Wow they cursed at you? Unreal. I kinda wanted buy it from someone who could service it if anything breaks, but I guess with these stoves there isn't really anything to break right? I had nightmares getting my first pellet stove fixed cuz I bought it online. All the local dealers told me to pound sand. So my second pellet stove I bought local
Yes they did, i was like Really? is that neccesary. I asked them the same question i did all the other places. "I am buying a wood stove factory direct and having it delivered, My question is can I have it delivered to your business, and then have you come and deliver it, remove my old stove and place the new one on my hearth?" Most places said no we don't do that, and we dont work with anything we dont sell. This place ,Valley fireplace and stove in canton CT, said "why the f*** would we do that, go find some other person to be your b****". I was completely blown away that a business would say that.
But back to the topic at hand. Woodstock has awesome customer service. I had 3 minor issues, and they went above and beyond to make everything right, and were very helpful with answering any questions i had on operation and isntallation. And everything I have heard from others that have had issues have also had very positive experiences. Wood stoves in general are pretty tough, and the progress hybrid is no exception. As long as you read the manual and operate it correctly you shouldnt have any major issues. The most common problems would be a result of building too hot of a fire the first time, or at the beginning of a burning season(first time burning it since the previous winter), you need a small fire at first to drive any moisture out of the soapstone so that you dont risk cracking any of the stones. Overfiring the stove in general, and general cat maintenance issues. This past year was my first year with my progress hybrid, and i was very impressed with it. I had read some complaints about the cat clogging up and needing cleaned frequently, but these from what i read were from people that didnt have the ash pan, or do not rake coals at reload and shovel out ash occassionally.
But since i had read about people having the cat clogging issue I decided I would check my cat frequently. I checked it the first time after 2 weeks, and then after that about once a month. Not once was my cat clogged. I would clean it each time i checked it, just because i already had it opened up. It takes me less than 5 minutes to do so. Take off the top 3 soapstone pieces and set them off to the side on a towel, lift up the lid, pull the cat out, set the gasket to the side, use a ash vaccuum and or a stiff bristled paint brush to clean it off and then put the gasket back on and put it back in and close it all up. It really takes very little time, even if you went really slow it would only take 10 minutes. I would do this typically on a weekend morning when i had a little extra time, before i reloaded the stove, but the stove would not be cold, it was usually around 250-300F stovetop temp still. I did this all wearing hearth/ heat resistant gloves obviously. This year i will only check my cat every 2-3 months, as i definitely was checking it too frequently last year.
The three problems i had with my stove. 1) inside middle piece of soapstone had a large chip that fell off during shipping, was probally 1x4in. Woodstock had me take a picture of it so that they could do their best to color match it, and shipped me a new piece. 2) Ash lip piece of cast iron had an imperfection around the bolt hole, and when i started tightening it it cracked and broke off. Woodstock shipped me a new one without question, along with a can of black stove paint to touch up some minor scratches on the ash pan. 3) The air control would get very stiff when the stove was up at peak operating temp. Woodstock sent me a replacement air control flap, or whatever the technical name for it is, damper i guess. The stove in general is very simply put together, with nothing too complex, if you have any mechanical aptitude whatsoever then you would be able to do any repairs if they were ever needed.
I was consistently getting 10+ hour burns with it, with an average of probably 12hrs or so. During the tail end of winter I was getting some 16 and 18hr burns. I didn't install it until the last week of january, so right when it started getting really cold here in CT last year. So after the break in fires i started really running it hard, and experimenting with operation and heat output. I was having no issues heating my 2200sqft house with high cathedral ceilings, and very poor insulation and air leaks. This year we did attic air sealing and blew in r60 insulation, so i expect a even better experience this winter. Goal being to be able to run the stove on a lower, more even heat output, and get 14+hr burns, instead of a higher heat output on 10ish hr reloads.
