Need CATALYTIC stove reviews - had it and want it back.

[azor]

This is my first time here and I'm hoping I can get some serious recommendations on catalytic wood stoves. I had a VC Dutchwest large catalytic wood stove in my basement and really liked it (it heated my entire house). I LOVED the fact I could go outside and not see any smoke what so ever come out of my chimney (or smell it). Well, I bought it used and after several years it really needed an overhaul. Because my mother lives in my basement apartment and complained loudly about how hot it got down there, we decided to go with a soapstone wood stove. BIG MISTAKE. Yes it's lovely and has a wonderful gentle heat and my mom likes it. But we freeze upstairs (we have a basement and two floors). The ash pan sucks! Worse of all I see obvious smoke coming out of my chimney ALL the time no matter how hot we are burning it with my lovely 2 year old oak! I am so dissappointed and I spent so much money on that "pretty" wood stove.
Well, I have 2 ideas: 1 - buy a new catalytic wood stove and sell the new soapstone and my mother just has to deal for several months a year. 2 - buy a new catalytic wood stove and install it in our first floor fireplace - this is the friendlier option for my mother but I am concerned about putting a wood stove infront of our fireplace and all the clearance mods I will need to make.

I would buy a new dutchwest in a heart beat. But, a professional told me that Vermont Castings has gone though a lot of instability in ownership and their new models aren't as good as the old ones. Is this true?? Is there some other catalytic cast iron stove that burns as cleanly and as well as the Dutchwest?

 

[Highbeam]

I own a soapstone and can tell you that you either bought the wrong size or you're doing something wrong if it smokes all the time and doesn't make enough heat. So I would definitely suggest another heater where YOU live so that you can be in control of your heat and won't cook out your dear old mom.

Nobody makes a cast iron cat stove anymore and that pro was right, VC stoves are crap now. So you've only got a few cat stove options. One is a small soapstone stove, then there are Buck steel plate, Blaze king steel plate, and country flame steel plate. All of these steel stoves are pretty ugly (IMO) except the Buck is somewhat conventional looking.

The prettiest one is the woodstock soapstone stove and if the area you want to heat is small enough and your wood is cut small enough people seem to love their largest model the fireview.

If you like cast iron then there are plenty of cast iron stoves that are high quality and make lots of heat but they are not cat stoves.

 

[Fsappo]

If you want the gentle heat of soapstone and the long burns of a cat stove, just go with a woodstock. Not many folks have woodstock products without loving them. Also, if the basement is too hot heating the whole house, put a stove in the place where you want the heat

 

[Bobbin]

We've had one of our catalytic soapstone stoves for close to 20 yrs. now. We loved it so much when it was time for another stove we didn't look anywhere besides Woodstock Soapstone Co.. I'm with Highbeam, if you're having that much trouble with your soapstone stove there is a variable you've failed to "isolate" in your equation.

 

[azor]

I have the Hearthstone Heritage. I have it on right now burning seasoned oak. The fire looks lovely and the stone on top is 400degrees. Yet, here I sit looking out my kitchen window and the wind is blowing the smoke right past my window. Never had that happen with my catalytic stove.

I have not heard of the Woodstock catalytic stove...is the EPA rating close to 1.4 g/hr? I'm having problems finding that data for them.

Thanks for the replies!

(How do you deal with that puny ash pan??)

 

[Backwoods Savage]

I have the Hearthstone Heritage. I have it on right now burning seasoned oak. The fire looks lovely and the stone on top is 400degrees. Yet, here I sit looking out my kitchen window and the wind is blowing the smoke right past my window. Never had that happen with my catalytic stove.

I have not heard of the Woodstock catalytic stove...is the EPA rating close to 1.4 g/hr? I'm having problems finding that data for them.

Thanks for the replies!

(How do you deal with that puny ash pan??)

Welcome to the forum Azor.

400 degree stovetop temperature is not going to heat a very big area for sure!

Perhaps you are not aware of Woodstock because they are not sold in any dealerships. You deal direct with Woodstock. They have been around for a long, long time and are second to none. They also have the best guarantee on the market. Not satisfied? Send it back. Believe me, they take very few stoves back.

We are on our third winter with our Fireview and not only are we staying much warmer with this stove but we are only burning half the amount of wood we used to. Our chimney stays much cleaner too.

Here is a link to Woodstock: Woodstock Stoves

 

[grommal]

I switched from cat to non-cat in 2009. I can tell you that, when properly operated, my non-cat has invisible exhaust from the chimney. But, to achieve this when the wood is still outgassing, you need to have secondary combustion going on. My stove has the tubes in the ceiling of the firebox, and if I'm getting flames there then there's no smoke. The only time I have visible smoke is during a cold start or right after adding wood atop a small coal bed before the temperature has risen enough.

BTW, there ARE still catalytic cast iron wood stoves available. 4 different models, in fact, but all from VC.

 

[Highbeam]

I have the Hearthstone Heritage. I have it on right now burning seasoned oak. The fire looks lovely and the stone on top is 400degrees. Yet, here I sit looking out my kitchen window and the wind is blowing the smoke right past my window. Never had that happen with my catalytic stove.

I have not heard of the Woodstock catalytic stove...is the EPA rating close to 1.4 g/hr? I'm having problems finding that data for them.

Thanks for the replies!

(How do you deal with that puny ash pan??)

Oh good, I have the heritage too. The ash pan is a joke and does not get used. Honestly, I wish it wasn't even there just to rid myself of another gasket.

You are burning too cool. This is either because your wood isn't as seasoned as you think it is or because of your chimney/draft conditions not allowing the stove to run up in temp. You can heat quite a lot of area at 400 but this stove makes major heat up between 500 and 600 which is where you want to go to get some heat. Mine doesn't smoke, just nice heat waves after initial startup.

How about just trying to run the heritage hot once. The most common mistake, other than wet wood, is using huge splits. You need to use the 4-5" splits and not the big monsters you could fit in your old cat stove. You need to stuff the thing full, get it roaring and close down the air in a few stages to about 1/2" from closed. Wait about 5 minutes between stages so that you don't snuff the fire and cause smoke.

The heritage is a 55000 btu stove and as I recall that old VC cat wasn't rated for many btus.

 

[BrowningBAR]

The heritage is a 55000 btu stove and as I recall that old VC cat wasn't rated for many btus.

Correct, the Defiant Cat is 55k and the Encore is 47k.

Definitely need to burn the Hearthstone hotter.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

BTW, there ARE still catalytic cast iron wood stoves available. 4 different models, in fact, but all from VC.

And for those who are not aware of it, there is a lot of cast with a Woodstock stove too!

 

[BrowningBAR]

BTW, there ARE still catalytic cast iron wood stoves available. 4 different models, in fact, but all from VC.

And for those who are not aware of it, there is a lot of cast with a Woodstock stove too!

I wood sooner take an axe to the back of the head than buy a new VC stove. If you are buying new, Woodstock can't be beat with their return policy.

 

[Todd]

Sounds like you either need a little more trial and error with this stove or you could have chimney issues. How large and tall is your chimney?

 

[wellbuilt home]

I switched from the DW EX Large to a equinox .
I like the new stove but I'm burning alot of fuel .
I was hoping the EQ would put out more heat then the DW and it mite but its still cool siting 5' from the stove .
My EQ doesn't seem to get over 400o much . If i could burn at 500/550 I would be warm enough .
Other guys are very happy with there stove .
It mite be the wood .
As of last year the old DW cat stove was still available I mite get one for my addition John

 

[azor]

I don't think it's chimney issues - our chimney is taller than the basement plus two stories. We've always had a great draft. Some of our wood has been wet due to the snow but it wasn't a drenching wet - something that a few hours next to the stove would take care of. Even with a huge bed of coals and a nice fire going in it and the vent open wide, it is difficult to make the stone on the top of the stove measure more than 400 degrees. Lot's of heat coming from the glass. Also, it is very difficult to boil water since I have to have little pads on the bottom of the pot to protect the stone. So different from my old Dutchwest.

Are there any EPA ratings for these Woodstock stoves? I'm having problems finding g/hr data on them...

Lisa

 

[BrowningBAR]

I don't think it's chimney issues - our chimney is taller than the basement plus two stories. We've always had a great draft. Some of our wood has been wet due to the snow but it wasn't a drenching wet - something that a few hours next to the stove would take care of. Even with a huge bed of coals and a nice fire going in it and the vent open wide, it is difficult to make the stone on the top of the stove measure more than 400 degrees. Lot's of heat coming from the glass. Also, it is very difficult to boil water since I have to have little pads on the bottom of the pot to protect the stone. So different from my old Dutchwest.

Are there any EPA ratings for these Woodstock stoves? I'm having problems finding g/hr data on them...

Lisa

If you can not get the stove over 400 there is an problem. Before buying a new stove, you should figure out the issue you have as there is a chance the problem will follow you to the new stove. You should not be getting that much smoke from that stove and you should be able to easily get it over 500 degrees.

The EPA rating for the Woodstock Fireview is 1.3 gms/hr. You can find additional information from their website: http://www.woodstove.com/pages/wood_stove_fireview.html

 

[azor]

Wow - it's hard to believe the negative posts about Vermont Casting. I know they have particular sizes for their gaskets and they are very expensive. Other than that, what is so bad about their newer stoves compared to the older ones?

Are we talking about actual equipment problems or customer service problems?

 

[Highbeam]

Both, the equipment sucks when the refractory packages dissolve and cost big bucks to replace IF you can get them, the service sucks because, well, they say it is normal for a stove to glow red IF you can even get someone to talk to you and most of all the design sucks since the stoves use these awful downdraft/backdraft designs that rely on ideal operations to work right and then they overfire or smolder. The biggest issue for me is that they use so many crappy materials inside the stove that won't last. The old stoves had better designs and were fine. All of the VCs look really great and in theory should be great stoves. If they would replace their crap ceramic materials with cast iron and use a single air control for them then at least the cat stoves might have a chance.

You have wet wood and you're running the EPA stove like your fisher. These stoves don't get hot when running the air control wide open. What happens is you send all of the heat up the flue. If your wood were dry, you could damper down in stages and keep a very healthy fire all the way down to a completely shut off primary air control. When the fire is ripping along with the primary air closed all the heat being made by that efficient secondary combustion will stay in the stove and heat it up. You have a long chimney, maybe too long, but that's not your problem. It's the wood, too wet. Your long chimney may show up as a problem if when you have the air shut all the way the stove gets too hot or burn times are too short. Smokey stoves with wide open air control and a tall chimney mean the wood is wet. Your fisher didn't care, modern stoves do care. The best thing you can do now is split the wood down to little 3" splits and stack them in to allow plenty of air flow. Can you get a hold of some dry wood somewhere? Maybe the supermarket?

You'll never boil water on the heritage. It just won't happen on a stone stove with a max temp of 600. It will evaporate though, just kind of steam away. I don't know who told you that you pcan't put the pot right on the stove. That's where my stone kettle sets and I don't have any marks or scratches when I occasionally remove it for cleaning. Just don't slide it around.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

I don't think it's chimney issues - our chimney is taller than the basement plus two stories. We've always had a great draft. Some of our wood has been wet due to the snow but it wasn't a drenching wet - something that a few hours next to the stove would take care of. Even with a huge bed of coals and a nice fire going in it and the vent open wide, it is difficult to make the stone on the top of the stove measure more than 400 degrees. Lot's of heat coming from the glass. Also, it is very difficult to boil water since I have to have little pads on the bottom of the pot to protect the stone. So different from my old Dutchwest.

Are there any EPA ratings for these Woodstock stoves? I'm having problems finding g/hr data on them...

Lisa

Lisa, you may have just solved one of your problems! If you are running the stove with the draft wide open you are shoving most of the heat up the chimney. Get the fire going good and then try shutting the draft at least half way and you should get more heat. If the fire is still going good after 10-15 minutes then try closing the draft another notch. Then late in the burning cycle open the draft full again to burn down the coals.

Boiling water on the stove can be difficult. Ours never boils but gets hot enough to evaporate the water. Yes, we have the water pot on some soapstones rather than directly on the stove top.

 

[begreen]

It takes time to learn how to operate a new stove, even for us seasoned burners. It does sound like the stove is not being run correctly. Try reducing the air about 50% once the fire is burning hot with a full load of wood for much longer burn times and a hotter stove. FWIW, our ash pan system sucks too, but we still love the Alderlea.

As for cooking, this may not be the best stove for cooking on the stove top. Spills are not good on soapstone. There are some reliable big cat stoves out there. Maybe look at the Buck 80 or a Blaze King Princess? Or maybe consider the big PE Alderlea stove for it's versatile cooktop?

 

[azor]

Hey - thanks so much for everyone's advice! I will split wood smaller, make sure we get a large big dry load in there, get it going good and turn down that air control and see if we can get it up to 600 (never had it past 450 yet).

Ok - I won't even consider a new VC Dutchwest...but maybe I should refurbish my old one...hmmm

 

[summit]

might I suggest a summit....

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Are there any EPA ratings for these Woodstock stoves? I'm having problems finding g/hr data on them...

Lisa

1.3 to 3.5 grams per hour depending on the model.

I got this from an old brochure so it may or may not be up to date. I was thinking that the Fireview was 1.3 but don't remember where I got that information. Sometimes the memory fails....

 

[BrowningBAR]

Are there any EPA ratings for these Woodstock stoves? I'm having problems finding g/hr data on them...

Lisa

1.3 to 3.5 grams per hour depending on the model.

I got this from an old brochure so it may or may not be up to date. I was thinking that the Fireview was 1.3 but don't remember where I got that information. Sometimes the memory fails....

The EPA rating for the Woodstock Fireview is 1.3 gms/hr. http://www.woodstove.com/pages/wood_stove_fireview.html

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Thanks Browning.

 

[Highbeam]

Of course, you do realize that the EPA pollution rating has almost nothing to do with how much smoke will leave the chimney right? A smoking chimney is always operator or installation error. Any stove can be made to smoke and any modern stove can be run smoke free.