Smoke Dragon

None taken, but then again, my house is at 80, the fire is purty, and I'm using less wood than before.

notbobvilla said:

I just wanted to say that I have lurked here for a long time and enjoy all the great info here. I read all the horror stories about new stoves that don't heat or are problamatic and it makes me appreciate my " smoke dragon". Every summer I get the urge to replace the stove with with a "purty stove with a viewing hole" and every winter I am so glad I didn't. It works great! In the 20's outside and I added too much wood and I have to open a window because it's almost 90 in here! I have an old, poorly insulated drafty 1700 square house and all I use is the ole "smoke dragon". I know there must be others like me around here, so my question is can we please come up with a better name than "smoke dragon"? Something cool and catchy? Something we can use as a "signature" as i'm getting tired of "jotul" and "PE" signatures everywhere.

No offense meant to anybody in their 65 degree house "watching" not "feeling" the heat! :lol:

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Notbobv--- your observations and operating conditions are very similar to mine. I love this site and also have lurked here for some time. Personally, I wish there was more interest and action going on regarding improvements (retrofits)that could be made to older but still servicible stoves like ours. It is unfortunate (IMHO) that the prevalent mindset seems to be "just go buy a new stove/chimney/whatever) with no apparent thought to the (possibility??) that large numbers of people are not in the position to do that. I also will continue to burn my trusty "Dragon" (Nashua) , because it still does the job it has for the last 30/35 yrs.
Best wishes, Woodrat

Allright!- Now, we're getting somewhere! I feel exactly the same way- so much talk about new stoves, with 20, 50, 100 replies. It's like subscribing to This Old House because you OWN an old house and you're not made of money, but guess what- it's filled with new houses or $500k renovations on old ones. My stove is twenty years old, and I love the looks and its downright strong-as-a-bull attitude. BUT, I do wish we could find out more about retrofits, alterations, techniques, etc to help a little with efficiency on older stoves. I like my '71 C-20 Chevy Pup w/ 3 on the tree, too. But damn, it LOVES gas! :lol:

Older stoves can work just fine and burn pretty clean if operated properly. As far as upgrades to older pre EPA stoves, I guess linning the firebox with firebricks and installing a baffle will improve efficiency some.

Heck, I modified my masonary fireplace with some airtight doors, firebricks, and hooked up outside air, and it blasts me out of my livingroom now.

Older stoves are at their best when running hard. Also, since there were 450+ stove manufacturers (way back when), the quality of older stoves varied MUCH more than the quality of newer ones.

It is possible to use a decent older stoves at a relatively high rate of burn...and burn clean! Harder to do overnight or in warmer weather.

The main "retrofit" for older stoves is proper installation, good chimney, seasoned wood, proper sizing and an educated operator. Given those, it is certainly possible for some older stoves to burn as clean as some newer ones (in the field).

Another factor is that many older stove manufacturers did not make a wide range of sizes. If you look at the typical manufacturer (Garrison, VC), they started out with gigantic stoves and, as time went by, made smaller and smaller stoves. The reason is simple - the big stoves were being choked down with very bad results!

So the benefits of newer stoves are more than a window. They often include a wider range of sizes, so that the stove can be better fit for the job. All in all, this is positive thing for air quality, safety and consumer satisfaction. It does not mean that my friend is not happy with his 1978 Dumptruck....that still does the job he bought it to do. But when you only have to pick up groceries, you don't need a dumptruck!

Input on older stoves is much appreciated- I think that some of us with older stoves just feel a little left out :down: The comment on older stoves being at their best when running hard seems to be true with my Buck. Guess I'll just be buring a little more wood than some others!

Hey- we could call ourselves Knights of the Round Stove :lol:

Personally I have a fondness for some of the older stoves. The cast ones especially are a work of art. I look upon them as a collector would, not to burn just to admire and fondle. Webbie keeps me in check from creating a personal stove museum in our basement. So I settle for my toy stove collection, which I have a cast toy Defiant and a brown Consolidated Dutchwest ceramic cookie jar from VC.

I've got an old Burdett and Smith Co. pot belly out of Troy, NY missing a few pieces. I hope to get 'er back together someday...

I want to see the fire but that is not why i am replacing my old stove I am just not going to keep in my house doing all the heating after it cracked from the corners of the door hole and if it burns less wood I do not see that as a bad thing as wood cutting is not my favorite activity So I am getting an Englander 30 by what ever name they carry where I buy it probably next month. I can not wait have mixed feelings sad to see my old friend go but excited to get a new stove with a window

Ah, the IRONy :lol:

Puff the magic dragon
lived by the sea..............................

How bout "Stoner Stoves"
Puff Puff Pass
Ugga Bugga

Woodrat said:

notbobvilla said:

I just wanted to say that I have lurked here for a long time and enjoy all the great info here. I read all the horror stories about new stoves that don't heat or are problamatic and it makes me appreciate my " smoke dragon". Every summer I get the urge to replace the stove with with a "purty stove with a viewing hole" and every winter I am so glad I didn't. It works great! In the 20's outside and I added too much wood and I have to open a window because it's almost 90 in here! I have an old, poorly insulated drafty 1700 square house and all I use is the ole "smoke dragon". I know there must be others like me around here, so my question is can we please come up with a better name than "smoke dragon"? Something cool and catchy? Something we can use as a "signature" as i'm getting tired of "jotul" and "PE" signatures everywhere.

No offense meant to anybody in their 65 degree house "watching" not "feeling" the heat! :lol:

Click to expand...

Notbobv--- your observations and operating conditions are very similar to mine. I love this site and also have lurked here for some time. Personally, I wish there was more interest and action going on regarding improvements (retrofits)that could be made to older but still servicible stoves like ours. It is unfortunate (IMHO) that the prevalent mindset seems to be "just go buy a new stove/chimney/whatever) with no apparent thought to the (possibility??) that large numbers of people are not in the position to do that. I also will continue to burn my trusty "Dragon" (Nashua) , because it still does the job it has for the last 30/35 yrs.
Best wishes, Woodrat

Click to expand...

I had that opinion of myself and my financial situation 3 years ago when I bought my stove. I had an old insert that was given to me by some relative of mine. We used it as a freestanding in the basement for 2 winters. It served the purpose by not letting the furnace kick on, but the house was cool everywhere but the basement. I was content with that setup until I made a few calls pricing fuel oil. When I my bought my house in 2000, oil was $0.84 per gallon, using 3 tank fulls a winter. The next year was a little over a dollar, and progressively higher until one day in 2005, I priced oil again and it was over $2.00 per gallon. I sat the old lady,(she was 26 at the time), and explained to her that the price was never going down, and will only escalate up until one day it will be too expensive to buy, and then we will be using space heaters everywhere and we will be slaves to the electric co. We made the decision to make it happen, because if our backs were up against the wall, we would do whatever it took to keep the house warm for our 4 kids. 2 months later, (October) we put the first of 2 payments to a dealer and had our burner operating by January. It cost us $4500 for everything, chimney pipe, cutting out the roof, 2 ceilings, installation, and the stove. This was a dedicated decision to get it done to save money in the long run. Initially we thought it would take 5 years to recoup the cost of heat, but it only took 2 and 1/2 years. After doing a little math, after this heating season, and the prices of oil rising each year, we would have spent $5850 in oil, and who knows how much for the electric part of operating the furnace. And from gathering a ton of firewood, I usually make a few grand selling off what I have left over, usually around 15 cords of wood. No need to go that buck wild, but it became a monster of it's own, and I am trying to scale back my gathering, but it is hard, running the saws is too much fun...

I heat with an old plate steel piece of junk with a 3/4" gap in one back corner, a rusted out collar and fire brick long since crumbled away. In our mild winters it's hard to heat the main floor of my small, uninsulated house to more than 65 degrees. I'll be extremely happy to scrap this unit and install my new used Hearthstone II which is sitting on my porch. I'm waiting till winter's over though since all projects take longer than expected, and I might need chimney repair etc. The old stove does seem to burn pretty cleanly though, very little smoke or creosote buildup.

well my old puff dragon,, fisher is gonna go bye bye as soon as i can afford a new one, any takers?

Todd said:

I guess linning the firebox with firebricks and installing a baffle will improve efficiency some.

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The HORROR.. the BLASPHEMY.. MODIFYING a PRE-EPA stove????

Our Dragon works just fine. Reading the last few months I doubt I would purchase a Vermont Castings Stove... Cat or Non-Cat. But our 1979 vintage SMOKE DRAGON breathes just fine.

I see soooooooo many complaints about starting, tending, Cat replacing, too much heat, not enough heat, warping, gasket failure, lack of burn time, spillage, noises, and the biggest complaint from these babies is "MY GLASS GETS DIRTY"... GEEEEEESH! :coolmad:

Every time someone tells me you should replace it with a EPA stove.. I tell em when are they going to deliver it and what time will it will be installed.

We love our VC 1979 Defiant SMOKE DRAGON!
Jim & Kathy

If you're on a budget, consider looking for a well-maintained used model of recent vintage.
I bought used and rebuilt it. The most expensive replacement part was the catalytic element.
This allowed me to have a stove I couldn't otherwise afford (enamel VC Intrepid II about $1300+ new) for much less ($275 plus about $150 parts). And while I had initial questions/issues about running this stove, I've since had trouble-free operation.

Sometimes the good old days weren't so good. My first season with the stove, I cut all my wood--including a 14" dia. 65 odd year old sassafrass tree--with an extremely pitted 5' crosscut saw with a missing tooth and one end broken off. The next year I was able to get a used chainsaw (about 20 years old). Even though I spent a lot of time fussing with the saw--cleaning out carb, stuck throttle wire, missing parts etc..--it made me wonder why I waited so long to ditch the crosscut. Though I missing the quiet and the rythym of the crosscut, I don't miss the massive amount of time, kerf-setting, and filing it took to accomplish anything.

I'm sure some might get over nostalgia pretty quick if they upgraded to a newer stove model. Sometimes you need to spend money to save money.

elmoleaf said:

I'm sure some might get over nostalgia pretty quick if they upgraded to a newer stove model. Sometimes you need to spend money to save money.

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OK Elmo..
So tell us all about your nostalgia about burning a stove. What SMOKE DRAGON did you burn prior to your rebuilt VC Cat?

I would love to hear the story?

BrotherBart said:

What do you want us to tell you? I burned in a 1985 Sierra "insert" for 21 years. Went to improve it and added a smoothwall chimney liner. Improved the draft so much that the crack in the firebox I hadn't noticed before let it get up to 1,200 degrees one night. Plugged the crack and it did it again the next night. The stove was just never designed for something that didn't exist in 1985.

It went out in the back yard as a meat smoker and I replaced it with a stove that heats at least a third better and I am only half-way where I used to be this time of year through my wood pile.

Modify away at your stove. After you buy a few new fire extinguishers.

And yes, I miss that old stove. We had a lot of miles on us together.

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Brother Bart,

I respect you dearly but wouldn't most people reduce their wood consumption by going from an insert to a stove?

I think in your case you had to ditch the old and look at new. I think most of us would make that move if we were jeopardising our family and home.

In retrospect, let's say your insert was still billowing and you weren't forced to do anything.... were you going to replace it before it let out that mighty CRACK or were you forced into it because of metal fatigue and could no longer run the beast?

I love my old stove as well. And although it smokes some, I don't consider it a "smoke dragon" as I burn it pretty clean.
Dry wood and user operation are key to cleaner burning in the "Classics".

I also noticed that there are more members here this year burning older units. I think these folks can benefit greatly from those who have flattened the learning curve on running a pre EPA stove.

So if you're burning a "Classic" then post up and ask questions, there are more members here burning them than one would think.

notbobvilla said:

I just wanted to say that I have lurked here for a long time and enjoy all the great info here. I read all the horror stories about new stoves that don't heat or are problamatic and it makes me appreciate my " smoke dragon". Every summer I get the urge to replace the stove with with a "purty stove with a viewing hole" and every winter I am so glad I didn't. It works great! In the 20's outside and I added too much wood and I have to open a window because it's almost 90 in here! I have an old, poorly insulated drafty 1700 square house and all I use is the ole "smoke dragon". I know there must be others like me around here, so my question is can we please come up with a better name than "smoke dragon"? Something cool and catchy? Something we can use as a "signature" as i'm getting tired of "jotul" and "PE" signatures everywhere.

No offense meant to anybody in their 65 degree house "watching" not "feeling" the heat! :lol:

Click to expand...