I am currently selling Breckwell stoves seems like a very good line. I have gone to classes on the stoves and am very happy to say that they are a low end stove and seem like so far very easy to maintain and fix if the problem ever arises.
any questions let me know
It’s the Accentra-2. Dealer installed. WHEN it runs, it runs rich. Pipe clogged twice. Side of house brown. When it stops it shows 6 blinking lights (out of fuel). It takes about 8 times of trying to start, then it may run. Ash bucket fills in 2 days with unburnt pellets. The glass turns black in 2 or 3 hours after cleaning. I’ve had a blow back that cost MY insurance company $6000.00. The dealer has stopped coming after being here 10 or 11 times. Called Harman and they hung up on me. I sent a letter to Dane Harman and he never answered it. I’m know dealing with the Attorney General of Vermont. I hope this helps.
you’re likely sucking air, in my experience a firebox leak can produce what you describe and they can be the devil to find, look closely at all the seams of the firebox, see if you find one which does not have soot all the way into the joint where the two pieces meet, if you find any , push some furnace cement into the crack where the pieces join, this likely will not be a perminant fix but could show you where the leak (if it is one) is at. now , without being there and able to look at it , its a guess on my part but i think its a good one. after sealing any prospective leaks , refire the unit and see if the flame looks more active. if so its a leak in an area you sealed, if not either you didnt find it or im wrong. hope this helps
Wow thank you so much for the replies and please keep them coming!!
1. Yes I am looking into replacement windows as well, currently leaning towards Anderson Woodwright replacements, with wood interior and clad exterior. ~$440/each with 13 to replace.
2. I’ll check out the place in Mansfield, $300 less is $300 saved or a point of negotiation with my local store.
3. Quadrafire seems to be recommended fairly often so I will check them as well.
I take it there are no definitive “worry free, best bang for the buck” models out there? In terms of noise how bad/good is the advance in comparison to other equivalent models? I am fairly handy so maintenance and occasional troubleshooting don’t concern me if that’s the nature of the beast, I just want to make sure I get a good stove and have no regrets down the road!
I just bought a Quadrafire insert 1200i. I currently have a Qudrafire 3100i insert wood buring and have had good results with it for the last 12 years. Only had to replace the fan set once in 12 years. I went with the Quad because the woodstove has done real well. I’m tired of lugging wood thus the change. I bought the stove at the place in Canton, MA and they seemed very helpful and knowledgeable. They have a few on display and the 1200i according to them has been in their store for 12 years and still going strong. Got last years price however that deal is over. Paid about $3000 with the flue kit. Gonna install it myself as I put my own woodstove in and that is suppose to be harder to install than a pellet stove. I recommend going to the store and looking at them and ask what the most common part to be replaced to get a feel for how they work etc ... Good luck and let us know what you get. Oh and Kirley in Mansfield is getting $250 a ton on New England Pellet with $45 flat delivery fee. Seems to be the going rate in our area. Wish I lived more western MA, as you could get the same pellet for $205 delivered.
It’s the Accentra-2. Dealer installed. WHEN it runs, it runs rich. Pipe clogged twice. Side of house brown. When it stops it shows 6 blinking lights (out of fuel). It takes about 8 times of trying to start, then it may run. Ash bucket fills in 2 days with unburnt pellets. The glass turns black in 2 or 3 hours after cleaning. I’ve had a blow back that cost MY insurance company $6000.00. The dealer has stopped coming after being here 10 or 11 times. Called Harman and they hung up on me. I sent a letter to Dane Harman and he never answered it. I’m know dealing with the Attorney General of Vermont. I hope this helps.
This is unfortunate. Apparently your dealer does not know how to fix it. (And I am hearing only one side of the story so don’t know for sure that this conclusion is correct). What he should have done is replace it with another unit. But many dealers, despite claims on this site to the contrary, are barely making any money and cannot bring themselves to pay the costs to correct these types of problems. It is short sited on their part, but it is a story often told. Many dealers may be nice folks but they are not yet very good business people and have not yet bought in to what it takes to satisfy customers. Many manufacturers are also behind the curve. How much better it would be if the dealer and manufacturer go out of their way to solve this issue instead of ignoring it?
I sold a stinker of a pellet stove to a family a few years ago. We could not get the thing to work right. So, we apologized and offered to replace it with another brand that we knew to be of higher quality. They could pay the difference in cost for the stove only. We’d pay for all the labor involved. They couldn’t afford to pay the difference, that’s why they originally chose the cheaper brand. We offered to swap in our floor demo model as an even swap. They accepted and were very happy with the new stove even thought it didn’t fit their room as nicely as the original stove. We sent the stinker back to the distributor and demanded our money back. We ended up with a happy customer and we ended up with no profit on the sale. We feel the happy customer will pay off more than the initial profit in the long run.
Many dealers do not agree with me on this point. They tend to believe that they must preserve the profit from the original sale at all costs. At least that seems to be their position. Why else would they piss off their customer by ignoring an obvious problem and refusing to fix it? Dealers must figure out a way to respond to problems in such a way as to end up with satisfied customers and realize a profit at the same time. A business cannot survive without profit. But it most certainly cannot survive without customers. I believe that if you take care of the customer first the profit will follow - IF you structure your business correctly. The trick is learning how to profit even in the face of less-than-perfect products and human mistakes.
Sean, thank you. I wish I was dealing with you. The things you mention are nuts on. The dealer is trying… but not hard enough. Harman… I just don’t get it. I’m sure I’ll win my suit, but it’ll cost the dealer and Harman more this way. Where are you located? Thanks again.
Sean, thank you. I wish I was dealing with you. The things you mention are nuts on. The dealer is trying… but not hard enough. Harman… I just don’t get it. I’m sure I’ll win my suit, but it’ll cost the dealer and Harman more this way. Where are you located? Thanks again.
One problem a dealer has is keeping his focus on one customer for long enough to correct problems quickly. We often have as many as 50-100 customers all demanding attention at once. This can affect performance drastically. I know I do not always get back to people as soon as they would like. But, you said he was there up to ten times? I think I would make up my mind by the third time as to whether I should replace the unit or not.
As to Harman, they are simply following their business model. They do not deal direct with customers. They only work through their dealers. Most stove companies operate this way. This works fine if the dealer is good and competent. This creates a real problem when the dealer fails to satisfy the customer. We need to come up with a better way to deal with problems so that the customer is not left holding. I wish I had more time to devote to solving this industry problem. For now, I’m just trying to solve these issues in my own market.
We are located about two hours north of NYC, in the Catskills, next to the Mid-Hudson Valley.
Somone correct me if I am wrong but did Quadrafire just buy Harmen????
No, Quadra-fire did not buy Harman. Harman, like Quadra-fire, was acquired by Hearth & Home Technologies. Quadr-fire was acquired several years ago, Harman at the end of 2007. They also have Heatilator and Heat-n-Glo under their umbrellas. Harman remains an independent operating company and continues to own the properties in Halifax, PA.
Hearth and Home Technoligies, is in turn, a division of HNI Corporation (HON Industries).
