We had a defective stove - it's fixed but I have ?'s

Installed a dvc 3 weeks ago. Gas heat has not been on since.
I questioned the warm air coming out of the bottom of the t cap when mine was installed.
I was told it was a safety feature for a severe down draft. I am not drawing in any fumes into my house.
Room temperature works fine . I keep room temp on about 70, and it keeps house + - 2 degrees.
When I burn on stove temp. it really throws heat. Can't burn beyond low because it burns to hot.
Don't see any rusting inside stove. I got my coal from a local dealer in Scraton Pa. I store coal in my coal bin.
From what I know you should not be burning wet or damp coal.
I don't think you will have a problem burning the stove with the t cap on, let me know if you do.
Dvc is a nice stove, very expensive but a nice heat source.

Your hopper is sealed, correct? With the damp coal, there is no place for the moisture to go, so it's going to rust. On my Keystoker, the hopper lid has two big mesh covered holes (3" diameter), and when I talked to them, they did metion to never seal up the hopper, or if you did, to make sure you let the coal dry for a while first.

Get a muck tub, it will hold about 2 bags of coal, fill it up and let it sit a day before going into the stove, that will allow it to dry a little. The coal will still be a little damp, which is what they recomend. Right out of the bag Blashak coal is pretty wet.

I cut a hole in the bottom of my muck tub and laid a piece of plastic screen oner it to let air come up through the coal. I have no rust in my Channing stoker hopper, in my second season burning it.

Also I use a metal feed scoop to load my hopper, keeps the dust down.

I just checked my hopper with a magnet, the entire font side where the coal hits and the lower part are all non magnetic stainless steel. The top two sides and top back are some kind of steel. (I say some kind - because it only has slight surface discoloration & it does not look to be galvanised - and there's magnetic and non magnetic SS) Because of the sealed hopper, I too get condensation in the hopper. The coal I'm burning now has been in the bin since August of this year - so I'm not so sure the coal is wet on the outside.

My Tee is plugged as well - I vent between a stoop and a walk out bay window - was getting fumes sucked back in with my combustion air.

The Hopper Must be seled on the DVC 500 it is a pressurized/airtight stove. I would shut down the stove and clean out all the coal from the hopper. I would then wire brush the area really well clean the area and paint it with high temp paint. The rust will only get worse if not attended to.