the sliding baffle is one of the things ive tried . it will work , but , once youve extended it out beyond 4 inches it will begin to reduce the draft thru the stove , creating probs with draft control now . to get a good hot fire going you need to open your draft up , and once you do that and the fire is hot , now your draft will increase( because of a hotter fire ) and the fire will be even hotter than you want and it kind of feeds on itself . the hotter the fire , the more draft and the hotter the fire and so on . so to overcome that , once you get a hot fire going , you close down the draft , but now it will begin to choke the fire and it will cool down . so what i have found to work best for me is to just extend the baffle 3.5 to 4 inches , which can be done with the firebrick by overhanging the baffle with the brick lenghtwise, or a steel plate . with that 3.5 to 4 inch extention, you can reliably control the draft for a hot or a smoldering fire , and still get the desired secondary burn , longs you dont have a smoldering fire . this is what i have found to work in my stove . i also began my experiments based upon the 1600 firebox . the way its set up now, is where i get the best performance . i use the feed door draft , approx 1/4 way open , rear plug plugged , ashpan draft is set to how hot you want the fire , i usually have it set at 1 to 2 turns open for daytime fire .