woodstove catalytic combustors: How to keep your combustor healthy

Friday, October 22, 2010

How to keep your combustor healthy

Never burn foreign matter such as…

garbage,

painted wood,

large amounts of colored paper,

cardboard,

rubber,

plastic,

paneling with glue,

oily products and so on.

Burning these materials will gradually reduce the efficiency of the catalyst.

“Burn only seasoned dried wood”

All catalytic combustors used in EPA certified Phase II stoves have a life expectancy of at least, 10,000 burning hours, when used according to the stove's operating manual. It could be said, that a catalytic combustor’s life is really based on a number of things....

-Operating the stove properly.... (Not burning with firebox door open or perhaps closing the by-pass to soon)

-Proper maintenance habits to both stove and combustor... (Simple things like checking the firebox door gasket)

-Burning proper fuel in the appliance, (This means burning seasoned dried wood only- no foreign matter that could poison the combustor)

-Using a Certified Phase II stove for home heating and not an older stove design. (most stoves built today are designed well and protect the combustor from the firebox flames, the older pre-phase I stoves didn't)

3 comments:

Unknown said...: what happens as the fire burns down and the temperature drops below 600? Does the dying fire hurt the converter?; November 2, 2010 at 11:34 AM
Tim Cork said...: Thanks for the question Doug.
The answer is no harm will come to the combustor. As the firebox temperature drops, the gases feeding the combustor will become cooler. When these gases drop below 500 degrees F., the combustor will begin to stop working.
Remember, the combustor needs 500 degrees of fuel (smoke) mixed with the stove's secondary air to keep the combustor lit. This firebox temperature will allow the combustor to produce an exhaust temperature anywhere from 1000 to 1600 degrees.
Hope this has answered your question.
Tim; November 27, 2010 at 12:30 PM
Unknown said...: You sort of answered it thank you. However, since I am not supposed to close the bypass until the combustor is hot (my understanding is that it will plug up if not hot) then why doesn't it plug up when cooling down? And can I just re-stoke the fire and leave the bypass closed or re-heat the combustor first?

thanks again; December 13, 2010 at 5:14 PM

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About Tim Cork

Hi, my name is Tim Cork and if you are visiting my site for the first time, I want to thank you for stopping by and hope you will return again soon. I will have new postings every 2 to 3 days.

Just to give you a brief background on myself, I have worked in the woodstove industry for over 27 years. I am retired now and have had many wonderful years of working with catalytic woodstove manufacturers around the world. In addition, I have had the pleasure of working with dealers, distributors, chimney sweeps, consumers and environmental agencies like the United States Environmental Protection Agency.
Over the years I have gathered a world of knowledge from these people and with the help of this site I hope to share with you many interesting articles and perhaps helpful information related to catalytic combustors, catalytic woodstoves and the industry itself.
Again, please visit with me regularly for new topics and what I hope to be very informative articles.
I hope you will feel at liberty to share with me your experiences, comments and questions as well.

Know what you're shopping for

Look for the FIRECAT brand. It's a name you can trust.

Need a replacement combustor? http://www.appliedceramics.com/
You will have Applied the best.

Over the last 20 years I have seem several brands of catalytic combustors available to the woodstove industry.

Only the FIRECAT catalytic combustor was available in the early 80's and still available today.

FIRECAT's quality and committment by it's producer is second to none.

FIRECAT catalytic combustors are available for any catalytic stove model ever built.

FIRECAT has been the choice of most catalytic stove manufacturers for the last 15 years.

FIRECAT catalytic combustors are made to the stove manufacturer's specifications. Their catalytic stoves were designed to perform based on the combustor's size and cell density. (cell openings)
This is why FIRECAT catalytic combustors are manufactured in 16 cpi, 20 cpi and 25 cpi (cells per square inch)
Cell size and thickness of the combustor, controls the flow rate and residence time for the gases to burn while passing through the combustor. This is very important.

The FIRECAT brand is sold by more distributors and dealers than any other brand on the market.

How do I know this, because I sold the FIRECAT brand for the last 20 years to distributors, dealers, consumers and to the catalytic stove manufacturers.

FIRECAT Warranty Information