Time to replace the stove, I think. Thoughts?

[begreen]

Snowleopard, is your stove a model 8021 or an 8022? Is the issue with the front or the side door? For a parts diagram, go here:

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[John Lehet]

What kind of a stove are you getting? And if you don’t mind me asking, why do you need an installer? If you already had a stove in place, isn’t it pretty much plug-and-play?

A Woodstone Progress Hybrid. Put deposit down on 9/9, Woodstock can’t ship these until they get a signature on the EPA certification. Apparently it was all ready to go, just down to the signature, when EPA closed for 6 weeks. Certificate not there yet. So maybe any day now. Or maybe not.

Vermont gives me $400 toward a pro install of a clean, efficient stove. I called a guy that Woodstock suggested. He is a real wood stove geek and is into the Woodstock stoves. As you know, Woodstock doesn’t have dealers or delivery. This guy charges $600 for other stoves, but $700 for the progress. So after Vermont’s $400 it’s $300 for him to pick it up, drive it 15 miles to my house, and set it up on the hearth. A bargain for a 750 pound stove.

I had a chimney guy set up the flue here 17 years ago with the stove I moved from my old place. A year later I got this Jotul 3 CB, which I transported myself, set up. Maybe 7 years ago I rebuilt this Jotul. I can wrestle with little stoves, but not soapstone monsters.

Funny story about ending up with the Progress. I once had a masonry stove, 3500 pounds of soapstone, which was only heat for about 15 years. After that I heard of soapstone stoves but I kind of thought it was a joke, compared to the masonry stove. I figured it would be the worst of both worlds, not really enough thermal mass to do all that much, except slow down the warming of the stove when you need it. Since then I’ve mostly thought that the ideal stove would warm up quickly, and I thought a small firebox was more efficient. I also didn’t want to have a catalyst after a bad experience with a VC around the turn of the century. I may sometimes be stupid, but at least I can change my mind.

A pre cat Heritage came up on my local listserve, right in town, I think it was $900. I figure I can get $900 easily for my Jotul. So maybe move to that Hearthstone, check it out. I decided against it., It got a bee in my bonnet and got me rethinking wood stoves altogether.

One of my best friends has a Woodstock Ideal Steel, which he says is “The best money we ever spent.” Besides his word, I have no real life experience with Woodstock stoves. But man, online, people sure do love them. It seems to be the one stove company where nobody hates their stove or has any complaint. (Though one complaint now is that catalysts are backordered). Read so much online, and had to have one. The ending of the tax credit spurred me. I figured I would probably get a new stove one of these years, but suddenly it was Right Now.

Since the Jotul won’t hold a fire overnight worth a damn, the overnight hours use the mini splits. The mini split is fantastic in shoulder season, but in my current use pattern I’m running it hard during the lowest temperatures of the day in winter — its least efficient. I figure with the Progress I can hold a fire all night, wake up to a warm house, give the mini split time off in the real cold.

 

[snowleopard]

I hear you about the install. Our dealer no longer does deliveries so if I go that route, I’ve got somebody lined up who has a truck and a skid steer that will be needed to take it down to my lower door. And then I have a crew to wrestle the old one out and the new one in. When you said install, I was thinking a new stove pipe, etc., I think they are beautiful stoves. I like the bigger window, to be honest, with the hearthstone.

I have had no problem with being able to load this thing up, shut it down and have coals in the morning, until this year, which is what got me thinking about replacing it before I realize that there was an air gap there.

The stove heated my house for about 10 years before I could afford to replace the boiler. So now I have both, and I feel so damn spoiled. I’m getting ready to get the indoor heating hooked up in my garage. Right now all I have is a blower mounted near the ceiling, which works, but it’s so off/on, and it’s noisy when the fan is running. The boiler install guy was out a few days ago doing the annual and getting things lined up to do the in floor, which is a process since it’s the old quest tubing in there. He talked to me about what my expectations were and what I was wanting to do, which I appreciated. Made sure I knew that the floor was gonna be set it and forget it. I told him I’d probably keep the floor around 40 or 50, and then use the blower to warm the place up when I wanted to work out there. And he described to me how effective his in floor heating was in his garage. He said if he opened the door to take a car out, it was warm again as soon as he shut it. I said it’s kind of like having a soap, stone stove only a lot more mass.

 

[bigealta]

Are these the screws you are looking for?


6. Remove the four screws (1/4" 20 x ½" black oxide) that hold the outer doorframe to the inner door frame with a phillips screwdriver. To remove the outer doorframe, pull it straight up (it has flanges on the sides that fit into the slots in the stones around it) and out of the stove. If the stove cement prevents movement, pry the frame up with the screwdriver from inside the stove.

 

[bigealta]

A couple pics of your bolts/screws would help here.

 

[snowleopard]

Are these the screws you are looking for?


6. Remove the four screws (1/4" 20 x ½" black oxide) that hold the outer doorframe to the inner door frame with a phillips screwdriver. To remove the outer doorframe, pull it straight up (it has flanges on the sides that fit into the slots in the stones around it) and out of the stove. If the stove cement prevents movement, pry the frame up with the screwdriver from inside the stove.

Thank you, but no. It’s four 10/24 half inch machine screws. The door itself is fine. The problem is that the soapstone panel that is inset into the door is held in, in the best of all possible worlds, by those four screws. Three of them have broken off inside their holes. The holes do not go all the way through the door frame; they go in from the fire box side, and dead-end inside of the hole. The one remaining screw is still holding, but it’s deteriorated so much that I cannot unscrew it. I would just strip it out if I tried.

So I ordered an easy out kit that I hope goes small enough to get in there and take those screws out. Worst case scenario, I have to get new holes drilled through there. This would be less nerve-racking if I could get that last screw out, because with that screw, holding the soap stone on there, then it’s at risk of getting broken when I try to work with it.

I’ll get some pictures tomorrow and post them here, but it’s dark and dirty and I don’t know that it will photograph well enough to help.

Again, I appreciate your interest and willingness to help.

 

[snowleopard]

I ordered an easy out extractor for the screws holding the soap stone panel to the frame, supposed to arrive today.

I was starting to feel uneasy about this, but now I’m looking at it as the worst that can happen is I have to order a new stove, and that’s what I was planning on doing anyway. It’s sort of like what they say about CPR. Go ahead and try because without it, that person is dead anyway.

Will update.

 

[John Lehet]

Possibly I’d think that the worst that could happen is you have to get another part, some other panel or frame, deeper in? I have no experience or knowledge of working on that stove, but I wonder if there is a deep dive somewhere on what wears out and should be replaced in a rebuild, in case you find you get deep in and really need to tear into it. And in that case order all the parts you’d need to replace at once. I don’t know that stove, but I think I was reading that it’s common to need to replace the door frame after some years, on those pre-cat hearthstones.

When I rebuilt my Jotul some years back I just ordered the back metal inner fire-plate, because it was cracked. When I got into it I needed both sides as well, which, of course. I should have ordered all those at once instead of having to wait for two shipments. Anyone who was savvy with these old Jotuls would probably have known that, and also how to remove them, which involved smashing them instead of sliding them out. (They were a little warped and would not slide out). Anyway, more study probably would have been good before I took the stove apart. Luckily it was summer.

 

[begreen]

I ordered an easy out extractor for the screws holding the soap stone panel to the frame, supposed to arrive today.

I was starting to feel uneasy about this, but now I’m looking at it as the worst that can happen is I have to order a new stove, and that’s what I was planning on doing anyway. It’s sort of like what they say about CPR. Go ahead and try because without it, that person is dead anyway.

Will update.

If you need to retap the screw holes, get a bottoming tap.

 

[bigealta]

It's not that hard to just drill a new hole if you cant get the bolts out. And then retap is not that hard either. There are many youtubes that show you how to do it with confidence.

 

[bigealta]

Possibly I’d think that the worst that could happen is you have to get another part, some other panel or frame, deeper in? I have no experience or knowledge of working on that stove, but I wonder if there is a deep dive somewhere on what wears out and should be replaced in a rebuild, in case you find you get deep in and really need to tear into it. And in that case order all the parts you’d need to replace at once. I don’t know that stove, but I think I was reading that it’s common to need to replace the door frame after some years, on those pre-cat hearthstones.

When I rebuilt my Jotul some years back I just ordered the back metal inner fire-plate, because it was cracked. When I got into it I needed both sides as well, which, of course. I should have ordered all those at once instead of having to wait for two shipments. Anyone who was savvy with these old Jotuls would probably have known that, and also how to remove them, which involved smashing them instead of sliding them out. (They were a little warped and would not slide out). Anyway, more study probably would have been good before I took the stove apart. Luckily it was summer.

Was that a jotul 118?

 

[John Lehet]

Jotul 3 CB

 

[bigealta]

Jotul 3 CB

You could not lift those plates straight out the top?

i had a jotul 3. But that was a very simple stove.

 

[John Lehet]

They were just warped enough that they wouldn’t come out. They didn’t look warped, but it kept them locked together. I couldn’t figure out why they wouldn’t lift out. I called a woodstove repair guy, happy to pay him if he could rescue me. He was too busy/far away, but he said, “If you can’t get those pieces out, then you, sir, need a bigger hammer.” They seemed pretty solid, until I hit them. Man, they sure smashed apart easily.

 

[snowleopard]

If you need to retap the screw holes, get a bottoming tap.

Miraculously, the extractor worked on the one screw that wasn’t broken. Now I have to figure out how to get the screw carcass off of the extractor, and remove the three broken screws. But this is very encouraging.

 

[Burnin Since 1991]

Miraculously, the extractor worked on the one screw that wasn’t broken. Now I have to figure out how to get the screw carcass off of the extractor, and remove the three broken screws. But this is very encouraging.

Try a couple vice grips.

 

[Burnin Since 1991]

Miraculously, the extractor worked on the one screw that wasn’t broken. Now I have to figure out how to get the screw carcass off of the extractor, and remove the three broken screws. But this is very encouraging.

Have you made any progress since your last post?

 

[Highbeam]

As I recall, the side door with the stone insert, that stone insert is just decorative. The door itself was all cast iron so even if the stone was removed or fell out, the cast iron door still makes the seal. You'll notice on the inside of the door that it's all cast iron.

You can lift that side door off of the dainty hinges and take it to a machine shop to have the broken bolts removed.

On my old heritage the hinges did get very sloppy and worn but the bigger problem was the latch for the doors was wearing and not repairable without stove disassembly. If that latch failed then the door could pop open at night.

Always was a good looking stove though.