Review of Jotul F 400 stove
Jotul F400 Castine - Very disappointed
I have to say that I'm very disappointed with the F400. I have an interior chimney that is only 10 years old and very robust. We never had any draft issue with our previous stove. The Chimney Sweep we have has nothing bad to say about it, yet every time I open the door on the F400, smoke come through into the room, no matter how slowly I open it. I also find that it sometimes "runs away" and burns much to hot even though it's turned way down and is closed tightly. (Very Scary!) I often feel like I have very little control over the burn temperature. I will definitely be replacing this (heavy) pile of junk before next winter. I only hope it doesn't burn my house down before then.
Stove expert replied: This sounds like the problem could be partly due to poor fuel - when a stove is hard to control and then suddenly runs away this can be due to wet fuel: it is hard to light and run to start with, and then when the fuel dries out the air vents are still fully open and off it goes! If the problem is partly down to chimney draft then fitting a flue damper may help with that.If you are choosing another stove then we find that very few people have problems with Morso stoves, regardless of the chimney that they are attached to, although burning poor fuel on a Morso would still stop the stove working well.