Comments & another question on my earlier Boxwood post.......

[Dign]

Thanks for the replies on the safety question of the Vogelzang Boxwood stove..A little more info--I have the model BX42e , ( the small BX26 was too little and very poorly fitting construction ), It's installed in a 600 sq.ft. room several feet away from the nearest wall with a straight up black pipe entering a triple duravent pipe thru the roof between the rafters, there is no lower ceiling and the entire installation is visible and sturdy with steel brackets. This draws very well and I have a damper installed above the stove. The front door had a half inch gap between the bottom and the sliding ash plate that I closed up by building up a bead of furnace cement caulking and filing it down to a closer clearance. Now I am able to load up the stove and close down the front intake and adjust the pipe damper to allow only a small draft and it will still have hot coals after an overnight burn The pipe temp will be down around 200 but with some stirring of the coals and some dry wood it comes right back up to heat. The entire rear two thirds of the stove has turned whitish gray but I was told by the company that while this was due to "overheating" it had not been damaged as it has never been over 800 degrees even when building up initial heat . During normal burning the temperature usually stays between 400 to 550 degrees...Performance wise, I am happy with the even heat I can maintain and the control I have over the burn.. BUT,, while this is not a sleeping/living area I am concerned about the possible thinness or poor quality casting that some have spoke of.. How long would it take for air pockets/defective castings to show up or go bad? Does the fact that I have used this stove for the last couple months with some stretches of non stop burning mean anything as far as it's strength of build?... I appreciate all the info & opinions.....

 

[drewboy]

Hey Dign, I'm not sure about the quality of the cast iron that you were asking about but I just
wanted to tell you what I did with my "26" which I burned for a season. The gap at the front of the stove
would let an ungodly amount of air into the stove so I cemented a gasket in that place, the sliding ash
plate had a slot cut into it that I used an antique iron to block the flow of air as much as possible -
although the air found it's way in from the stove top anyway...You also want to check the corners of
the stove and re cement the joints after a season of burning - no big deal there. I had a couple of
uncontrollable fires in mine which scared me into either not burning wood or buying something that I
trusted when I left the house - which doesn't seem to fit your situation since it's not in your living
space.
Good luck with it - I won't preach too much - just figured I'd tell you my experience.

Rob