Winter Warm/ steel vs. ceramic cat/ thermometer

Hi everyone,

I have a large Vermont Castings Winter Warm insert, 6 years old and performing poorly. The catalyst is crumbled and the inside seams are crumbled too. I plan to reseal the seams with furnace cement and replace the cat and gaskets. There is a website that sells replacement catalysts that offers a steel catalyst upgrade, does anyone have expirience with this?? Also, the same site offers a digital catalyst probe thermometer, has anyone used this sort of thing on a winter warm model???

Thanks,