I bet it wasnt in the 700 range. I hate where the cat throat is on this stove!! You really have to load this stove perfectly and either pile everything towards the front or completely try to block the opening to get good burns with good time and good heat.... BAD STOVE!! I told you not to eat all my locust!! I think Im getting a jotul next year to replace this stove and move this one to the basement OR Im just getting a wood fired boiler and say F#kc it. Stay warm boys and girls its getting COLD out!!
I find that wood with an MC of 20 - 25 percent gives me about 12 hour burn times at 450 gt, with 16 hours not unheard of. I am burning mostly red oak. Cat temps are also a non issue. When I load something like kiln dried wood the cat can skyrocket to 1800 easily. This is with about 450 gt also. The stove temps also run hotter at the same setting and I lose some control since when I close it down the temps get up there. I also notice that burn times are also shorter. Either way she runs clean at the stack with both wood types.Oh I forget to mention that this is with my 1945 Defiant but the 2550 ran similar. However, it did blow a little bit more smoke. I can't be certain but the path way to the cat in the 2550 doesn't have a grill to cause turbulence like the 1945. With the 2550 the path is unimpeded. Also on both, the path to the catalyst is very short. Not sure how it is on say the Blaze Kings or wood stocks but I know on the Jotul Firelight 12 the path was much more convoluted. The smoke would have to travel through the rear burn plate then down to the bottom of the stove to the refractory opening and then up through the cat then down again. The firelight seemed to burn a little cleaner than the VC stoves and it also had a bit better burn times even though the firebox was smaller.
Yea when I loaded up with white oak the other day it tried to take off on me. Its the nature of the stove I guess and there isnt any mods we can do unless making a partial block off plate for the cat opening to restrict air flow to it (that would probably blow the stove up LOLOL)
Ash is my favorite thing to burn in this stove right now. On 4 decent pieces I get 4-6 hours of GOOD heat at 1350-1450 cat and 6-700 GT....... heaven
Use sparingly.... by the looks of it I may run out of seasoned wood before the end of feb. I have 3/4 of a cord of ash that is mostly seasoned that I should probably start mixing in now
Usually far left and right near the door hinges? I get a spot or two sometimes either there or right infront of the andirons but they disappear pretty quickly.
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But anyway Im starting to wonder, how does one differentiate between smoke and steam? I always thought that steam dissipated faster but I think I have something confused. Right now Cat 1400 and all I see from the stack is heat waves earlier when I first loaded I wasnt paying attention and let the stove on bypass too long (kinda 6-700 gt) I closed the bypass and watched it go to 1550 or so in 10min went outside to check and what appear to be "steam" was coming from the stack but I still smelt a little smoke........
