Fireview cat observations

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Chad S.

Member
Nov 27, 2007
127
West Bend WI
This is my second season (first full season) using the new fireview. Too warm for 24-7 so a cold start every day or every other day. I have noticed that the cat is ready to go in about 15 min from firing it up and the stove top is only at 175-200!! So instead of waiting I engage, and 10 seconds later its glowing!! I am using box elder wood and supercedars to get the fire going and have good stuff to put on top when it gets cold. No kindling needed, just throw half or quarter of the supercedar between the 2 bottom logs, light, and finish loading the stove. I am already at 300deg from a COLD start only 35 minutes ago. Last season I waited until the stove top reached 250 and went through a lot of wood and wasted a lot of time. So if I am sure that the stovebox is at 500 deg or more and all the wood is charred, I engage and take a look and today the stovetop was at 175, but the cat was glowing (1000 or more deg).
 
Chad, you state that you noticed that the cat was ready to go in 15 minutes. What is it that you notice about this cat that tells you to engage?

Also, you need to be aware that it is recommended to not heat the stone too quickly lest you might get some cracks. From the manual, page 13: Never build a roaring fire in a cold stove! It takes at least 45 minutes to fully heat up the soapstone mass of the Fireview stove. Any attempt to hurry this process and generate extremely high heat quickly could result in damage to the cast iron or to the soapstone.
 
This is how I've been starting my stove. I get a good pile of kindling going and let it burn til it turns into a good red hot coal bed, usually takes 20-30 min and the stove top is up over 200. Then I rake the coals forward, add the number of splits I need, get them going for 10-15 min and engage the cat around #1 and go from there. The hot kindling fire helps warm up that chimney quickly and when I add the splits it's just like a normal reload when you burning 24/7 so I'm not losing as much fuel from the splits as I would if they were in the kindling fire for 30-45 minutes.
 
Yeah I forgot about the roaring fire thing :red: Just excited on how well the supercedars work. As for knowing the cat is ready, I look up and see it glowing so its obviously 1000+ degrees. but the stove top isn't ready yet and built a hell of a roaing fire :eek:hh: Suppose I better use kindling and cedars to get it going instead of just using full size splits and the cedars to avoid damage. Thanks for the reminder Dennis.
 
Just packed my stove pretty tight with mostly hard maple and a couple smaller pieces of ash on top of the super cedar. Lit off the super cedar, bypassed the cat and left the air control at 4. Took almost an hour but now the stove top is 300 degrees and I just shut it down - all the wood is charred on top, the ash is mostly gone and the maple is glowing through the window and small ghost flames everywhere. I's agree that if you are getting it up to temp that fast, you might want to slow it down a bit.
 
Those super cedars are awesome, I have to agree with you there.
 
WNY PAT said:
Just packed my stove pretty tight with mostly hard maple and a couple smaller pieces of ash on top of the super cedar. Lit off the super cedar, bypassed the cat and left the air control at 4. Took almost an hour but now the stove top is 300 degrees and I just shut it down - all the wood is charred on top, the ash is mostly gone and the maple is glowing through the window and small ghost flames everywhere. I's agree that if you are getting it up to temp that fast, you might want to slow it down a bit.

Pat, you can heat the stove up a bit faster than you are. The way to do that is to dial down that draft a bit. With the draft set on 4, almost all of the heat just goes up the chimney. Try dialing it down to 2 after maybe 12-20 minutes or thereabouts. Sometimes you might have to wait 30 minutes; it all depends upon your fuel and the weather.

I recall last evening when my body was not in too great of shape I asked my wife if she would get the fire going. There were some coals in there but not many. All went well but at one point I recall asking her to check the flue temperature. She did and said it had hardly raised. It was only about 3 minutes later I could hear the stove pipe ticking and she was in the other room so I got up to look. Sure enough, the flue temperature was 600. I dialed the draft down to 1 rather than 2. Then it was just a very short time before we engaged the cat. My point is that when I dialed the draft down, the flue temperature dropped and the stove temperature raised; quite rapidly too. We did engage the cat when stove top was 250 and flue was 450. Then the temperature reversed with the stove top raising and the flue temperature decreasing.
 
Thanks Savage - I'll give that a try next time..... :)
 
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