F500 V3 Oslo - First Impressions
It's now mid October and I recently completed the three step seasoning/break-in procedure for my new Jotul F500 V3 stove and I'm now burning it to take the autum chill off. So far so good. We have yet to see how we'll fare in a raw coastal Rhode Island winter which will soon be upon us.
As background, my 100+ year old 1500 sq. ft. farm house came with a boxy, old and leaky Better 'N Ben's stove. While it kept the house warm, it wasn't a good solution as a primary heat source so I replaced it with a Jotul Black Bear F118 CB. I loved that stove, but sadly, the baffle between lower and upper chambers warped and eventually developed a gaping hole, which led me to replacing it with the F500.
The Black Bear could easily keep my house 30- to 40-degrees F. over outside temperature, and if I pushed it, 50+. I'm expecting the larger F500 will do equally as good or better. Lighting the F500 is a bit tricky, but so was the Black Bear when I first got it. I'm in the early stages of climbing the F500's learning curve. I also attribute lighting difficulties to a less than optimal chimney. When the stove is cold there's always a slight down draft. In addition, the 6" double-wall stove pipe is connected to an 8" chimney pipe which isn't optimal. All-in-all, the entire chimney structure (stove + chimney pipes) is about 12-feet.
Once it's burning, however, it's a simple matter of adding fuel and adjusting the air flow to control the burn rate and heat output. There's a thermometer installed in the side of the stove that measures the the secondary combustion temperature in the upper chamber that I use to determine where to set the air flow for optimal burning. I also have a stovetop thermometer to measure stove surface temperature.
I burn mostly small pieces of wood (small diameter 12" to 15" long) at this time of year, saving the longer 20" to 24" stuff for when it's cold. Filling the woodbox to about 1/2 capacity, in 6-hours I still had hot coals that easily got another fire going. All of my wood is seasoned hardwood, mostly red and white oak and hard maple, stored under a roof in a south-facing open woodshed.
The stove has lots of nice features. The expansive door glass stays clean while burning. The air flow control is easy to adjust. Front and side doors make loading and cleaning easy. The combustor thermometer is very useful. The ash removal drawer makes removing ash a snap. Looking at what's coming out of the chimney, there's nothing black or gray, just shimering heat. And overall it's a good looking stove.
That said, the door latches seem overly tight making the doors hard to open and close securely. The seasoning/break-in procedure as described in the user manual was somewhat vague and should have been more explicit. I'm also hopeful that the the fastener system that holds the stovetop in place won't be impossible to unscrew when it's time for a year-end cleaning. Lastly, I'm hopeful the catalytic system is as trouble-free as advertised. Time will tell.
Stay warm everybody!
Lee
