Jotul 8?? Can anyone shed some light on that stove?

[1990Jotul]

Thank you! Yes, after seeing photos of various Series 8 stoves I’ve been curious as to what exactly this is. Unfortunately no plate on back of stove. It’s interesting that if you look closely at markings on side plate in the photos, you can read the lettering KAT. That got me wondering if it was Norwegian for a catalytic ID. But when you empty the ash pan, it’s clear that it’s just the grate separating the pan, nothing in between. And yes my flue is 6”.

At any rate, this is my first experience with a wood stove, and I have to say I really love this one. Easy to get a fast fire going, and seems to draw really well. The ash pan is a little awkward as ash always falls in between the gap, so it requires another cavity sweep so the pan will fit back properly. The ashpan door has a gasket, but the pan does not; it’s just a deep pan approx 4” deep. It’s a bit of a yoga exercise to empty lol, other than that a perfect camp stove that I found for a great price.

Agreed, it's an excellent stove. I essentially have the exact same stove you have. It started out as 1990 8-TDIC catalytic, but after about 25 years of use, I de-catalyzed it. I bought parts here in the USA for the pre-catalytic version and a part from England and was able to make it an F 8. So I know EXACTLY what you are running. As far as your comment about the Ash pan gap, I understand what you are referring to, but I'm not sure why you find it to be much of a problem. You can let the ash accumulate in it because there is no reason to be taking the pan out and putting it back in again. Just leave the pan in place and take ash off with a small shovel (trowel). It always sounds like having a gasketed pan would be a great thing, but they really aren't. Besides the fact that they require an additional gasket to worry about replacing, you then also have to constantly be taking the pan out and emptying light fluffy voluminous ash. With our stove's design, you can just keep burning load after load of wood and the ash becomes a supper combusted dense crusty mineral-like dirt that need to be removed far less frequently. I prefer that any day. Regarding the "Kat" you observed on the part. The Norwegian word for catalog is katalog. So think of that as "Cat No. xxxxxx".

 

[1990Jotul]

Rangeroad,
Once again I have to correct myself about your ash-pan. I went back and re-read your post and looked at the photos again. I now realize that I do not have exactly the same stove as the F8. I see Jotul's website refers to this as having an "ash removal system". I guess that's what your pan is. I can now see that you have a grate for ash to fall through. I do not have this- I have a solid bottom. Hence my comments about how I deal with ash. My recommendation is to see if you can remove that pan and see if you can find a solid bottom piece to replace it. I can show you a photo of the part and give you the part number if you are interested. Anyway, I learned something new about these stoves from your photos. Thanks!

 

[Ashful]

You maybe mis-identified the pan, but your advice on how to deal with it still holds. Many choose to just let the pan fill up until it’s compacted in there, and shovel ash from the firebox as if they had no pan. I always preferred using the ash pan as designed, but can understand the argument of the camp that favors shoveling. To each their own. Before the BK’s, I owned three old Jotul 12’s.

 

[rangeroad]

Ah ok, interesting about ash pan technique. I just assumed that it was meant to be emptied every time it’s full, I’ve been doing it approx twice a week. So there’s no adverse reaction to just letting it accumulate?

I’m also curious if you’ve redone the gasket on the glass door? I’m thinking of doing mine if a warm day pops up, I doubt it’s ever been replaced. Or should I stay on the ‘if it ain’t broke, leave it’?

1990 Jøtul, I’d be interested in that part number and supplier if you wouldn’t mind posting it. Thx!

 

[1990Jotul]

You maybe mis-identified the pan, but your advice on how to deal with it still holds. Many choose to just let the pan fill up until it’s compacted in there, and shovel ash from the firebox as if they had no pan. I always preferred using the ash pan as designed, but can understand the argument of the camp that favors shoveling. To each their own. Before the BK’s, I owned three old Jotul 12’s.

Ashful,
Having had both the Jotul 12 and the BK, what are your general thoughts comparing your experiences with them? I have had my Jotul 8 for about 30 years now. I dearly love it and have been very happy with it. I know it is stoneage technology compared to the BK's and I am really tempted by the Ashford. However, I've also had experiences where I learned newer is not nessarily better and there is certainly a lot less to go wrong with my Jotul 8, espcially since I've removed the catalyst assembly. So what are your thoughts? BTW, you were extremely helpful to me last year when I was considering getting a splitter. I ended up getting a County Line 40 Ton and am very happy with it so far (have only had for 2 weeks). Thanks again for your help with that.

 

[1990Jotul]

Ah ok, interesting about ash pan technique. I just assumed that it was meant to be emptied every time it’s full, I’ve been doing it approx twice a week. So there’s no adverse reaction to just letting it accumulate?

I’m also curious if you’ve redone the gasket on the glass door? I’m thinking of doing mine if a warm day pops up, I doubt it’s ever been replaced. Or should I stay on the ‘if it ain’t broke, leave it’?

1990 Jøtul, I’d be interested in that part number and supplier if you wouldn’t mind posting it. Thx!

I looked up that part, and it is referred to as a Jotul 8 Bottom burn plate (part number 101933). Since it is considered a burn plate, I am thinking you may already have this part in your stove, underneath that ash pan. Take a look at the photo and see if you have it. If so, you can just remove that pan and grate. If you don't have it, I think it is highly likely that you could put one in your stove, as I think you have the same exact stove body as the ones that had this in them. You can buy them new (old part stock) but they are kind of pricey (I saw $160), but you may be able to get a used one somewhere from a junked stove. As I said before, the idea of an ash pan may be good in theory, but I certainly wouldnt want to be emptying light fluffy ash a couple of times a week. I can run my stove really hard for 2 or 3 weeks, burning many, many loads before I need to do a clean out. When you have repeated fires and continuous packing with the weight of new wood being put directly on top, the ash basically becomes so mineralized and stone like that it forms a solid crust. There is barely any dust released when I shovel out that "cement". Ashful mentioned you can try this approach with your pan in place, but I think you would have better luck without it, since it will give you a bit more useable space in the stove, and the wood will be able to more directly pack down your ash.

Regarding the gasket question. First, you should be able to tell if you need a new gasket just from the performance of the stove. Are you able to really lower the burn when you fully close down the damper? If not, that would be a sign that air is leaking in around the door. You can also do the dollar bill test. Close the door on a bill and see if you can pull it out from the latched door. Do this in multiple places on the door. If it can easily be pulled out, you need a new gasket. The are easy enough to replace.

 

[rangeroad]

Thanks for the link, a solid plate would definitely be an improvement after looking the photo. The nice thing about the ash is that my fruit trees love it as an amendment, but I’m sure the bulkier stuff you’re talking about will still break down nicely. As per the glass gasket, I can see a sliver of light coming in so I’m going to add this to a warm day project list.....lord only knows when that might arrive.

 

[1990Jotul]

Just to clarify- is the gasket you are asking about for the GLASS or for the DOOR (there is one on both of them)? The Door gasket will need to be replaced periodically, but the glass ones really don't need to be done very often (at least not in my experience)

 

[begreen]

It's an 8 AP. Some of the Series 8 are without the cat. I think Jotul might still sell the non-cat 8 in Europe as the 8TD (traditional). KAT NR and the number means catalog #.

 

[Ashful]

To determine if you need to re-gasket your glass, wait until the stove is cool enough to touch, open the doors, and grab the glass with one hand on inside face and the other on outside face. Try to shift the glass around. If it slides around easily, it's likely time for a new gasket. If there's good resistance to slipping around, leave it alone.

Many people, not just Jotul people, have broken off the retaining screws when removing them. Stove interiors see a lot of heat and a lot of water, not the friendliest environment for fasteners. A small impact driver is your friend here, letting the impact hammer away at it for 30 seconds easily beats wrenching on it by hand, in terms of getting the fastener loose without snapping the head off.

As to new BK's versus old Jotuls, there's a lot to be said there. If you want to get into it, please post a separate thread and link it here, but I'll quickly give a few points:

1. I had a lot of trouble with overheating the combustors on my Jotul 12's anytime I filled the firebox full with wood. They were fine on a half load, but not much more than that. The combustor was half the size of any modern BK or Woodstock of similar firebox volume, so I blamed the issue on that. But they were also 30 year old cemented iron plate stoves, and while I couldn't find any leaks in them, the likelihood that there was a leak somewhere was actually very high.

2. The Jotuls were sensitive to the air inlet setting. Fully closed worked fine on the stove that had the taller chimney, but if I wanted any more heat than that I had to worry about the thing going nuclear two hours into the burn on a higher setting. The other stove on the shorter chimney would back-puff if I went fully closed on the inlet air, so I'd try to run that one at 5% open. By contrast, the BK's are happy to run at any air setting on the dial. Set it for my desired burn time and forget it, never any fiddling with it.

3. This is unique to me, and not really unique to BK, but the Ashford is a convective stove an the Jotul cast stoves are almost entirely radiant. I have my stoves stuffed into masonry fireplaces on exterior walls, and found the Jotul's were wasting most of my heat to the outdoors. But really any convective stove would have fixed this problem, not just the BK's.

4. The BK's are about as reliable and boring as concrete. Put load in, char it and close the bypass, then set the dial for your desired output or burn time. The thermostat moves as the burn peaks and wanes, to maintain that nearly-constant output. It's as boring as everyone claims, if you crave unpredictability and excitement in your heating appliance, but I do not.

I can't make the same claims as others over wood savings. I'm sure they're saving me wood, but I changed my burning habits at the time I changed my stoves. Whereas I was throwing as much as 14 cords per year thru my Jotuls, I backed off and decided I'm just going to load my BK's once and twice per day, for the two stoves respectively. They contribute a consistent and predictable base heating to the house, and my programmable thermostats modulate on top of that with the oil burner, keeping everything where we want it. I'm not burning any more oil than I did before, but I'm working a lot less, and we're much more comfortable.

 

[begreen]

Glass gaskets last a long time because they are not in a wearing situation. But eventually heating and cooling will start to break them down. Glass can be loose with a good gasket. Age and amount of fires may be a better guide. The glass was loose on our Castine when new from the factory. I had to gingerly tighten the clips on it.