2020/21 VC Owners thread

[RandyBoBandy]

Nice! How many Splits? I've noticed 4 splits and I rarely ever get over 1550, 5 splits and I may get close to 1700 but usually peak before that. 6 splits or more however and I ALWAYS over-fire.

I’m guessing 7 or 8. I try and keep my splits in the 3”-5” range. I also try and square off my splits as much as possible so they stack nice and tight. I blocked my secondary air so I have a lot of control over the burn.

 

[Jimmy C]

I blocked my secondary air so I have a lot of control over the burn.

How do you do this?

 

[RandyBoBandy]

How do you do this?

What model stove do you have ?

 

[Jimmy C]

What model stove do you have ?

2550

 

[RandyBoBandy]

Ok cool. You will have to take off the rear heat shield and the secondary air probe cover. Take off the secondary air shutter. There should be a round washer that lets the shutter pivot easily. Remove that. If the shutter has a little pin in it that keeps the shutter from closing all the way you need to remove that as well. Now put the shutter back on without connecting the rod to the probe. Hold it in the completely closed position and snug the screw up. Done. I attached a small magnet to the bottom of the stove so the shutter can’t fall down and start to open up on top. Put your heat shield back on and burn away. You will have to change your primary air habits a little bit to accommodate this change since all the air is now coming from the primary air supply and the epa holes.

 

[Diabel]

I also put aluminum tape over it. +1 on the primary air control habits.

 

[RandyBoBandy]

Here’s the magnets I was speaking of. These worked good too when I still had the shutter connected and was playing around with the timing of the air probe. The magnets would keep the shutter from continuing to open allowing a gap on the top side of the shutter which would then send the cat temps into orbit. I finally got sick of always hanging out behind a hot stove messing with it. So I disconnected the shutter and locked it tight. Haven’t looked back.

 

[Woodsplitter67]

So this year I bought gasket kit and replaced for the doors, glass, griddle, ashpan, flue collar, damper. The damper was the hardest. I ended up applying the cement with my finger onto the fireback and thought it would do. But realized the bottom of damper does not create tight seal like the rest of the sides. There’s a nice little visible gap see pic below. It sits too high once closed like the bottom of the damper is almost level with the top of fireback! if I can only bring it down then I think I’m in business. *Can someone please tell me if there is a way to adjust it to go down so I can have a tight seal??(Encore 2n1 2040) thank you

I'm thing your slightly warped.. comes from being to hot. I'd put a thicker gasket in the warped area If it was me... I'd order either door or housing depending on where the problem is and drop in a new part in over the spring or summer.

 

[Reckless]

Here’s the magnets I was speaking of. These worked good too when I still had the shutter connected and was playing around with the timing of the air probe. The magnets would keep the shutter from continuing to open allowing a gap on the top side of the shutter which would then send the cat temps into orbit. I finally got sick of always hanging out behind a hot stove messing with it. So I disconnected the shutter and locked it tight. Haven’t looked back.

I stuffed old gasket rope in my epa holes. And stuffed old refractory in my secondary before disconnecting and tightening the shutter.

 

[Reckless]

So I was wrong about white oak, my stove loves it! Burning it exclusively with these single digit temps.

 

[Blackcat]

So after another weird flame out 2 days after the first one, I took the blackened parts to the place where we purchased the stove to see if they had any advice for what may have happened or I’m doing wrong. No real help there. Had me set up an appt for a chimney cleaning and a stove check.
Last night as I was staring at my stove with the pieces lying in front of it, I realized my mistake: I’m pretty sure I had a piece of the refractory stone in backwards. Not the access plate, the other piece before you take the cat out. I remembered that it started to come out with the access plate when I went to check what happened, and it has never come out like that before. A true duh moment.
Cleaned up the stove and hoping to get a fire going later on. Crossing my fingers that I just did a dumb thing.

 

[Woodsplitter67]

So after another weird flame out 2 days after the first one, I took the blackened parts to the place where we purchased the stove to see if they had any advice for what may have happened or I’m doing wrong. No real help there. Had me set up an appt for a chimney cleaning and a stove check.
Last night as I was staring at my stove with the pieces lying in front of it, I realized my mistake: I’m pretty sure I had a piece of the refractory stone in backwards. Not the access plate, the other piece before you take the cat out. I remembered that it started to come out with the access plate when I went to check what happened, and it has never come out like that before. A true duh moment.
Cleaned up the stove and hoping to get a fire going later on. Crossing my fingers that I just did a dumb thing.

I dont see anything recently about this.. can you take a picture of how your putting it together.. what stove are u running

 

[Blackcat]

I had posted earlier this week with the flaking on the refractory panels. It was just normal wear and tear.
Had a low roar and puff-out of smoke out of the doors, which made me take out the catalyst the next day. The stove did it again th next fire with the smoke puff-out at the back. I opened the damper and shut down the stove.
Both refractory covers had black on them and the catalyst had a slight black coating, though the cells are clear and intact.
I realized last night that when I had checked the catalyst before the first fire-I more than likely placed it in backwards. It seemed to fit somewhat so I didn’t question myself at the time.
She’s doing a fine job tonight, thankfully, since we’re supposed to get a foot or two of snow in the next day or so.
It’s a VC 2040 Encore.

 

[Woodsplitter67]

I had posted earlier this week with the flaking on the refractory panels. It was just normal wear and tear.
Had a low roar and puff-out of smoke out of the doors, which made me take out the catalyst the next day. The stove did it again th next fire with the smoke puff-out at the back. I opened the damper and shut down the stove.
Both refractory covers had black on them and the catalyst had a slight black coating, though the cells are clear and intact.
I realized last night that when I had checked the catalyst before the first fire-I more than likely placed it in backwards. It seemed to fit somewhat so I didn’t question myself at the time.
She’s doing a fine job tonight, thankfully, since we’re supposed to get a foot or two of snow in the next day or so.
It’s a VC 2040 Encore.

So.. back puff is a build up of Gass in the box.. which means a couple things.. your gassing off a lot of wood and the air needs to be turned up some, or your draft went weak.. your pipe was not hot enough or did not stay hot enough which is your cat ran a little cool.. like 6/700 degrees.. I like to keep my cat at 1k to less than 1475..

There's an area on my primary air that I rarely use.. between 1/3. and 1/2.. I can shut the aire all the way down with no issues.. but with a good amount of wood it gasses off to fast or much for that air setting

 

[Diabel]

Both refractory covers had black on them and the catalyst had a slight black coating,

This tells me that your burning practices need some refining and/or your fuel is not ready. Do you have any thermometers on the stove, pipe, cat probe?

 

[Blackcat]

It was 100% not having the inner refractory cover placed correctly. It was not letting the air flow correctly at the cat and it just built up and “blew up”.
Good burn last night with no issues. I let it get a bit hotter than usual to burn off the crud. Glass was 100% clean this morning.
with. Foot of snow already out there and another one or more predicted, I’ll be lighting up shortly.

 

[Jimmy C]

Here’s the magnets I was speaking of. These worked good too when I still had the shutter connected and was playing around with the timing of the air probe. The magnets would keep the shutter from continuing to open allowing a gap on the top side of the shutter which would then send the cat temps into orbit. I finally got sick of always hanging out behind a hot stove messing with it. So I disconnected the shutter and locked it tight. Haven’t looked back.

I will be tackling this during the off season. I want to get a longer stove pipe (mine comes out horizontally into a T) so I can have more room behind the stove. As it is now, I have to pull it foward to take out the probe or clean out the chimney. I will add this project onto that. Thanks for the help.

 

[Jimmy C]

Well, my 4-year-long running problem has happened once again... I just moved a new face cord from my stacking area to right outside my house where I keep the wood I'm burning. Its mostly oak, so I was not too concerned when it seemed a bit heavier than I expected. I noticed a good amount of checking going on at the ends so I figured it was ready to burn. It was split and stacked in the late fall of 2019.

When I loaded up the stove with this new wood I noticed low flames. So I opened the top loader and heard that dreadful sizzling sound. It was not very loud, but noticeable. I did not see any moisture boiling on the ends or anything like that. After keeping some of the pieces inside for the night I split them open to get a moisture reading. Most of the smaller stuff is okay but anything 3"-4" was 22% to 25%. I even had one that was 30%! Honestly I'm shocked at how little this wood seasoned over the 16 months it was stacked.

I have a face cord (or rick) of seasoned wood still that I will be mixing with this other stuff. I am still probably going to need 2 cords to get through the season so there wont be much to mix going forward. I also have a cord or two of some smaller spits ( 2.5" average) that I was planning on selling but will probably end up mixing with the partially seasoned stuff. I have been keeping the damper open longer to try and burn off as much moisture as possible. Also, it obviously takes longer to get up to temp and take off properly anyway in this scenario so I guess its serving two purposes. I plan on just continuing this way.

Anyway the point of this post is to hear your guys' thoughts on this... From how you feel about burning partially seasoned wood in a catalytic wood stove (not good, I know), to what you think about mixing the fuel, also thoughts on keeping the damper open longer to burn off moisture, and lastly any tips on seasoning wood faster (I intend on building some sort of solar kiln eventually).

 

[Woodsplitter67]

I dont know your situation... but if this were me, I would not burn unseasoned wood. Id grab bio bricks or something like that. The whole unseasoned burning like crap would just piss me off. I'd burn what I have, look for solid fuel and turn on the heat to supplement.
As fas as the 18 months of season, you did 18 months with the coolest weather.. I season in 18 months.. starting in march.. so my wood has 2 summers to dry and 1 winter, your wood sat over 2 winters and 1 summer. Thats a big difference.. late spring, summer, and early fall is for seasoning.

 

[arnermd]

A day late and a dollar short... did you ever find a solution? Did you try heating from the inside? Not sure if you can remove the right air manifold without removing a lot of other stuff. If it is helpful attached is the service manual, it says Encore, but also includes the Defiant.

Just for posterity and hopes that it may benefit someone.....

What I ended up doing was making a "pointer extension" for the allen cap screw that secures the air adjustment cable to the air inlet door. I found a metal pen pocket clip fit perfectly over the screw head. I then fashioned a paperclip into a stationary pointer such that with air full open and stove cold it pointed right at the air door "indicator". I lit off a fire and once the stove heated up I could see the air door had definitely closed slightly, it does not move very much. As the stove cooled it opened up again. I figured if it was moving at all the coil was likely fine. I verified this over several fires at various temps.

Sadly a few weeks after that I discovered my rear refractory had cracked, real bad. Fortunately HHT / VT Castings covered all the refractory under warranty. After 6 weeks waiting for parts the stove top came off, damper out and I replaced the entire refractory engine. 4 hours and 20 ft of gasket later.... she was all back together

I love having this stove but I seriously wonder about the design.... With a full load I routinely see cat temps in the 1500+ range for an hour or two before it settles in to cruise at 1300 -1400 for 5-6 hours. I really think this stove needs more secondary air to keep the refractory cooled. I have not discovered an easy way to do that without increasing the primary air flow too..... My griddle temps are good, 350 - 450 for 8 -10 hours. This stove really needs secondary air control, like the older Encores. I typically get 2-3 years out of a cat before it crumbles, too hot.....

 

[Jimmy C]

I dont know your situation... but if this were me, I would not burn unseasoned wood. Id grab bio bricks or something like that. The whole unseasoned burning like crap would just piss me off. I'd burn what I have, look for solid fuel and turn on the heat to supplement.
As fas as the 18 months of season, you did 18 months with the coolest weather.. I season in 18 months.. starting in march.. so my wood has 2 summers to dry and 1 winter, your wood sat over 2 winters and 1 summer. Thats a big difference.. late spring, summer, and early fall is for seasoning.

Thanks, I was thinking of using the Bio bricks. I used them around this time last year when I ran out of wood. I will more likely just use the smaller splits after I run out of the seasoned stuff. If mixing them is not working out I will just use only the small splits and keep the stove at half loads.

I hear you on the 2 summers part, thats the goal from here on out. I just figured that after a full year they would have been around 18% - 20% but not with oak apparently.

 

[Woodsplitter67]

Thanks, I was thinking of using the Bio bricks. I used them around this time last year when I ran out of wood. I will more likely just use the smaller splits after I run out of the seasoned stuff. If mixing them is not working out I will just use only the small splits and keep the stove at half loads.

I hear you on the 2 summers part, thats the goal from here on out. I just figured that after a full year they would have been around 18% - 20% but not with oak apparently.

I did a test on some of my wood a number of years ago. in December you will louse roughly .25%MC in the month of December..while you will louse roughly
2-3 % mc in june..

 

[RandyBoBandy]

Thanks, I was thinking of using the Bio bricks. I used them around this time last year when I ran out of wood. I will more likely just use the smaller splits after I run out of the seasoned stuff. If mixing them is not working out I will just use only the small splits and keep the stove at half loads.

I hear you on the 2 summers part, thats the goal from here on out. I just figured that after a full year they would have been around 18% - 20% but not with oak apparently.

Oak can take 2-3 years. I have also struggled with getting oak to season in a reasonable time frame. Therefore the majority of my oak gets split on the smaller side. Its not a total loss, however, definitely not ideal and I wouldn’t run a full stove load with the oak only. You will just have to mix it with your dryer stuff. Resplit the big ones down if you have to. Leaving the damper open longer is an option but keep in mind you don’t want your stack temps to get to high. So definitely close the damper when your stack temps are ideal. Once your damper is closed just leave your primary open longer in hopes of getting your griddle temps above 450-500 before the cat temps hit 1500. Once you do start closing your primary it will probably have to happen with smaller increments than usual.

 

[Rusty18]

I finally gave up and broke out the duct tape (not duck tape). Cat is running between 1000-1400 and near as I can tell no change in visible emissions.
I am also fairly certain the coil on my secondary was hanging up. As I was putting the plate back on I noticed it would catch in the full open position so that may have been giving me trouble all along. Either way it runs like it did before just without the nuclear cat behavior.

 

[Woodsplitter67]

I finally gave up and broke out the duct tape (not duck tape). Cat is running between 1000-1400 and near as I can tell no change in visible emissions.
I am also fairly certain the coil on my secondary was hanging up. As I was putting the plate back on I noticed it would catch in the full open position so that may have been giving me trouble all along. Either way it runs like it did before just without the nuclear cat behavior.

ok.. thats cool...