STEELCAT Combutstors

I had one self-destruct on me. Condar traded it for a standard ceramic one, so I lost a little on the deal. It started sagging in the middle like a roll of toilet paper when you pull the center out. This was one of the long skinny Vermont Castings cats, so maybe a more normal shape would have held up better - I notice the folks at Woodstock seem to like them, but they take care to support the cats better than VC every did.

I've got the SS in the Fv and it's working well in its second year, even though it is from the batch that some folks were complaining about. I did put an extra wrap of interam gasket around it to fill the gap between it and the cat frame. I think the woodstocks are made by Sud Chemie, though. I put a steelcat in my SIL's Dw 2460, second year, and it's working well. It's a 2" thick x 6" round cat.

I had this link saved; Been a while since I looked at it but I think it was pretty interesting IIRC...:

http://www.chc-hpba.org/images/Renewable Heat Symposium.pdf

Ralphie, go to Woodstock's web page: http://woodstove.com/

Along the right side of the page there is lots of information including information on the cats. Woodstock has been playing back and forth and working with the cat manufacturer. When we bought our stove it had a ceramic cat but it did not seem to last too long. We now have a steel cat and what we've noticed is first that the cat lights off faster than the ceramic and will also light off at a bit lower temperature although we tend to still light off at the higher temperature.

One things it does appear is that on the steel cats we may have to resort to cleaning them in an vinegar/water solution once per year. There is still work being done on the cats and Woodstock is working with them still. Improvements have been made again this year so we have high hopes that the newest cats will be better and better.