Jotul F500 vs Woodstock Fireview?

Hmm. . .maybe atmospheric conditions were giving you better draft on your first burns. . .or maybe not. Some other things to consider: Flue leak? Did you seal the connection at the flue collar with furnace cement? Maybe the door latch needs to be tightened. . .check the door seal with a dollar bill. Try using smaller pieces of wood very loosely packed to heat up more quickly.

It sounds as if it could be 2 things:

1. Cat not working properly. Pull the cat and check it.

2. Bypass not working. Easy to determine by opening top lid and working bypass lever while watching bypass.

Gyprat,
How tall is your chimney and what's the weather like down in SC?

And did you call Woodstock? Answer? Or did you check the cat and the bypass? What did you find?

Sounds like you have a good wife, good chainsaw, and a good kerosene heater. Maybe in time you can make that cat-rock keep you warm :lol: just funning of coarse you will get it going.

Gyprat, I hope you can straighten out your quick burn problems. I would go with what others above have said. You'll be up an running in no time.

I was reading this entire thread last night and know that one of your concerns was the ash removal on the fireview. I was finding that I had to remove some ash and coals daily (still do) to prevent large coal buildup. It was tedious to remove hot coals with a shovel and dust could easily get all over the house. I never spilled a shovel full of ash, but could imagine the mess it would make.

I bought the "Ash Dragon" last burn season. I am very happy with it. One scoop every morning and I'm good to go for the day. It closes right over the ashes to prevent spillage. It also is just the right width to get in the side door of the Fireview stove. Check out some old threads. I believe others are happy with this device too. http://www.ashdragon.com/

inspector, that is highly unusual to have to clean ashes that often and very undesirable for sure. We've burn a lot of wood for this early in the season this year but still have yet to empty any ashes. During the winter months when we are burning the most wood we empty ashes perhaps every 4th day. As for the coaling, excessive coaling is usually a hint that the wood is not as dry as it should be. Another thing on the coaling, just before our wood gets down to nothing but coals, we open the draft full. This will help to burn down the coals and works really well.

I looked at those same choices when I moved into our new house. It came down to capacity - I needed the firebox size of the Oslo. If faced with a similar decision again I would still come down on firebox size as the deciding factor between such two well regarded, quality stoves.

And the ash pan on the Oslo didn't hurt either. The open grate in the Oslo with the large ash pan is a big deal to me. I also burn 24/7 for about five months a year and the ability to quickly remove the ash without disturbing the fire is a real plus. I wish I could go a week, but it is every three to four days for me.

The comment above about the air control getting hot caught be by surprise; I had never thought about it. It does, of course, but I don' grab it, just tap it one direction or the other

My stove works better with less ashes in it so I clean mine out every 4 days or so and my wood is dryer than a popcorn fart.

Yes, I know that pulling ashes out daily is not the best thing. I've discovered that this stove is simply too small to heat the area that I am heating. As a result, I have to run it as hot as I can to keep the space warm. Basically, I'm running it as hot as I can get it 24/7. So, by doing that, I get coal buildup. I know my wood is dry (with an occassional wet piece once a week or so), so know that isn't the problem. Current wood has been C/S/S for 2 years, starts like a dream and gets the stove plenty hot.

I considered upgrading to the new, larger Woodstock stove, but thought it over and I'll stay where I'm at. I just don't want to spend another $1800-2K on a stove. My wife would shoot me!

I leave the one inch or so but it seems like the fires get going quicker with less ash, the Nashua was the same way, a deep bed of ash and a new fire seemed slower to get going.

If you're burning that hot now, there is no way it will keep up when the temps get really cold.

I don't think Oslos need a super chimney. Mine is about 15 feet, external masonry chimney, 8" square clay tile lined, uninsulated. Not exactly the best recipe for a chimney. Yet my Oslo runs like a champ. Starts right up, don't need to crack any doors to get it going, no smoke spillage issues. I can't comment on the wood quality sensitivity, as I have only tried burning thoroughly dry wood.

I can't agree with those who say the ash pan is worthless, though. I've had two stoves (old one was a VC Defiant Encore, too) and both it and the Oslo have great ash pans. I burn 24/7 and empty the Oslo's ash pan every 5-7 days. There is no ash mess at all if you do it right, which involves NOT raking a bunch of hot coals into the ash pan before removing it. If you just pull the pan, it's fairly cool, and the ash does not fly around.

Agree that the front door ash dumping is a design flaw. An Oslo is designed to be run from the side door. I open my front door once at the end of the season for spring cleaning.

I know it won't be my complete heating for the whole house. The layout of my house isn't conducive to heating with a single stove - even an Equinox, or some other large stove. I live in a large, old, uninsulated masonry home. There are simply no oppurtunities to insulate the exterior walls, mainly due to the type of construction. However, this stove (and the previous one) provide about 1/2 to 2/3 of my heating. I think the only way to heat the whole place with wood would be to have a second stove (like you!). Not something I'm willing to do, yet. So far (we've lived here for 17 years) the heating bills are manageable and the stove is a great source of extra heat, a great gathering place for my family, and a great hobby.

Yes I did call Woodstock. They advised to buy some kiln dried wood from a grocery store and try again. They also suggested to pull out the combustor and check for any contamination or damage.
It'll be another week before I can do this. I'll post the results.

Yes I put some stove cement on the flue collar although the manufactutrer did not recommend using any cement. Checked the door gasket. Everything seems ok.

The cimney is about 16 ft total length. The weather was around 31 degrees when I did the testing. It's warmer now.

My house is equally poorly laid our for good distribution of stove heat, i however bit that bullet and bought another stove. I will have to post the true rsults of this legendary duel set to go down. A but more work and it will be oslo vs fireview under one roof....

Now ill have to decide who will get the starting gig in the family room, and whos going for fridgid weather backup, in soon to be finished basement.

You guys were right about the ash pan or the lack of it on the Fireview. No big deal. It's vey easy to clean and will easily go without cleaning for 4-5 days. No additional gaskets and dors to worry about.

This will be an interesting stove duel. Cat against non cat, stone against cast iron. Can't wait to hear the results.

Gyprat,
You will get it figured out, keep us posted, plenty of Fireview owners here to help out.

I'm guessing the Oslo will pack a heavier punch within a certain radius. The burn times is where the Oslo will far way short.

Yeah, I'm guessing the Oslo heat will feel more intense and have more ups and downs in the heating cycle while the Fireview will give that longer lasting less intense even heat.

You are a very bad man, StumpBranch!
Similar predictions here. Both fireboxes ~ 2 cu ft, AFAIK, but I did read a recent post by someone who thought that the Oslo was bigger. . .I guess you will soon be in a position to tell us for sure. I'd probably use the FV as the steady heater. It holds coals, like f0rever, so it's very forgiving of missed reloads. To me, the heat capacity of the stone makes it like a train, slow to get up to speed and slow to stop, at it's best running non-stop. The Lil' Heat Engine That Could! The Oslo should be quicker on cold starts, and is rated for 70K BTU, but I guesstimate that this level of output would result in ~ 4-hr burn time. So yeah, I'd want to keep the FV simmering 24/7 and fire up Ozzy to add a fast blast of heat when temps dip, but you'll probably have to swap them around 3 or 4 times to know for sure. This is gonna be g00d!