Lopi Leyden is out of the running...now what? F500? Isle Royale?

Any reason you can't put a stove pipe damper in to reduce the draft if necessary?

Jotul Rangeley is a top loader with firebox capacity similar to the F500. With regards to side loaders, the Woodstock soapstone stoves are very controllable too.

Good luck,
Bill

I also went from a top loading VC to a side loading F500 Oslo. Side loading takes some getting used to. Still seems a little wierd to me. Very happy though.

Side loading ain't bad at all. One of the things I like is that I really don't have any smoke escape on my Keystone - it's still going up the chimney while I'm loading. That gives me plenty of time to load the stove and shuffle splits around if I need. The floors are generally well below the door, so no ash spillage.

Good luck,
Bill

One other thing I noticed is that with your hearth, you are going to need some space in front of the stove - typically 16 or 18 inches if it has doors on the front - in addition to side doors. You look good on the sides. Not to beat the Woodstock drum to death, but they don't have a door on the front and their front clearances are tighter - around 8 inches. I think one of those would look pretty good on your hearth and they've got some great pricing going right now. Check woodstove.com

Bill

I have an F600, 34+' fun to the top of the cap. Running like a charm- will see if that changes when the real cold (teens down to single digits) makes a difference.

Hi,
I used to be a dealer for QuadraFire, and one time when we had excessive draft on a tall chimney, their factory engineer okayed a restrictor down to 5" at the top of the flue. Lopi/Travis Industries is a class outfit, and if you call them, they might be able to help you out. I would check out this apprach before I would settle (imho) for any lesser stove than the Leyden. They are my current favorite, based on performance, engineering, build quality, looks, and overall heirloom potential (old school ambiance and quality, along with state of the art/science technology)...
Pragmatically speaking, a damper in the smokepipe will solve/prevent overfiring, but in today's political/legal climate, manufacturers and dealers and installers and inspectors and insurance folks try really hard to account for Darwin, aka the "bigger and better idiot" factor... Let your conscience be your guide...
Stay warm, and practice safety,
Ed

stay away from the QFIR that top baffle is a pain, we won't even sell em anymo look at a Harman Oakwood, real quality product.

CT Burner said:

One said he has had several Leydens come back with "collapsed backs, and that the clips that hold the bricks in place are made of soft metal and weaken over time."

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I had a local dealer tell me he didn't like the Leyden, saying they burned too hot. That's what I'd worry about with 35' of pipe, and maybe with the Oakwood, too. The Oakwood also likes really dry wood.

Don't think you could go wrong with the Jotul.

The top loading on the IR is actually quite easy to use--lift the griddle/lid, raise the plate with the bypass lever (just like any other top loading stove....) insert new splits, lower bypass, close griddle. Easy as pie!

NP

CT Burner said:

Thanks Ed.
Someone earlier pointed out that the Leyden manual states 33' max chimney length. Plus, I've spoken to 3 dealers in the area that deal with QF, Lopi, and Jotul. All of them are pointing me towards the Jotul 500 for what I'm looking for. The QF IR with the top door where the tubes move out of the way, etc....sounds complicated?

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humpin iron said:

stay away from the QFIR that top baffle is a pain, we won't even sell em anymo look at a Harman Oakwood, real quality product.

Click to expand...

We've had no problems with the top baffle on our IR, though admittedly we've only had it a few months. We bought our used and it needed a new baffle, and rather than pay QF $80 for one, I ordered the material off of ebay and made our own replacement for $10 and about 5 mins of work....

We've been burning for 25+ years and the IR is by far the best wood stove we've ever owned.


NP

Doug we've been burning 25+ years and have owned over 12 stoves, and our IR is hands down the best stove we've ever owned. The top-loading works just great, and we used a Defiant-Encore for several years and got spoiled on top-loading. I don't know what you mean by "can't pack the box," we pack ours full every night and get great 8-10 hour burns. Raising the burn tube asempbly out of the way for top-laoding is just like using the bypass damper on a VC stove--one lever is all you need.

We also really like the 18" depth of the IR firebox which allows us to "cigar burn" (N/S) which we great prefer over E/W stacking as we seem to get better/longer burns and no logs rolling into the glass. FWIW we sold our F-500 Oslo to get the IR instead because we were never happy with the Oslo's performance, it always seemed starved for air in our installation whereas the IR is a dream to light and keep burning. With the amount of draft you have an Oslo would probably work fine for you, though we really like the larger and deeper firebox of the IR over the Oslo.

NP

CT Burner said:

Hi All:

In my search to replace my cracked 30 year old VC Resolute, I was nearly ready to buy the Leyeden (love top loaders)... but then someone pointed out max chimney of 33' state in the manual.

I'm well over 35' on my solid metal liner...so I guess the Leyeden is out.

As for top loaders, my local rep told me about the IR. However, reading more about its top loading option, it does not sound ideal (ie. can't pack the box...tapered box...burner tubes in the way, etc...).

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Doug, we too liked the Lopi Leyden and came very close to buying it. Also loved the Hearthstones. But after checking out the Woodstock stoves we ended up with the Fireview and couldn't be happier. No 33' chimney here either as we are close to 10' with ours and it does the job nicely.