at first the primary was all the way open. Now I am closing around 400* on the cat probe.
I'm not familiar with the operating instructions on the Appalachian 52, but this sounds awful early to me. Normal procedure (on reload of an already warm stove) is as follows:
1. Open bypass.
2. Load wood. A few smaller pieces (3") on bottom to get load going, larger stuff (4" - 6") on top.
3. Burn with bypass open until stovetop hits 500 - 600 F, or flue temp hits 500 - 600 F on outside of single-wall.
4. Close bypass.
5. Wait 5 - 15 minutes for cat to reach cruising temperature (~1000F).
6. Lower primary air in 3 - 4 increments (1/2, 1/4, 1/8, closed).
7. Verify cat probe temp stays well above 500 F (1000 - 1500 F is typical).
Doing this, I typically have stove-top temps 350 - 400 F, and cat probe temps of 1500 F for the first several hours of the burn.
If you're starting from a cold stove, precede the above instructions with:
1. Kindle and light.
2. Add a few 2" - 3" splits, let them get going.
3. Add a few 3" - 4" splits, let them get going good.
4. When stove-top or outside of single-wall reach 500 - 600 F, close bypass damper.
5. Burn this load with air control kept full open, or 1/2 open. Stove will not overheat due to small load of wood. Your goal here is getting the chimney and stove pre-heated.
6. When this small load reaches coaling stage, proceed with the reloading instructions above.
Very tough to get a good fire going with all oak in the firebox. If you said it, I missed it, but have you split a piece and checked moisture content on a freshly-exposed interior face? The overwhelming majority of all cat stove troubles come from insufficiently dry wood.
Now this is got me.
1. Do you get all the wood cherried like a cig. Are just some?
2. How long should it take to get up to temp?
3. What should be the ideal temp to get the stove before closing down?
4. How do I get the temps to 1000* on the cat probe with out it back puffing and keeping the temp until it peaks?
Some of these questions I just answered above, but I do try to get all of the wood charred over in bypass, before closing the damper. This sometimes means closing down on primary air while still in bypass mode, to allow the wood to char longer, without overheating the flue. This would be the case when burning lots of oak, or other insufficiently dry wood.
In terms of getting cat temp up without backpuffing, I suspect you're having the same exact trouble I had last year. Wood is too wet, and so things don't really take off the way you want, early in the burn. At some point an hour in, the wood finally dries out, and with a hot bed of coals now established, things take off like a bat out of hell. I remember many late nights, wanting to go to bed, while sitting up frustrated with a backpuffing stove. You will actually find several threads of me complaining about this the last two years, but this year my troubles seem to have disappeared. I think the only thing I've really changed is the quality of my wood.
This morning at 7 the house was 50* still had coals in the firebox to start the load but it took a hour to get up to 800* on the cat probe. We left to go to our Thanksgiving dinner at 2 and the house was at 70* and stove was 800* on the cat probe.
An hour from a cold stove, or an hour from a reload? If an hour from cold, not entirely abnormal. If an hour from a reload, you've got wet wood.