the draw on the stove, maybe moving the stove forward alittle to improve the ventilation??? at the moment its around 2" away from the back of the chimney wall but the flue is ridged so might have to alter that.
We have had the chimney sweeped before installation and booked to come again in 6 monthly intervals, we are burning smokeless coal ovals and season wood dried outside and then brought indoors ready to burn
Its really difficult to clean the glass so I will get some proper stove glass cleaner thanks for all your advise :T

A._Badger

Did you have the stove professionally installed? The reason I ask is because the draughting of a stove is one of the most important aspects of it and whoever installed it should have checked this was right.

Generally speaking, blackening of the glass means you are not burning the fire with enough air, so the smoke is condensing on the glass. You should start with a small fire, get that roaring away and then slowly build it up.

I'm not familiar with the latest Little Wenlock (I had one of the old, British-made models) so I don't know if they have a secondary air control these days. If they have, then the instruction book should tell you how to set it. If they haven't, and all you have is a spinner, that should be fully open when lighting the stove.

philious

Hi
No I did the install myself, it seems very straight forward and it was.
I asked the misses to get the sweeper to do a draw test but as always she forgot.
Do you think if I move the stove forward that may improve the draw?
The stove does only have the spinner which is fully open.
thanks for your reply`s so far :T

muckybutt

Moving the stove forward wont make much difference, you need more air, is your house double glazed ?
You will probably need to introduce an air vent into one of your walls to allow the extra air into your room to aid combustion.
Do you realise that you need to inform council building regs to get get the job signed off and passed ? part J
Another point have you a register plate fitted ie is the chimney blocked off above the fire, except obviously for the flue to go through ?

philious

Hi
Yes I am aware the I need to inform the council to have it signed off and passed just trying to work out the bugs.
The house is double glazed but I thought the vent was only required when you went over 7kw stove!
yes their is a registery plate fitted and I have sealed it with fire cement around the plate it also has a sweeping hatch which isn`t sealed.
today i lite the stove and kept the door open a little and the fire was roaring away until the door was closed although the spinner was fully open wouldn`t this suggest more air was needed, would this be why I need a vent?

muckybutt

philious wrote: »

Hi
Yes I am aware the I need to inform the council to have it signed off and passed just trying to work out the bugs.
The house is double glazed but I thought the vent was only required when you went over 7kw stove!
yes their is a registery plate fitted and I have sealed it with fire cement around the plate it also has a sweeping hatch which isn`t sealed.
today i lite the stove and kept the door open a little and the fire was roaring away until the door was closed although the spinner was fully open wouldn`t this suggest more air was needed, would this be why I need a vent?

Im no expert fitter just a sweeper but I would say by the sounds of it you do need extra air flow into the room, I would suggest fitting a 150mm air vent into the room from the outside at floor level with an internal baffle, it all about room size and air flow, if you think about it if you have a small room with a fire that uses oxygen to burn then if the door is shut and the house is sealed ie DG then the fire will burn the oxygen content of that room, when the 02 falls below a certain level the fire will not burn as efficently as oxygen isnt being replaced because the house is sealed.
You might want to contact an Hetas approved installation engineer just to be on the safe side.

hex2

philious wrote: »

Hi
just installed our Aga little wenlock multi stove and very new to this trying to get to grip with getting it started and finding the glass blackening up after a couple of hours.
Firstly any tips for lighting the stove and any ideas why the glass in blackening up and lastly how to clean the bloody black off the glass :mad:?
thanks

Hi Philious,

We have the much wenlock and love it. You need to keep the wood away from the glass so the flames don't touch it, but it will still black up regularly especially if you burn gash or green wood. You can get the 'stovax stove glass cleaner' from Homebase for about £8, nasty stuff but works a treat.

HTH

philious

Thank you all for your replies
I have sat down and read through the manual again all about air combustion the stove needs a 100mm space around it to function at peak performance which I have but not at the back due to the ridged flue so Firstly I`m going to move the stove forward another 50mm which will make 100mm all round then if that doesn`t solve it I will fit a vent to get more air in and if that doesn`t solve it call in a hestas engineer to sort it then I will buy the glass cleaner :j
Muckybutt thank you very much for your advise much appreciated :T
I`ll keep you post as I go through the stages

Igol

Best stuff I've ever used to clean the glass costs about 60p, well it did in 06.
Morrisons Cream Cleaner, the stuff that you get for bathrooms.
3 years on I'm still using the same bottle so shows how much you need, that and a few papertowels and a bit of a rub after a min or so of soaking and everything comes off the glass.