Defiant Encore - Something Just Isn't Right...

[LFEngineering]

Alright guys I need some help. I'm new to wood burning, but I think I have a good idea what I'm doing. However inexperience leads me to worry about every little thing. For example: there were a few days which I was getting a TON of smoke when I would fill the stove. I got all concerned that the chimney was getting blocked, or something was amiss. Nope, turned out to be inverse air, we had a warm front come in and mess with the pressure. 2 days later it was good. Anyway... I installed a refurbished 86 Defiant Encore (cat model) in October and have been burning 24/7 since. After burning some questionable wood early in the season I cleaned the stove out in November. I cleaned it again on Jan 1st to see how dirty it had gotten. Both clean-outs yielded little creosote.

Typically the stove will have a good coal bed; I'll fill it > leave the damper open > wait for the griddle temp to hit 500-600 > close the damper to engaging the cats > wait for the temp to dip while the cats ignite > once the temp is back on the rise I'll adjust it to our normal operating area & continue with my day. On average the stove lasts between 9-11 hours. For the first 2 months of having the stove we had to be careful about leaving the stove on high (air control full open) because even with the cats engaged the stove could over fire.

Recently however I've noticed that the once the cats are engaged I can leave the stove on high & the griddle temp wont ever get over 600. I'm burning the same wood supply, same filling / operating procedure ect. What could cause this?

 

[morningwood]

Cat and or Cats are going bad.

Without spending money on a replacement, I am not sure how you could confirm this though.

Scott

 

[LFEngineering]

Yea that's kinda what I was thinking too. I had my wife IR temp read the converter housing and it's defiantly lower then it used to be.

I mean I'd be disappointed if the cat was junk already. I know it's been used a lot but even under heavy use they should last 1-2 years. Then again I don't know the quality of converter they used in the refurbishing, all I know was it was new. Also It's probably not the case, I wonder if its just plugged with fly ash? I remember vacuuming the cat intake when I cleaned it in November, but when I cleaned it on Jan 1st I don't remember vacuuming that area. I was in a hurry because the house was getting cold.

 

[logbutcher]

1. If the cat has over 12,000 hours burn time, or over 6 years of intermittent burns, it may be gone. Replacement possible---12K is the average life from the manufacturer's tech sheets. Some last longer with good, dry, clean wood. Sounds like you may have clogged the cat early on.

2. The cat could use a serious cleaning a la "vinegar bath" ( if the construction of the cat ceramic is solid). Details are online. It's simple but smelly.

3. Easiest: just carefully brush off the cat. Fly ash collects on the ceramic squares preventing the cat from lighting. While you have the cat out, check that the ceramic is not cracked, deformed, or missing. If so, time to replace.

Newer all metal cats may have a longer life than the original ceramic. Time will tell; we put one in last Fall.

The original Defiant Encores with the cat access in the rear of the stove are fussy beasts if everything--air leaks--, damper, primary air control, and the secondary air device are not ALL perfect. You have to want to fuss with this baby.

Good luck.

 

[mking7]

1. If the cat has over 12,000 hours burn time, or over 6 years of intermittent burns, it may be gone. Replacement possible---12K is the average life from the manufacturer's tech sheets. Some last longer with good, dry, clean wood. Sounds like you may have clogged the cat early on.

2. The cat could use a serious cleaning a la "vinegar bath" ( if the construction of the cat ceramic is solid). Details are online. It's simple but smelly.

3. Easiest: just carefully brush off the cat. Fly ash collects on the ceramic squares preventing the cat from lighting. While you have the cat out, check that the ceramic is not cracked, deformed, or missing. If so, time to replace.

Newer all metal cats may have a longer life than the original ceramic. Time will tell; we put one in last Fall.

The original Defiant Encores with the cat access in the rear of the stove are fussy beasts if everything--air leaks--, damper, primary air control, and the secondary air device are not ALL perfect. You have to want to fuss with this baby.

Good luck.

Amen. I have an encore cat. I have an air leak I think but can't find it. You can pull he fireback and remove the cat pretty easily. Might be worth checking.

 

[kentuckydiesel]

I had a similar issue with mu defiant encore...turned out it was a combination of two things.

1)The cable adjustment on my primary air door was off...primary was closed off too much. I adjusted it so wide open on the lever is wide open on the primary when cold.

2) I noticed my stove glass was getting very dirty and the wood was burning on one side of the fire box, then the other. It turns out that my fireback and inner sides weren't sealed well. I broke the rules a little and used a (caulk gun size) tube of stove cement and ran a heavy bead of it in place of the old rope gasket material. We run our stove 24/7 and so far so good...glass stays clean and I'm getting a hot, consistent burn every time.

My cat looks awful...but I can see it glowing (working) through the gap between the cat cover and the upper fireback, and we're getting very healthy temps from the stove.

BTW, make sure you have at least 16' of chimney above the top of the stove...as I remember, that's the minimum for good draft on these things.

-Phillip

 

[LFEngineering]

More Info:

For the past week we have been burning wood from the pile out back, it's been stacked out there since beginning of October. Prior to that we had been burning wood that was stacked in the driveway. (both stacks are log cabin style for air flow with a tarp covering only the top) My wife just filled the stove about an hour ago, I asked her to pick from our reserve pile in the garage (saved from the pile in the driveway). Oddly enough the stove reached 700 degrees within 45 min & the cat housing was over 520 degrees & she had to back the air control down.

I would guess that if the cat were bad or plugged the problem would stay consistent, regardless of what wood we burned.

I asked my wife to check the moisture % in both pieces and found that the garage / driveway wood was 12% and the stuff from out back was 22%. Now before we blame it on the extra 10% moisture I know for a fact when the wood was delivered & burned the moisture range was between 20-30%. Both loads were from the same place, split around the same time & consist of mixed hardwood with 80% of it being red oak.

Looks like it's time for an experiment: Saturday = wood from out back. Sunday = wood from driveway. I'll try to take a sneak peek at the cat with an inspection mirror at my next fill.

Thanks again guys & I'll let you know what I come up with.

 

[morningwood]

Sounds like you are on the right track.

I burned a VC Dutchwest for six years with a cat. As part of my yearly maintenance I would take the cat out and vacuum it. I would also vacuum the area around where the cat sat in the stove. I am not sure if it made a difference.

My first year of burning with it, I burned a lot of wood with high moisture and it did not like it at all. I found if I let my wood season at least six months ( I burn a lot of wood from dead trees ) it burned a lot better and hotter.

Just my two cents.

Scott

 

[schaaed1]

IMHO, its your wood. With our '83 vintage 028 Defiant Encore ... air open all the way and fairly decent +1yr seasoned red oak ... we will maintain a pretty constant 700 griddle temp. We also only make barely 6-7hrs burn time (coals left) with the air throttled all the way back (maybe I have a small leak, but I don't think so).

However, if I mix in some wood that is just a tad moist ... I will see barely over 500 temps (air open). I have one stack that should be dry ... but for some reason it is just a tad wetter then the rest (no meeter).

 

[Sandhill Crane]

Our magnetic thermometer is mounted 12-14" above the stove on the pipe. Curious how/where the temp readings are from. I have had to adjust the cable for the air control as well weeks after replacing it due to stretch. Beautiful stoves. Enjoy.

 

[logbutcher]

Our magnetic thermometer is mounted 12-14" above the stove on the pipe. Curious how/where the temp readings are from. I have had to adjust the cable for the air control as well weeks after replacing it due to stretch. Beautiful stoves. Enjoy.

Accurate measure of stove temp should be ON the middle surface of the of the "griddle" loading door. The flue pipe temp measure is not what you want for this VC Encore cat.

If you're really techie about things, install a cat probe. I just want heat.

 

[LFEngineering]

Um... I'm going to say it's a plugged cat. I can't put my finger on it, but I just have a feeling.

 

[kentuckydiesel]

I would say at least that much of mine has been plugged on occasion...but I refuse to take it out all the time because then the sides and fireback have to be resealed. That said, with some white oak I cut from a deadfall last weekend (which then got snowed and rained on before bucking and splitting yesterday), the stove had no trouble hitting 800* last night when I waited about 10min too long to check on it.

BTW, I never go by the recommendations in the manual for closing the damper at 450*. Just doesn't seem to work as the stove always cools off. I always let it hit 600* before closing the damper, then the temps just climb if I let them.

-Phillip

 

[logbutcher]

Agreed Phil: ~ 600 F is what we let the griddle temp get to, +/- 50 F for each load /cycle with the primary air wide open. Then when it rises, drop the air to where needed.
That extra step as well as keeping an eye on the cat is why the manufacturers engineered "non-cat" stoves. It is a customer convenience thing. Apples to apples in all respects, this cat Encore will heat the same space consistently for about 1/3 less wood than our non cat Jotul Oslo.

It's sad that the successive Vermont Casting owners could not achieve the high QC and customer service of the original Vermont Vermont Casting operation from the 70's through part of the 90's. They were more like "investors" ; though nothing wrong with that except for the poor schmucks ( a Spanish expression :hmm3grin2orange who bought and sold their later stoves.:bang:

P.S. No need to reseal the fireback if you have installed the correct gasket cemented into the groove.

 

[kentuckydiesel]

P.S. No need to reseal the fireback if you have installed the correct gasket cemented into the groove.

Yea, realize it's not a requirement, but with as much heat as the fireback sees...it makes me feel better.

-Phillip

 

[logbutcher]

Yea, realize it's not a requirement, but with as much heat as the fireback sees...it makes me feel better.
-Phillip

"Feeling better" is critical. Go for it.
BUTT: with the fireback gasket cemented, the fireback can be pulled out with the gasket staying in place.

This Encore (2001 2550 ) is normally loaded up to ~ 600 F. Easy to overfire however, so SWMBO insists on setting an alarm. Not a bad SOP since it's too routine to get involved in other 'things', leave the house to do outdoor man work, or ......................The one big advantage of most non cats is that you can't overfire them most of the time with normal splits.

 

[schaaed1]

This Encore (2001 2550 ) is normally loaded up to ~ 600 F. Easy to overfire however, so SWMBO insists on setting an alarm. Not a bad SOP since it's too routine to get involved in other 'things', leave the house to do outdoor man work, or ......................The one big advantage of most non cats is that you can't overfire them most of the time with normal splits.

I don't usually run mine up so hot before closing the damper ... but you are right on setting the timer (alarm). If I leave the basement (stove is downstairs) ... the timer goes on!

 

[LFEngineering]

Seem to be working fine now. The cat removal / cleaning took about 5 min & was a snap. I don't know why you guys had to go in through the fireback, but mine has a cat access cover in the back. Little gasketed plate with 4 bolts. Took the cover off, took out the refractory plug & slide out the cat. The manual says to inspect & clean the cat 3 times / year and seeing how easy it was I probably will take them up on that.

Where I made a mistake was during my Nov & Jan cleanings I merely stuck the vacuum up to the cat cut-out in the fireback & figured that was "good enough". I didn't know that the passage that leads to the cat was 2-3 times longer then I though. Although the stove & chimney were clean the cat never got dusted off. It's such a simple process I will defiantly be adding the cat cleaning to my normal stove cleaning procedure.

Thanks again for all the help.

 

[logbutcher]

Seem to be working fine now. The cat removal / cleaning took about 5 min & was a snap. I don't know why you guys had to go in through the fireback, but mine has a cat access cover in the back. Little gasketed plate with 4 bolts. Took the cover off, took out the refractory plug & slide out the cat. The manual says to inspect & clean the cat 3 times / year and seeing how easy it was I probably will take them up on that.

Where I made a mistake was during my Nov & Jan cleanings I merely stuck the vacuum up to the cat cut-out in the fireback & figured that was "good enough". I didn't know that the passage that leads to the cat was 2-3 times longer then I though. Although the stove & chimney were clean the cat never got dusted off. It's such a simple process I will defiantly be adding the cat cleaning to my normal stove cleaning procedure.

Thanks again for all the help.

Later VC Encore models 2550 have the cat ass'y access in back of the fireback. Yours is one of the earlier cat Encores with rear access. For most installs the stove is close to a wall or alcove which forces you to move the stove for cat access. Fireback removal in the 2550 is fast once you get the hang of removing the cast protective plate and the fireback wedges. It's no more than a 5 minute job for the 2x/year removal for us.

Glad you got the job done.

 

[LFEngineering]

I never though about the wall clearance issue, though it makes complete sense. In that regard I lucked out, because I had to install the pre-fab chimney between ceiling joist we were forced to put the stove almost 18" away from the wall. I had plenty of room to sit behind there & work.

Also it looks like the refreshers put in a steel cat, pleasant surprise.