Ideal Steel Season #2 Tips, Tricks, and Improvements.

Yeah, I told them everything I did.. 675 highest I have got my STT since I owned it.. then first time this year burned real BTU wood. such a mild winter I have been burning popular.. even loaded 3/4 full rarely got above 525 STT. Past weekend I tried to keep that as minimum..

 

Yeah Customer Service SOLD me this Stove... Are there other good stoves out there Absolutely .. But small locally owned company, great guarantee and Solves problems what's not to like...

 

Hi Canadian border,
You are not the first to warp an unshielded radiator. The temperatures from the combustor are very high and that heat is projected right onto the radiator above. While there is no harm in running the stove with a warped radiator and the part will still be effective, it can get progressively worse, making it difficult to remove to clean the combustor. Your replacement radiator will come with a stainless steel heat shield attached. This stainless steel heat shield will help protect your radiator from the high temperatures.

All the best,

Lorin Day
Woodstock Soapstone Co.

 

I might have a radiator made up out of stainless locally because the radiator seems to be made from plain ole mild steel. The temps that the cats run at definitely damage them..I think I've heard the radiator is a "wear" item similar to tires on a car. The steel peels away from itself. A stainless radiator would not do that but obviously adds to the cost. Is there any negative issues with having a stainless radiator made up? I'd think not due to you guys adding a stainless heat shield to it but one never knows.

 

Babaganoosh, I will see how the one with stainless heat shield works.. But that is a good idea.. One of my concerns with this stove purchase was it was a new design, meaning the IS did not have a longevity record, but their customer service is fantastic, and parts are reasonably priced those factors along with ease of repair alleviated that concern.

Kudos to Woodstock for continual part analysis and improvement.

 

We had this problem last year on the old thread. You would find it mentioned quite a bit in the old thread.

Mine continues to scale metal off of the radiator and it has gotten very thin.

 

Our Ideal Steel Beta testers of 2013-2014 (some of which really put the stove through its paces), helped us work out the majority of changes pre-production. Once we went into production, and had a much larger user group, we were able to identify some minor changes. The radiator shield is one, and for those who had an early production stove, the "alarm clock" tertiary bimetal plate was the other. Both were easy to fix.

Lorin Day
Woodstock Soapstone Co.

 

JA600L- Do you have a shielded radiator?

Lorin Day
Woodstock Soapstone Co.

 

I purchased my stove in October and I did not get one that had a stainless shielded radiator.

 

Agreed. I have scaling on both top and bottom. I usually pull the cat once every week or two and check for metal laying on the cat and scrape the radiator.

 

Lorin,
Do you recall when Woodstock began adding/using stainless radiator shields to the production of IS stoves?

 

It looks like we started using the radiator shield mid-November of 2015.
Lorin

 

Look at that big chunk of radiator. That was a few weeks ago.

Doing a clean out today so I'm curious to see what's going on.

 

Is the whole radiator stainless steel or is there a S.S. section in the middle of a steel shield? Do you have a photo by any chance?

I just pulled my cat. out and for the first time, my heat shield is dished down in the center, no doubt due to the extended, hard burning from the recent cold snap. I did not over- fire the stove, merely ran it somewhat harder than normal.

Just got done receiveing a new door (I bought that) and a new cat. from Woodstock and I agree, their customer service is second to none that I know of. Plus their packing and shipping is just about as good or better than anything else I have ever seen; I have only been a customer since last year but those people are a pure pleasure to deal with every single time I have had any interaction with them.

Brian

 

BDF, Brian it's being shipped when I get it I will post a pic. I just called as I saw the dip and wanted to make sure wouldn't hurt anything.. As Donna said I was the first I assume she thought I had warped the new style.. I am only 125 miles from Woodstock so it should be soon..from Lorin description I assume it has a stainless protector plate on it..

 

Great-thanks!

The dip in mine is almost enough to have the radiator clip the thermocouple above the catalyst. I may have to bend it back up a little bit.

Brian

 

Here is mine.

 

If you try to bend it back it just weakens the metal and causes more scaling.

 

Well, I cannot have it dragging over my temperature probe (man, that sounded nasty, didn't it?) so I do not have much choice.

Putting a piece of angle stock across the top of the radiator, with the two edges flat on the radiator (with the "V" shape pointed straight up) would go a long way to stiffening the front lip of the radiator too- maybe this summer when the stove is down.

Brian

 

I thought about a piece of angle iron in the front there too. I'm just not sure if the angle iron would hold up to turning bright red. It might warp too and make the front heavier.