BWCA Stove baffle? Boundary Waters Winter Camping and Activities
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Minnesotian
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12/02/2012 02:55PM   (Thread Older Than 3 Years)


Anyone here use or have made an internal baffle for their stove? I have been toying with the idea but was wondering how much it affects the draw of the stove. Will it make lighting a fire harder? Should I expect more smoke in the tent when I open the front? Thanks much.
 
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PortageKeeper
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12/02/2012 04:08PM  
I have been using wood stoves all my life. A baffle in a large stove only helps a small amount when it comes to holding heat in the top of the stove, and does help fill the room with smoke each time you feed the stove. IMO, most tent stoves are too small to benefit from a baffle at all. Also, the stove pipe itself acts as a baffle in most tent stoves anyway, as it usually drops down into the stove a couple inches, blocking SOME heat from escaping.
12/03/2012 05:23AM  
I too have been around wood stoves most of my life. In my youth,, wood stoves were just basically a big steel box with direct access to a vent. I think the efficiency of these brutes was at 50% or under. I believe sometime in the late 80's or early 90's,, the EPA stepped into to make the efficiency better and less pollution-- and now eff is generally between 65% and 75%. One of the main things added was baffles along with tubes with small holes in them, the later being over the top for portable wood heat in a canvas or nylon tent. However,, in my experience,, a baffle alone will allow a stove to burn slightly more efficient as more of the smoke is allowed to combust before being vented out. But more importantly,, less chance of sparks being vented to places you don't want them/ More smoke may enter the tent when fuel is added in the beginning etc,,but you will have piece of mind of another obstacle a spark has to get through before it lands on your tent. I think it really comes down to just how many times you go in the winter and type of tent material for a baffle to be added.
Dan Cooke has several stoves with baffles. I recently asked him how he added his baffle-- his words,
"The stoves have a "divider" forcing the hot gasses to go towards the front of the stove before getting around the divider and going up then back to the flue. Pop Riveted in a piece of titanium foil about 2" from the top of a Kni-co Packer Stove. The other was a duct work home built."


 
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