1977 VC vigilant
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You came to the right place. A BUNCH of people on this website have, and love, this stove. I have mine going now. Our house is right at 4000 square feet and this stove will keep the whole house around 73 degrees with mid 20s temps outside. If the stove is in good shape, and you're burning good wood, it will do a great job for you.
Good wood means wood that has been cut/split/stacked long enough to get to around a 20% moisture content. My wood contain about 90% various types of oak and a little bit of hickory. Fantastic firewood but it needs, in most cases, at least three years in the stacks before it is ready to burn.
Do a search on this site for the owners manuals. If you can't find it, let me know (Private message) and I'll email you a copy. And don't be afraid to ask questions.
Good wood means wood that has been cut/split/stacked long enough to get to around a 20% moisture content. My wood contain about 90% various types of oak and a little bit of hickory. Fantastic firewood but it needs, in most cases, at least three years in the stacks before it is ready to burn.
Do a search on this site for the owners manuals. If you can't find it, let me know (Private message) and I'll email you a copy. And don't be afraid to ask questions.
Thanks for the reply. It keeps your 4000 sq/ft warm!? This thing should cook me out of my 1100 sq/ft ranch haha. Its got a small crack but I've talked to a friend that is a welder and was told its not a big fix and it was definatly caught in time. I'm really just excited to have to be getting a stove with glass doors
Yeah, the stove is in what we call the "great room." It's about 40 x 60 feet with cathedral ceiling and opens up to large lofts upstairs connected sort of a bridge/catwalk so there is a lot of open space and the air is pulled up and circulated nicely by a couple of ceiling fans. It almost gets too warm upstairs. The Master bedroom is downstairs around a corner and down a short hallway from the great room. It's a little cooler in there but we like it that way. We will have a ceiling fan on year round and may even have a window open when it's very cold outside. It's a very air tight, well insulated house. We have two heat pumps but haven't used them for heat in the winter in several years. (We sure use 'em in summer time for A/C, though!)
Thats awesome can't wait to get that sort of heat in here. This is my first year burning and my current stove doesn't do bad it's just all buisiness and no show. I feel like it goes through way too much wood and as far as burning its nothing special. Lots of room for improvement over time tho
That crack- is it on the fireback, down near the reburn chamber (bottom right corner of the fireback)? That is a common place to see that type of thing.
We just moved into a house that has a Vigilant stove with 1977 imprinted on the inside. I don't think I am doing something right as it doesn't seem to heat up the room that much. I know there is a thermostat on the back, but I don't know which way to push it---to the right. middle or left. There is also this metal stick with a twist have of metal on top of it. What is that? I tried reading the online manual, but I didn't understand some of it. Could you please explain? Thanks
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