Woodstock Absolute Steel

Yes..

 

This is when trying to keep STT as high as possible.
Wife gets up at four am. Open air all the way burn down coals. With good BTU wood I keep bed of coals 18 hours easy.. IS is bigger firebox so YMMV.. our home has a lot of cubic feet to heat.. many vaulted ceilings. Of course we are colder in Vermont

 

I can only reply on my experience with 5 stoves; one was a used stove that had been abused before I got it. So the 4 stoves I've had since new the only gasket that needed some maintenance and not even needed changing for 10 years, was the top of the Fireview. It's a thin gasket and that top is heavy and used frequently for access to the Cat and cleaning. It really only need more glue after about 5 years and changing at 10. Also at 10 was the feeding door. This year at 12 years I'll also be changing the Cat engage/disengage plate gasket.

 

My IS needed a cat gasket about every 3 years
Door closing and glass in door every 5 so far..

Realize my stove is probably in use 10,000 hours a year so usage hours might have impact

 

I'm replying to my own post on this subject. I picked up my AS back in 2017. I admit it is not a full time 24X7 stove as it is in my basement/family room, now that it's just myself and the wife, it's really just the laundry room most of the time. But when it's below 15'F or less, I get it burning and keep it that way around the clock. This year it's been almost 24X7.

I haven't changed a gasket or the CAT yet. Sometimes I use my fingers to fatten up the feeder door as it is a little too easy to use the handle for that door a little too heavy. It's getting ready for a new Cat, but it seems to be fine with a 50/50 wash at the beginning of the season and then again right about now.

Like gas mileage in cars, YMMV.

 

Awhile back a guy at Woodstock told me you’ll get 4-6 years full time burning out of the steel cats if you do a 50/50 wash once per year. Sounds like good preventative maintenance.

 

The AS model is probably the one other stove I would consider if for no other reason than to have a bigger window- but the larger stove might wind up being too much for me. I think the FV is beautiful, but I'm not sure I could convince myself to get away from a hybrid stove. Kind of a me problem there though, because I suspect it would be fine.

If you're stuck in a rut trying to get up to the 3 year mark- I'd suggest getting a pallet of compressed wood bricks. They're definitely dry and burn great especially when in conjunction with cordwood. Just my 2 cents on the matter.

 

This is gonna sound dumb.....

Just cleaned the cat with vinegar solution. Read the hair dryer part,.said.eh heat gun will work more better. Started then thought maybe that's too much heat? Yes I know the cat gets raging hot in the stove. But I'm doing this outside, mid 40s and breezy... Does that matter? Any kind of risk to the cat in terms of thermal shock?

 

Sorry I haven't been back to reply for a while. I used a hair dryer just because I had one I use to dry-out my air-cleaner on my motorcycle. Sometimes I use it to get a stick-on that says some crazy thing on paint or chrome.

I heat gun might be better or quicker but the hair-dryer just was what I had. I doubt the heat gun would hurt it at all.

Sorry I didn' reply quickly. My bad.

steve aka oldhippie

 

Here is an excellent review of a recent Absolute Steel.