Green Mountain 80 vs BK king 40 vs F5200 regency

[Highbeam]

I replaced mine in that range as well. It was still working but taking a long time to reach active temp and dropping off early

I wait much longer. Visible white smoke through most of the burn, stalling cat, low output for a given stat setting, even dripping tar creosote onto my storm collar once. I’m cheap and want to be sure it’s dead.

A new one is so nice. Easy to install too.

 

[bholler]

I wait much longer. Visible white smoke through most of the burn, stalling cat, low output for a given stat setting, even dripping tar creosote onto my storm collar once. I’m cheap and want to be sure it’s dead.

A new one is so nice. Easy to install too.

I did mine in a hot stove. It is easy

 

[Teachme]

I’m sorry if I wasn’t clear, after complete cat failure it’s like burning an old smoke dragon which you must realize can be done quite cleanly if you burn it hot enough. Lots of people happy with their smoke dragons. You will want to replace your cat before total failure.

Before total failure, you will lose a lot of the reasons why you want a cat stove such as low output ability while burning clean.

All of those old studies that use “seasons” or “years” are questionable data with questionable conclusions. My year of burning (9 months on low) looks much different than some interior folks and that burn far fewer months at high rates which is much different from the hobby burner that might only light one fire per weekend in December. “Years” is a worthless unit of measurement in this application. It’s just lazy because most stoves don’t have hour meters.

Many users from all brands that have no bias have demonstrated the 10-12k hours of cat life to be a very dependable prediction before unacceptable performance occurs. We would all be happy for longer life. Why not?

Thank you. Yes I understand. But its go to know that in a emergency you could still run a cat stove like a "old smoke dragon" aka What I have now. (what a funny name. ) The wood stove is not my only source of heat but when the power goes out it is.

 

[BrianVA]

I disagree; if 10 people here give their experience of what a normal burn is, it's pretty clear what a normal burn is. A few will be too short a few will be unexplainably long, but the rest is right on.

My stove (a different one than the OP is asking about), I mostly get 18 hr burns when it's 30 outside (i.e. my heat needs are ...). I can go up to 26-27 without trying too hard (but I don't use it when I need that type of heat, see minisplit+solar). When it's 20 outside, I get 12-14 hr burns. I've never ran the system such that I only get 8 hr burns.

Real life experience will always result in a distribution of numbers, due to the many variables you touch upon. However, that distribution is informative to a prospective user.

10 people are way too few to be a statistically significant representation.

The variables you are pointing out are exactly what BKVP 's point is.