Vigilant II Is Just Humming Along!!!

blrman07 · Post by **blrman07** » Sun. Sep. 27, 2015 6:23 am

Came down this morning to find the stove had picked up about 60 degrees on the griddle top for no apparent reason. Same coal, same routine, nothing changed. I opened the ash door to check the ash level and saw that the rope gasket had come loose at the top of the door. I suspect I hit the gasket while taking out the ash pan and dislodged it.

Time to pull the door and recement the gasket. I should be able to do this without shutting down the stove. I'll make a temp board from drywall to put in the ash pan door opening. It stays relatively cool so there should be no problem.

Glad I found this now instead of in January!

Check your gaskets while we are approaching the shoulder months.

Post by **Lightning** » Sun. Sep. 27, 2015 12:47 pm

blrman07 wrote:Time to pull the door and recement the gasket. I should be able to do this without shutting down the stove. I'll make a temp board from drywall to put in the ash pan door opening. It stays relatively cool so there should be no problem.

I've also read that people have fashioned some tin foil around openings while a door is being worked on. Maybe the foil solution would be easier than trying to get a chunk of dry wall to fit snuggly.

Doby · Post by **Doby** » Sun. Sep. 27, 2015 1:21 pm

I had one come loose last Feb on a stoker stove, just shot some high temp silicone behind it and closed the door, checked it and still good

michaelanthony · Post by **michaelanthony** » Sun. Sep. 27, 2015 7:27 pm

blrman07 wrote:Came down this morning to find the stove had picked up about 60 degrees on the griddle top for no apparent reason. Same coal, same routine, nothing changed. I opened the ash door to check the ash level and saw that the rope gasket had come loose at the top of the door. I suspect I hit the gasket while taking out the ash pan and dislodged it.

Time to pull the door and recement the gasket. I should be able to do this without shutting down the stove. I'll make a temp board from drywall to put in the ash pan door opening. It stays relatively cool so there should be no problem.

Glad I found this now instead of in January!

Check your gaskets while we are approaching the shoulder months.

...thanks for the reminder Rev. the same thing happened to me last season

for the life of me I couldn't figure out why the bi-metal flapper doo hickey wasn't working right! We must stay vigilant!...no pun intended.

blrman07 · Post by **blrman07** » Sun. Sep. 27, 2015 9:41 pm

Doby wrote:I had one come loose last Feb on a stoker stove, just shot some high temp silicone behind it and closed the door, checked it and still good

Nice Idea!!! I can pick up a tube and take care of this quickly without taking the door off. I'll use the waxed paper trick. it's cool enough down there so I don't have to worry about instant combustion.

ddahlgren · Post by **ddahlgren** » Mon. Sep. 28, 2015 12:50 am

I have added a long time ago gorilla glue and high temp silicone to the standard repair kit of duct tape and WD40 LOL..

deepwoods · Post by **deepwoods** » Mon. Sep. 28, 2015 4:18 am

ddahlgren wrote:I have added a long time ago gorilla glue and high temp silicone to the standard repair kit of duct tape and WD40 LOL..

A coat hanger (the metal ones) has bailed me out of a few pinches. I have some stashed away just in case along with what you mentioned

blrman07 · Post by **blrman07** » Wed. Dec. 02, 2015 7:12 pm

I was given a free ton of nut coal for the hauling in the fall. I have burned through about 1/2 of that and I went today and got 8 buckets of pea which is about 355 pounds. The free nut was nice but it burned hot and had a LOT of ash. I topped the stove off this afternoon with pea and reset the inlet air to about 1/2 of what I had it set for with the nut. Within 10 minutes I had blues all across the surface of the pea and here we are about 4 hours later and I still have the blues!!!

I set it to indirect and now have 350 on the griddle, 73 in the living room, 70 upstairs with 41 OAT.

Gonna feed it pea the rest of the winter and just sit and look at the blues when ever I can.

michaelanthony · Post by **michaelanthony** » Wed. Dec. 02, 2015 7:58 pm

blrman07 wrote:.........Gonna feed it pea the rest of the winter and just sit and look at the blues when ever I can.

I must agree pea size works the best for watchin' the blue flames non-stop in the Vigilant.

blrman07 · Post by **blrman07** » Thu. Dec. 03, 2015 7:49 am

16 hours after switching to pea and I still have the blues

Makes me want to just add more to make more blues.

I love the blues

blrman07 · Post by **blrman07** » Fri. Dec. 11, 2015 7:44 am

Got a nice warm spell coming this next week. I will probably let the stove burn out and give it a good cleaning. I try to take the flue pipe down at least once in November usually around Thanksgiving and give it and the chimney a good cleaning to remove any fly ash that drifted up.

Sitting here looking at the stove it may take all weekend for it to burn out at the setting I have it on. It's been going for 13 hours now and looks like it could go at least another 10 if I don't touch it. 24 hour burns are not uncommon with this stove. I guess I will open the air inlet flapper wide open and get it to burn all the coal just a bit faster.

Rich W. · Post by **Rich W.** » Fri. Dec. 11, 2015 10:28 am

It's been mild here too. I've been on a 24 hour schedule for a week; very spoiled! In fact, I've cut back the size of the fire by clearing ash in the center two sections only, leaving ash and unburned coal on both sides. My fire is narrow, but still deep after adding coal, so I'm still getting the 24+ hour burn. Very little coal consumption and not overheating the living room. Love it!

VigIIPeaBurner · Post by **VigIIPeaBurner** » Fri. Dec. 11, 2015 1:13 pm

Rich W. wrote:It's been mild here too. I've been on a 24 hour schedule for a week; very spoiled! In fact, I've cut back the size of the fire by clearing ash in the center two sections only, leaving ash and unburned coal on both sides. My fire is narrow, but still deep after adding coal, so I'm still getting the 24+ hour burn. Very little coal consumption and not overheating the living room. Love it!

After 15 years of using this stove, the way handling techniques can widen how versatile the 2310 variants are still amazes me

joeq · Post by **joeq** » Fri. Dec. 11, 2015 6:49 pm

You guys with your Vigilants, sound like you're on easy street. Don't you feel guilty, or what?

Rich W. · Post by **Rich W.** » Fri. Dec. 11, 2015 7:14 pm

Feeling LUCKY, to have a great stove and all of YOU to teach me how to run it!

Vigilant II Is Just Humming Along!!!

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