I know this is an old thread, but for posterity sake:
I have been burning wood for 38 years. We purchased a Vermont Castings Defiant Catalytic stove 20 years ago. It has heated our home ever since. I know stoves very well. I have cookstoves, weldment (fire brick) stoves, coal stoves, on and on! Likely 4 wood stoves here, 6 cookstoves.
The "cat" in my stove is ORIGINAL, never replaced! The key is to get the fire going, build a substantial bed of coals and to burn off most of the Volitile Organic Compounds VOC from the wood (which is what causes creasote) this is burning off the impurities and approaching charcoal....THEN turn on the converter. If you pile in a bunch of wood it takes an hour or two depending on moisture content to burn off the VOC's. If just adding a piece...it might be 30 minutes. If you do this you will get substantial life and service from your Cat.
The red stove pictures in this thread has been significant ly over fired, note the warped, cracked piece in the rear. . Additionally, the temps the original posted listed are crazy high. If my chimney get 500-600 I am shutting things down (choking air etc). We do use the ash door to get things going. As stated BE CAREFUL!!
Additionally, some folks may have draft issues, we have a nice liner in our chimney at home, but our cabin has a chronic cold chimney and if I were burning there I would think something was wrong with ANY stove!
We LOVE, LOVE our Vermont! .
