How to use your wood-burning stove – the right way

Smoke should be invisible

It is easy to remain on good terms with your neighbours, even if you are burning a lot of wood in your stove. If you are burning wood properly, the smoke from your chimney will be almost invisible and thus be of no nuisance to your neighbours. As a general rule, if smoke from the chimney is grey or black, this means that the stove is not being fired correctly.

Retain heat with soapstone

Trying to burn firewood on low heat during the night by reducing airflow is not a good solution. It produces partial combustion, which produces a lot of soot and particles. Never reduce airflow beyond the point to which the flames in the combustion chamber are clear and vibrant.

If you would like to retain heat for a longer period of time, you should instead choose a stove with soapstone/natural stone or a heat-retentive stone (akku). This will retain heat long after you have stopped adding firewood.

See our selection of stoves with heat-retentive stone.

Tips for efficient heating with consideration for the environment

The correct form of ignition is called “Top/Down”, whereby the wood burns from top to bottom. Here are a few tips for the best way to ignite the wood in your stove:

• Always leave 1-2 cm of ash in the base.
• Lay out 2 larger (4-6 cm thick) pieces of firewood on the base.
• Lay 10-12 (1-2 cm thick) kindling sticks on top, with plenty of air in between.
• Place one or two fire-lighters among the kindling sticks.
• Set all the air grilles to fully open.
• Once the fire is burning well, close off the primary airflow, then adjust the secondary airflow until there is a clear and vibrant flame.
• For masonry chimneys or on days where there is fog, for example, it may help to open the door for a few minutes during the initial ignition. Remember to close it again though!
• When the fire has burnt to glowing cinders, add new firewood. Carefully open the door 1-2 cm for a few seconds to relieve the pressure, to prevent ash and smoke being ejected into the room.

Watch the video to see how to fire up your wood-burning stove correctly.

VARDE STOVES – Correct lighting and refuelling of a VARDE stove from Varde Ovne on Vimeo.