Vermont Castings Defiant

[tiber]

more from the stove project which won't die... yes it's being held up because I'm cheap.

Vermont Castings Defiant catalytic - trying to land a deal on one. There's a lonely one with an eight inch pipe setup.

What's with the eight inch pipe?

If I neck it down to 6 inches will it really make a difference? Seems like the "standard" is 6" pipe.

 

[Fsappo]

If it's the Defiant "Encore" 6" should be fine if you dont plan on burning with the doors open. If it's a Defiant, then unless the owners manual says different I would strongly reccomend NOT downsizing from 8" to 6". Theres a million threads here that explain why. There's plenty of large stoves with 6" flues, why are you stuck on the defiant?

 

[tiber]

Mostly price. Surely you remember my posts about six months ago which went "So I want X and my wife wants Y"... That's really where the project sat - she was locked into the jotul and I was locked into whatever had the biggest firebox. I taped each and every oil bill to the fridge and she came around after seeing we could have bought two jotuls for what we paid for in fuel oil alone.

On page 4 of the manual it says you can use a 6" chimney, but the whole setup looks like it's an 8" oval to 8" round single/double wall stovepipe to 6" chimney. I was just wondering if people really did this and if I should be using 6" stovepipe after necking it down to 6" at the stove or if I should be using 8" stovepipe to 6" chimney. Or if I was a total fool for buying a 8" stove when 6" is the standard.

 

[mikefrommaine]

I looked into this myself, if it is a newer stove, VC sells an adapter for 6" chimney -- but the stove can not be used with the doors open with a screen.

 

[Fsappo]

If the manual states you can use a 6" flue, and your chimney was going to be a straight up chimney thrue the roof, you shouldnt have a problem. There are lots of stoves that size that use a 6" flue.

 

[tiber]

I looked into this myself, if it is a newer stove, VC sells an adapter for 6" chimney -- but the stove can not be used with the doors open with a screen.

I have a fireplace for that. Stove is three years old. The person selling it bought a new house with a 6" pipe and it included a BK, so he's offing the BC. He just called me back to seal the deal. I'm picking this up Sunday.

(broken link removed to http://reading.craigslist.org/for/1763767056.html)

Actually I think I'm an idiot and I think the pipe adapter is on the stove already. I fail it quite badly.

 

[tiber]

alright so I'm going to pick this up Sunday at 1pm, anyone wanna give me pointers on red flags for this particular stove? I know if it won't hold water, it's not a good buy. anyone got anything else?

 

[ansehnlich1]

I burned a Defiant Catalytic. (# 1945) It was a good stove and a great heater, easy 10 or 12 hour burns.

Look, I'm goin' from memory here, but I think it said in the manual that if you went down to a 6 inch pipe you couldn't use the front door screen on the thing. Otherwise a 6 inch pipe was fine.

Only issue I had was a warping ashpan that wouldn't go back in after emptying. That was solved by getting a second ash pan and just rotating them. I think that ash pan has a lid on it.

 

[tiber]

I burned a Defiant Catalytic. (# 1945) It was a good stove and a great heater, easy 10 or 12 hour burns.

Look, I'm goin' from memory here, but I think it said in the manual that if you went down to a 6 inch pipe you couldn't use the front door screen on the thing. Otherwise a 6 inch pipe was fine.

Only issue I had was a warping ashpan that wouldn't go back in after emptying. That was solved by getting a second ash pan and just rotating them. I think that ash pan has a lid on it.

So what got you into the jotul if I may ask?

 

[mikefrommaine]

I had a defiant catalytic that I left in a house I sold -- missed it ever since. It was in a finished basement of a Cape on a center chimney. Would easily heat the house but the basement would get too hot if we burned it all weekend.

 

[ansehnlich1]

hey tiber, the defiant stayed with our old home when we sold it. That was 5 years ago or so. We went out and bought the Jotul when we built our new place. The thing about the Defiant is this, you don't get a nice view of burning flame. Once you get the hang of it, burnin a cat. stove is awesome. It'll just sit there and put out heat for hours. Ya gotta run it up to temp. before engaging the cat. That can take a lttle time, but I used to come back to that Defiant after 10 hours and throw wood right into it for the next burn cycle.

no pretty flame to watch though. I wanted a stove where I could watch the fire, but I DO miss the cat. technology for the LONG, CONSISTENT, burn.

 

[mettauercat]

download the manual from the internet and read the whole manual, it states to my recollection the specifics about this issue. 8'' a min. distance than 6'' a min height of 16' If any of you burn the cat stoves I highly recomend the probe thermometers from Condar, if you don't, you have no way of knowing what temp. you are burning, possibly destroying your refractory chamber, fireback, or the entire stove.