New door gasket - how often?

[lml999]

When we first installed our Kodiak Encore 1200 insert, it seemed like I replaced the door gasket at least once a year. Our teenagers were pretty rough on the gaskets, I guess!

Now that they are out of the house, I don't think I've replaced the gasket in four or five years.

I checked it last week, it still passed the dollar bill test. However, I decided to replace it anyway as I seemed to be getting fairly short burn times, maybe an hour to 90 minutes before I had coals.

The door gasket came off in pieces. It literally fell apart as I was pulling it off. I cleaned up the gasket channel on the door and mounted the new gasket.

Now I'm getting solid three to four hour burn times with a mix of wood. I guess I'm getting much better air control.

I guess the old gasket became porous even though it passed the dollar bill test.

How often do other people replace their door gaskets?

I'm going back to at least a bi-annual replacement strategy, maybe even annual. Gaskets are relatively cheap!

 

[HotCoals]

Sounds like you're on the right track!
I'm shooting for every other year.
I'm not happy unless a dollar would rip before getting pulled through!

 

[BrotherBart]

What stove are we talking about here? The door gasket on my 30-NC is on year seven and is dollar bill tight. My previous smoke dragon regularly did ten years on a set of door gaskets.

Sounds like Blaze Kings eat more gaskets than wood?

 

[HotCoals]

What stove are we talking about here? The door gasket on my 30-NC is on year seven and is dollar bill tight. My previous smoke dragon regularly did ten years on a set of door gaskets.

Sounds like Blaze Kings eat more gaskets than wood?

lol I prolly will go 3 years like I did on the last one and I'm most likely to fussy about it.
But it's cheap insurance.
Most of it looked good but there were a few hard/burnt parts of it that I didn't like.
The cat cost too much to take a chance.

 

[lazeedan]

Sounds like Blaze Kings eat more gaskets than wood?

Alternative fuel!

 

[Backwoods Savage]

At present we are starting on our 7th year with the Fireview and still on the same gasket. Our last stove we went somewhere around 20 years before changing the door gasket. I've never quite understood why some stoves seem to eat the gaskets while others do just fine for many years.

 

[Sprinter]

Aren't the "knife edge" seals harder on gaskets than flatter seals? I could see how my gasket may have to be replaced after a few years because it gets dented in pretty hard.

Also, are some gasket materials better than others? I've heard that the graphite impregnated gaskets last longer, but I don't know for sure.