Stove hasn't been running as good the last week, and last night the load barely burned at all. As soon as I closed the bypass I noticed the fire die down quickly. Knew the cat had to have been clogged up. So pulled the remaining logs, coals, and ash out this morning to let it cool down. The cat was clogged up with light ash and it definitely made a difference. It hadn't glowed at all last night, so I took a little brush and the ash cleaned off easily. With a new load of logs it heated up and the cat ignited right away. So I'm back to happily burning. Here is a before and after pic.
Wow, what type of wood have you been burning? I've never had my ceramic get any significant build up on it. I plan to pick up a replacement after this season,(4th season on it) I've been trying to decide on ss or ceramic, this has helped to make that decision easier.
It's 3 yr oak and 1 1/2 yr locust. The build up was just very light fluffy ash, not creosote so not sure what caused it. Only on my second year with a cat so still learning. bogydave might have more input, and I should have checked it sooner I'm thinking.
Just my two cents, but I had a ceramic cat on the FIreview, 7 years never had to clean it. Cleaned it routinely between each season, but never felt it needed it even then. Steel cat is an entire different ballgame. Vastly prefer the ceramic, although one does have to be careful about flame impingement, so if you burn really hot maybe the ss is better.....
So far, I like the steel cats better than the ceramic. But they do seem to like to be cleaned a bit more often.
Looking good swags , I have been getting the same results with the IS, just a little bit of ash buildup. Easy to clean and it's right back into action.
Correct. However, just because they seem to collect more, that does not mean they collect a lot. However, I've seen some pictures where they did collect a lot and I'm still puzzled. Ours just don't get much on. I cleaned it just a couple weeks ago and there just was not much to clean.
I'm thinking it's as simple as the cells are smaller so they collect more fly ash. I wonder if flip side of this is they clean up the smoke better due to more cell surface area?
I shut it down and brushed the chimney last week. The front of the cat didn't look too bad, but the back side had a lot of buildup on it. At least 25% of what I could see was completely plugged. No telling what it was like behind that shield. I cranked my compressor down as far as it would go and still blow air, stuck a piece of 1/8" copper tubing in the end of the blow gun so I could bend it around to blow directly into the face of the cat, and carefully blew out each cell. Working much better now.
I did mine last weekend since it was "warm". I did the same thing with my compressor, cranked it down and blew the fly ash out of it.
Mine clogged up when I went to my 3 and 4 year oak, I've cleaned it twice since. I decided to go back to sugar maple and its staying cleaner, I can tell by all the fly ash that collected on the front glass with the oak, not getting that with the maple. Not sure why but that's been my experience so far.
Jeff, Swags, Does BK say it's alright to use compressed air? Woodstock specifically says not to use compressed air, as it can destroy the coating.
I've heard other WS owners saying they used canned air. Dialing the compressor down creates no more pressure than the canned air does.
I Don't know at what point it becomes a problem...was just asking and giving a heads up. One Woodstock owner posted within the week that his cat was replaced by Woodstock because he used compressed air: don't know whether canned or from a compressor....
BK doesn't really say, just to use a vacuum and soft brush, and some owners run a pipe cleaner thru each cell. I turned the regulator down until it quit blowing air, than back up a hair, maybe 20 psi. I'm sure blasting it with 150 psi would be pretty hard on the wash coat.
