Morso 2110 - Page 7

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2.2 Wood and briquettes
Seasoning
Note that wood must be well seasoned if it is ever to work well for you. Logs should have been
cut to length, split and stacked under cover until seasoned (over a year with many woods). Well-
seasoned logs (with 20% moisture content) are light to handle, have radial cracking in the ends
and burn without steaming or hissing.
Avoid driftwood (due to its corrosive salt content) and “processed” wood such as chipboard
and Melamine coated panels (due to their chemical bonding agents).
Starting with wood
NB. Always remember to push in the grate control lever before opening the doors.
The procedure for woodburning can be summarised as follows:
1. Ensure that the grate is closed by fully pushing in the riddling lever at the lower-right corner of
the righthand door. Open the airvalves fully (6). Ensure that the log retaining bar (7) is in position.
2. Light a paper and kindling re (use relighters if you wish).
3. Leave the doors cracked open a small amount. The best position may be with the very
edges of the doors just about touching but not overlapping.
4. Once the kindling re is established, add larger logs and allow them to catch well alight
(ve to ten minutes).
5. Close the doors tightly and adjust the air valves to a normal setting.
6. Any time that you need to give the re a fast boost, open the air valves a few turns. You
may also wish to open the grate slightly by pulling the riddling lever out. But remember to
close the riddling grate for normal running and at any time that you wish to open the doors.
For a prolonged burn:
7. Once you have a well-established re, load with larger pieces of dry wood.
8. Close the doors tightly.
9. After ve to ten minutes - once the fresh fuel has been burning well for a time - close
down the air valves to a low setting (NOT fully closed).
Woodburning in more detail
Wood is adequately burnt without under-fed air. For this reason, the riddling grate should be
left in its closed position after initial ring and refueling. The combustion air will be delivered by
the air management system round to the slot above the doors. Let ash build up on the grate.
As mentioned above, the riddling grate may be moved to its open position in order to boost the
re. It may also be used to riddle out ash at certain times. But under normal circumstances, it
should be left closed with the riddling lever pushed fully in.
Ashbed for wood
Leave a one inch thick bed of ash on the oor of the stove. You will nd some benet in spread-
ing the live cinders across the width of the stove, towards the front, before adding more logs.
The frontal air supply will tend to burn the fuel from the front backwards.
Initial Air Supply
Any re will start best with the doors slightly ajar. A typical position might be with the very
edges of the doors just about touching, but not overlapping. Leaving the door locking handle
in a vertical position at this early stage will remind you that the doors need to be shut soon.
Settings
Once the re is properly fuelled, the ”normal” position for the air valves can be set. This setting
may be six to eight half turns (anti-clockwise from fully closed), on each valve. On slower or cool
ues, ten or more half turns may be needed. On fast, warm ues, fewer may be needed.