Jotul Firebox Comparison
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quotejso
Feeling the Heat
Here's my opinion of the Oslo F500 after 15 years of operation.
The ash pan is great. I agree with Jake, I lets only ash to fall into the pan, with coals left in the fire box. It does get filled up, but empty it and then brush more the floor grate and empty again. No ash flying around. We never get any spillage on the floor. The only issues, you get a little ash in back of the pan, if you empty it when its overflowing. My method, to level the ash, shake the pan before pulling it out. And don't even think about opening the front door, for clening or loading wood. Ash will fall out. Our setup stays very clean.
The fire box will handle just about a 26 inch split. It cut all my wood to be 18. But when I'm down to the last cut, and the piece is 48", no problem one cut in the middle. I have no issues with any length wood. Never saw any difference burning 12" north / south, or any other size. Its a decent size fire box, although there are bigger.
We only using the side door to load, or the occasional glass cleaning. Because of the issue I explained. Glass cleaning only needed when I don't want to wait until I burn it clean. We love the fire view. There has been a lot of discussions here about the corner installation, which I did. With a rear heat shield and the proper corner and rear clearance, loading from the side door is not a problem in terms of access clearance. And IMO the side door has less issues with popping logs. But I believe Jotul does not allow this. I've tried contacting them, but they don't respond.
Over all, IMO the issues are minimal. The stove is easy to run and well behaved.
The ash pan is great. I agree with Jake, I lets only ash to fall into the pan, with coals left in the fire box. It does get filled up, but empty it and then brush more the floor grate and empty again. No ash flying around. We never get any spillage on the floor. The only issues, you get a little ash in back of the pan, if you empty it when its overflowing. My method, to level the ash, shake the pan before pulling it out. And don't even think about opening the front door, for clening or loading wood. Ash will fall out. Our setup stays very clean.
The fire box will handle just about a 26 inch split. It cut all my wood to be 18. But when I'm down to the last cut, and the piece is 48", no problem one cut in the middle. I have no issues with any length wood. Never saw any difference burning 12" north / south, or any other size. Its a decent size fire box, although there are bigger.
We only using the side door to load, or the occasional glass cleaning. Because of the issue I explained. Glass cleaning only needed when I don't want to wait until I burn it clean. We love the fire view. There has been a lot of discussions here about the corner installation, which I did. With a rear heat shield and the proper corner and rear clearance, loading from the side door is not a problem in terms of access clearance. And IMO the side door has less issues with popping logs. But I believe Jotul does not allow this. I've tried contacting them, but they don't respond.
Over all, IMO the issues are minimal. The stove is easy to run and well behaved.
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