Cat engaged on Defiant and I have smoke

[BrowningBAR]

I can see the cat is glowing but I have smoke (not steam) coming out the chimney. Not a massive amount of smoke, but smoke nonetheless. And a steady amount. I have been noticing this has been happening on the Defiant.

Any suggestions? No cat probe and I won't have one until next burning season.

 

[jimbom]

I don't have a Defiant, but an Encore. You certainly trump me on knowledge of VC stoves. When I was thinking of failure modes on mine, the thought came to me that the bypass damper needed to be monitored. I have not had a problem, but if I did, that will be the first place I am going to check for smoke escaping without going through the cat.

 

[BrowningBAR]

I don't have a Defiant, but an Encore. You certainly trump me on knowledge of VC stoves. When I was thinking of failure modes on mine, the thought came to me that the bypass damper needed to be monitored. I have not had a problem, but if I did, that will be the first place I am going to check for smoke escaping without going through the cat.

The Damper seems to be closed properly. It isn't shifted or uneven. Any flames that I have do not seem to be drawn to the damper.

Stove top sitting at 640, which is way too hot for the weather right now, but I need to sort this stove out and work out the kinks now before next winter. Even with the excess heat, it is still tons more efficient than the Vigilant.

Currently have three medium-large splits sitting on a thick bed of coals (Intentionally early reload for this reason). One hour into the burn. 45 minutes since the cat was engaged. I have the air at 45-ish% open. I had it closed all the way (did it in stages), but I opened it back up to see if the smoke would decrease. It did, but there is still smoke at a steady rate.

Cat is still glowing.

 

[BrowningBAR]

It is possible that it is my wood and that the Defiant is more sensitive to this than the Encore is.

The smoke lessens when I have the air controls opened up a bit. Which would seem to indicate that it is the fuel. Which is a little surprising considering how the Encore has been running.

 

[wkpoor]

I barley know what your stove looks like but feel inclined to comment that something has to be real wrong. A 650 degree stove top on a pre epa stove would exibit a clean chimney let alone a cat stove. I'm thinking it has to be the wood unless its just plain steam.

 

[BrowningBAR]

I barley know what your stove looks like but feel inclined to comment that something has to be real wrong. A 650 degree stove top on a pre epa stove would exibit a clean chimney let alone a cat stove. I'm thinking it has to be the wood unless its just plain steam.

I agree that it is the wood at this point. It's not steam as it travels too far before it disappears. It also has a smell.

The smoke increases when I shut the air down more. The cat is still glowing, though. A little disappointing as it will be difficult to properly judge the stove if the rest of my wood is too wet to burn clean.

 

[begreen]

This is with a ceramic cat correct? Is it new or is this the cat that came with the stove?

 

[BrowningBAR]

This is with a ceramic cat correct? Is it new or is this the cat that came with the stove?

Ceramic. New. Came with stove.

The stove came with a new assembly and cat.

 

[jimbom]

The pressure drop across the cat/refractory assembly is very high. Negative gauge pressure at the flue collar will be trying to pull combustion gases through any path around the cat. Is there any chance the fire back gasket is displaced? Or that the fire back is sitting slightly high in the bottom groove? Piece of stove cement, rock, screw, or something in the groove.

When I got my used Encore the fire back had a lot of stove cement in the lower left corner of the fire box. After I chiseled that out and got the fire back out, found the lower left corner of the fire back gasket had been displaced. Combustion gases had been escaping at that corner leaving a black sooty mark. Someone noticed this and tried to seal the leak with stove cement in the fire box. For me it meant a lot of work getting the groove for the fire back cleaned to bare metal and same for the fire back gasket groove. When I replaced the gasket, I used one size larger and stretched it ever so slightly except at the lower corners. Rather than install the fire back while the cement was plastic, I allowed the assembly to cure a couple of days to lock the gasket onto the fire back. During assembly, I looked for firm but smooth resistance as the fire back went into position. So far, knock on wood, the stove has worked like a charm.