I have a small fire going; three small splits and some cedar shake kindling. Stove top griddle easily got to 500-600 and I have a good draft. The small fire is tough to judge when I would normally engage the cat as the griddle/top of stove is at 500-600 but the rest of the stove was below 200 due to the fact that the majority of the firebox is not in use right now.
I engaged the cat about 30 minutes into the fire to see what would happen. I had some smoke from the chimney so I dis-engaged the cat and let the stove burn in updraft mode for a while longer. Switched back to cat with the air wide open and slowly cut back the air to about half open. Stove top is at about 450 and no smoke from the chimney.
Sides of the stove are still at about 200 degrees and slowly climbing. I'm only using about a quarter of the firebox right now.
I'm all ears to anybody with info on running a cat version of the VC Encore. Right now everything seems to be as it should, so far...
Installation side note: Holy crap, it sucks.
I engaged the cat about 30 minutes into the fire to see what would happen. I had some smoke from the chimney so I dis-engaged the cat and let the stove burn in updraft mode for a while longer. Switched back to cat with the air wide open and slowly cut back the air to about half open. Stove top is at about 450 and no smoke from the chimney.
Sides of the stove are still at about 200 degrees and slowly climbing. I'm only using about a quarter of the firebox right now.
I'm all ears to anybody with info on running a cat version of the VC Encore. Right now everything seems to be as it should, so far...
Installation side note: Holy crap, it sucks.