Jotul castine vs oslo

[goofa]

I have the opportunity to buy hey Castine with double wall pipe for 15 feet the through the roof kit and the stove for 1500 dollars or an Oslo itself for 1500 both are used and only a year old. Any suggestions?

 

[begreen]

It really depends on your heating needs. How large an area is being heated? 24/7 or nights and weekends? Is either stove enameled?

 

[goofa]

The stove would be a second stove in the home but could be used as a primary heat source or supplementary heat source. the room was previously an attached garage turned into a family room. the other stove is in the basement. the house is a 1400 sq foot ranch but the garage is an additional 400 sq foot. Currently the stove in the basement heats the whole area very well but the stove into the new room could possibly be the new primary heat source or just used to heat that room if we closed all the doors. and whatever stove I purchase will be following me to a new home in 3-4 years.

 

[begreen]

Unless the new space is wide open and connected to the main house it may be hard for the heat to convect to the rest of the house. How large is the connecting entryway to the new area? If under 4 ft The Castine may be a better choice as an area heater. If the opening is very wide thn I would opt for the Oslo.

 

[DianeB]

We have a raised ranch and use the Castine to heat the roughly 1,200 upper level - does a really nice job. We almost went with the Oslo, but on the advice of the hearth shop owner, decided not to. He felt with the Castine, we would run it hotter. With the Oslo, we would be dampening it down and perhaps creating too much creosote. Hard to tell from the picture, but the hearth is 6 feet wide . PS - we used to have the Fisher Mama Bear - when doing a re-build on the chimney and pulled the stove out, we found a crack in the back of the stove. Could have tried welding it, but after 35 wonderful years with the stove, felt a retirement in order

 

[goofa]

thank you very much. we seem to be on a similar page i have a 1400 sq ft ranch and am currently heating with a Fisher Papa Bear from the basement. but i just pulled the trigger on a hand shake deal with a CL ad for a 1 year old Jotul Castine. i go pick it up on the 19th so the count down begins until i pick up the stove and then until its installed and until i get to use it.

 

[DianeB]

Good luck with the stove. Will be a learning curve. Get some stove top thermometers. I got two. One for each side so I can make sure it was heating pretty evenly. I had a new stove, but with a used, you may especially want to monitor stove top temps unless you plan on changing out the gaskets just to make sure all it new in that dept. Get yourself some Rutland glass cleaner too. Until you figure out how to get the temp to 500 at least, you may darken your glass if you shut down the stove too soon. Getting the stove hot - 550 or so will generally burn off the black on the glass, but I like to clean mine every couple of days in the morning. Quick job. You also will want to monitor the stove top temps per your Castine manual (you can download manual from the Jotul website) Ash pan real easy to use. I pull it out every 3-4 days. Make sure you pull it out before overfilled as if it overfills and you pull the pan out, you skim some ash that falls in the back of the pan that you have to brush out or the pan does not go back in correctly. Also, never try to get your fire going by opening the ash pan door. Too much air drawn in and the overheating could warp the grate. Just open the glass door a 1/2 inch or so and monitor it by sitting nearby if you are in a rush to get it lit. Get some supercedar fire starters they are great. Get yourself a rake tool also to drag the ashes over the grate so they fall in if you want to clean the stove out,

http://www.amazon.com/Rutland-Heart...1283345&sr=8-1&keywords=rutland+glass+cleaner

http://www.supercedar.com/
(members here get a discount, I think the code to use at check out is hearth) They are great. I only use 1/4 of the disk to get my fires going and rarely have to use anything but paper and the super cedar


http://www.amazon.com/Bayou-Classic...id=1381283455&sr=8-1&keywords=wood+stove+rake


http://www.amazon.com/Inferno-3-30-...1283560&sr=8-1&keywords=stove+top+thermometer

With the Fisher, gloves were not needed, but you will find gloves come in handy with the east/west wood loading - you may need to reposition pieces to get the best fit. Get the ones that go up beyond your elbows.

.http://www.amazon.com/Steiner-21923...qid=1381283793&sr=8-3&keywords=welders+gloves

Just sharing things we found we needed going from the Fisher to the new EPA stove

 

[stovelark]

Hi Goofa, sounds like a Castine would be great, congrats on your new stove. Nice posting from Diane above too, one can tell she is experienced using her Castine and has good taste in enamel colors (blue black, my favorite Jotul color..) Lets have some pix when its installed... good luck.

 

[lumbering on]

I've been agonizing over the same question, castine v oslo. I think I'm going castine as an area heater for first floor for similar reasons. Beautiful stove. Congrats.

 

[goofa]

Diane B Thank you very much for all the helpful information. The only thing i lack on you list is the glass cleaner because i never had to deal with glass... thats half the excitement with the new stove. I just got my free sample of the super cedars last week and have not gotten the chance to use them yet. I have a pair of welding gloves that I use to load the stove but i can see where they will definitely be alot more useful with the e/w loading of the new stove. should I be putting a damper in my new chimney?

 

[goofa]

This is a whole project is just insanity but Im like a kid who is Über excited in a candy store. Its nice to have all this help and recommendations and information at such an ease for all of us like- minded individuals that cant wait for the cold weather just to fire up the wood stoves where "normal" peolpe dread the winter and heating season

 

[goofa]

Should i put a flue damper in the new chimney install?? Double wall or single wall to the ceiling box...??? That is the question. No clearance issues seeing i can build to suit in this new room.. any reason to choose one over the other..?

 

[begreen]

The Castine likes a good draft. There's no need for an extra damper. Double wall will help strengthen the draft. What will the the total flue height on the stove?

 

[goofa]

It will be approximately 20 ' total 9' of single or double then through the attic and roof with triple wall for 11'.

 

[teutonicking]

View attachment 113733 View attachment 113732
We have a raised ranch and use the Castine to heat the roughly 1,200 upper level - does a really nice job. We almost went with the Oslo, but on the advice of the hearth shop owner, decided not to. He felt with the Castine, we would run it hotter. With the Oslo, we would be dampening it down and perhaps creating too much creosote. Hard to tell from the picture, but the hearth is 6 feet wide . PS - we used to have the Fisher Mama Bear - when doing a re-build on the chimney and pulled the stove out, we found a crack in the back of the stove. Could have tried welding it, but after 35 wonderful years with the stove, felt a retirement in order

Nice looking set up.

 

[DianeB]

Diane B Thank you very much for all the helpful information. The only thing i lack on you list is the glass cleaner because i never had to deal with glass... thats half the excitement with the new stove. I just got my free sample of the super cedars last week and have not gotten the chance to use them yet. I have a pair of welding gloves that I use to load the stove but i can see where they will definitely be alot more useful with the e/w loading of the new stove. should I be putting a damper in my new chimney?

We don't have a damper, but I learned where the air intake is underneath the stove in the center rear. It is the size of a golf ball I would say. In am emergency, where you would like to close off air intake completely, have ready near the stove, a balled up aluminun foil ball the size of the intake hole so you can plug it up. (Safety tip I learned form some people on this site). Our pipe goes up a lined chimney. We have no trouble with draft at all, but I am thinking of adding a rear heat shield, not so much for added protection, but to have the heat radiate up between the stove and the shield rather than heating the the rear of the stove & chimney that faces outside.