Dampers 101

       This post focuses on dampers, mostly for wood stove flues.

            Now for indoor fires, mostly they need air in, and air out, like most of us don't like smoke or carbon monoxide poisoning directly related to the fire, all this as a part of the air out part of things.  Better up the chimney than into the room I live in.

            As to fireplaces, most have dampers, mostly to keep the warmer air in the house when the fireplace is not being used.  Otherwise it is usually set on full open. Yep, it is a manual setting.

            As to wood stoves, the dampers are a way to keep the warmth in the wood stove and the house heating for a longer period of time before the warm air and smoke ultimately goes up the chimney. The theory is that more modern wood stoves mostly use bimetal spring thermostats to control the air in, and let all the resulting warm air go up the chimney. Again the theory is that older type stoves also depend on best heating when using a damper on the output side of things. In this case it is kind of like learning the "personality" of whatever you setup or use, i.e. trial and error works OK. For example too much "damping" will slow down the fire too much, and one's Family won't be happy.

            Last there are both home manufactured flues, and even some store bought ones. Both work about the same. Even homework on all this in on the Internet for those interested.

            One more last. It is an OK idea to get a flue thermometer. There are many available. But one can also use their own eye, like if the exhaust pipe is glowing red hot, you have probably screwed up somewhere, and will probably get excited as to what to do.

            And I agree with the conventional wisdom that one must "burn off" a wood stove because the smell is noticeable, at least to me.  That generally only takes one use, but one does have to do this if one doesn't want their Family to smell the initial result.