How are you guys measuring your CAT temps? did you install an aftermarket probe in there? I have never monitored my CAT temp and by reading this thread i dont want to even know.
The VC Encore is the hardest stove to run I have ever had, and I've had multiple brands over the past 20 years. Granted mine is an older Encore CAT stove but i did a ton of maintenance to it before this burn season and its hardly different than last year. I'm about done with it. There should be more people on here steering others away from VC, I sure wish I did more research before i bought the "pretty" stove from a company thats been making stoves since the beginning of time. A company thats been around as long as VC there is no excuse as to why these stoves are a PITA to operate.
I started with the mechanical probe that came with the cat kit, then borrowed a neighbors digital setup and then gave it back to the neighbor and now just use a STT behind the griddle toward the flue ONLY to look at quickly as Im walking by while Im in the middle of a burn. It's not reliable to look at STT during start-up or reload.
I was shocked to see that my secondary was getting so hot. That's one of the reasons why I borrowed my neighbors setup because surely this mechanical probe isnt working. I learned how to keep it mostly on track but I didnt want to worry about every time the cat briefly gets to a point that Im not super comfortable. For me I like a cushion of extremes so anything over 1300 cat or 625 STT I started to freak out.
I tried everything, I logged everything. I couldnt find consistent answers. The only thing that seems to work for me is to ensure I reload with a nice hot bed of coals and let the next load really catch, or if I waited too long to reload, I have to keep it on primary for a long time to really let a load get nice and coaled up before flipping over to secondary. The larger bed of coals seems to help the secondary not get so hot, as long as I only sweep the front half of the coals toward the back half of the coals and dont touch the back half of the coals much. On a windy day though through the valley, I can hear what others described as a 'blowtorch' effect if I get close enough to the stove and that's when I know my cat area is probably getting really hot. There are others that state they can hear this blowtorch effect standing 15' away. That's where I think some sort of mechanism would work for folks that have that extreme amount of air/flames rushing through the secondary. Another air control of sorts, maybe something that was automatic like they advertised but...it doesnt really exist. I believe this because I had a similar experience doing this through primary. If you have a nice new load of wood loaded and let it really catch, and air control is on high, open the top hatch for a bit and watch the flames RUSH up through the hatch into the flue pipe. One time I had this open and was talking with a family member about the stove (and the issues Ive had), and had the hatch open for awhile. I then closed it but immediately started to smell a plastic burning smell and then started to hear what sounded like mini firecrackers going off inside my flue toward the lower half. I briefly saw tiny puffs of smoke puff out of the pipe joints. After checking in on here and other resources, many would say I had a chimney fire but it was more of what most would call a 'creosote burn off'. Sure enough I looked inside the next day and I had some creosote further up, for a stove that was used maybe ...I dont know...10 times?!?! I was creating a ton of smoke when I first started out on this journey, my glass was black and my doors/walls were covered in creosote. YIKES. I was burning too low for this stove, and burning during a shoulder season to test.
Now my glass stays mostly clear. My last burn, it was COMPLETELY clear. My mind was racing to figure out what I did because I normally have at least a little bit of darkening toward the top left/right sides of my left/right doors.
At any rate, mine is a weekend stove so I dont have the time to master this to the point that I can say with assurance this or that is what people should do to dial theirs in for a specific problem. I was hoping that by page 40 of this years thread, there would be a IF > Then > else type of instruction book that people could garner to solve THEIR problems, but it seems these stoves and the problems they have are all unique while looking similar.
None of the people I know that have stoves deal with this. My one neighbor went down the path of trying to get the most out of their stove using all the probes etc and finally realized he didnt need it anymore, he just knows his stove and barely messes with it. He wont burn pine and he wont burn super wet wood, aside from that - carefree.
I almost like my stove at this point, but then I quickly remind myself that 1. things can change quickly back to crap and 2. I should be able to easily show my wife how to use this and not worry Im going to come back to a heaping pile of cast iron or a box full of charred oily wood with black glass. I feel like Im close though, especially in between reloads - just leave the air control between HERE and HERE....NEVER anywhere else. If you see tons of flames lower it down to HERE, if you see NO flames take it up one notch and wait 15 mins. If you are cold take it up 2 notches and watch the STT doesnt get to 650. If it does, lower it to HERE. (<--that's already too much for her). While that doesnt seem like a lot, like I said...my other neighbors literally set theirs and forget it until they say ..oh look , I ran out of wood. They chuck in more wood and walk away again for another 5-6 hours.
