Harman PB105 Owners

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ok finally called the dealer about unburned pellets in the ashpan. I cleaned it sunday, empty ashpan, ran fine, wife checked last night no unburned pellets, i get home from today and check and theres probably 10 cups of wasted pellets.

They told me to check the holes in my burnpot there may be some stuff stuck in them, said to use a small nail to poke them.

Also told me the cover underneath to make sure its snug but not too tight. Does this make sense?

First he told me its normal for a few pellets to be unburned

Its happening every couple days. i should not have to clean this thing completely every 2 days to keep it running right.
 
ok finally called the dealer about unburned pellets in the ashpan. I cleaned it sunday, empty ashpan, ran fine, wife checked last night no unburned pellets, i get home from today and check and theres probably 10 cups of wasted pellets.

They told me to check the holes in my burnpot there may be some stuff stuck in them, said to use a small nail to poke them.

Also told me the cover underneath to make sure its snug but not too tight. Does this make sense?

First he told me its normal for a few pellets to be unburned

Its happening every couple days. i should not have to clean this thing completely every 2 days to keep it running right.
I have not ever seen a single unburned pellet in my ashpan after burning about 15 tons total. My feed is set on 4.5 and I have burned mostly Curran's, but have burned some Somersets.
 
ok finally called the dealer about unburned pellets in the ashpan. I cleaned it sunday, empty ashpan, ran fine, wife checked last night no unburned pellets, i get home from today and check and theres probably 10 cups of wasted pellets
Chris,
last year my PB pulled the same crap ...only 2 times. This year it has done it several times. I caught it once, over feeding pellets, just after ignition. this had the tendency to put the fire out. I have chalked it up to low grade pellets (green Supremes ..I have 9 tons:confused:) My fix...just plumbed a dump zone with 24' of fin tube. PLUS now I have the stove on manual. I'll bet if I was willing, dip switch changes could fix this.
are you burning a lower grade pellet?
 
ive burned all fireside ultras, i have a hopper full and 2 bags left then ill be using Maine Woods

Not sure whats going on with it and apparently the dealer dont care


Do you think this is happening during the start up?...I kinda think that's when mine acts up. I also can smell smoke in the house too, obviously only when it act up.. pressure lighter or finned?
 
The only time that's ever happened to me is during startup, when it doesn't light. But, the only time it doesn't light is when I haven't cleaned it for a long time.
It's not possible to have the cover underneath too tight. You don't want air flow around it. But you don't want to strip the threads either. Are you getting the burner closed tightly with that big red nut? I push just a little on the front of mine as I tighten the nut.
Maybe check with a different Harman dealer? I don't know how the Harman dealers work on warranty issues. If someone bought a stove from a "sub-par" dealer are they stuck with them? What if the dealer they purchased from goes out of business? I'll send you a PM with the name and number of the dealer I bought from just in case.
 
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My thoughts on the overfeeding pellets into the ash pan, the amount of pellets fed into the burnpot at startup and the feed rate setting together can cause this. A burnpot 1/2 full at startup will cause slow ignition, lots of smoke, when it finally ignites with all these pellets in the burnpot, when the ESP is satisfied the igniter will shut off and the pellets will start feeding at the feed rate setting, at higher settings causing unburned pellets to be pushed into the ash pan. The least amount of pellets in the burnpot for ignition at startup, the better ignition plus the possible overfeeding pellets into the ash pan. I cannot stress enough my thoughts about the quanity of pellets fed into the burnpot on startup. ( dip switch settings) This situation could be corrected by lowering the feed rate but...... when a higher demand for heat, the feed rate will not be high enough to meet the demand.
 
Do you think this is happening during the start up?...I kinda think that's when mine acts up. I also can smell smoke in the house too, obviously only when it act up.. pressure lighter or finned?
Yes i think its a start up issue, i just bought the boiler so id assume it has the newer ingiter in it I am burning Fireside Ultras for a few more bags then switching to MWP
 
My thoughts on the overfeeding pellets into the ash pan, the amount of pellets fed into the burnpot at startup and the feed rate setting together can cause this. A burnpot 1/2 full at startup will cause slow ignition, lots of smoke, when it finally ignites with all these pellets in the burnpot, when the ESP is satisfied the igniter will shut off and the pellets will start feeding at the feed rate setting, at higher settings causing unburned pellets to be pushed into the ash pan. The least amount of pellets in the burnpot for ignition at startup, the better ignition plus the possible overfeeding pellets into the ash pan. I cannot stress enough my thoughts about the quanity of pellets fed into the burnpot on startup. ( dip switch settings) This situation could be corrected by lowering the feed rate but...... when a higher demand for heat, the feed rate will not be high enough to meet the demand.

My Dip Switches are OFF ON ON(Factory Default) any ideas on what to try them at?

After a good cleaning it goes about 2 days before it acts up, but should i really need to clean this thing every two days?
 
My Dip Switches are OFF ON ON(Factory Default) any ideas on what to try them at?

After a good cleaning it goes about 2 days before it acts up, but should i really need to clean this thing every two days?
I have an older 105 and it has the 6 rpm auger and the older finned igniter. The feed setting is on 5 1/2 and I don't see any pellets within an inch of the highest edge of the burnpot which gets cleaned once a week.
 
My pb105 was installed back in May. It sat unused for the summer. I started it in late September and started having issues mid October (2-3 weeks run time). My dealer has gone over the top to work with me to resolve the issue. I have watched the system like a hawk and discovered that the smoke smell I was getting in the house was caused by a slow ignition. I had pellets in the ash pan too. So the first time they came out my burn pot was replaced because mine had all ready warped. We fired it up and had ignition in no time, so I continued as before. Well smoke smell came back and when I would scrape down the burn pot and re-fire I noticed that I was getting a lot of pellets before any ignition. So again, once it ignited it went with a bit of a poof which caused the spring loaded plate under my hopper to release letting excess pressure out of the boiler and also allowing smoke into the house. Dealer came back checked more stuff and replaced my ignitor (I have the pressure ignitor). Then he fired it up and saw my ignition was still very slow. Told me to run it in manual for the rest of the weekend until he could speak with Harman. He came back today and changed the dip switch settings at Harmans direction. So now my settings are off, off, on. So far so good.

So my unit is heating about 2500 sq ft. 3 different zones. It is plumbed in series with my oil boiler. My high temp setting is at 175 and low is 165. Feed rate is at 4.
 
My Dip Switches are OFF ON ON(Factory Default) any ideas on what to try them at?

That setting will feed the least amount of pellets during startup from what I can tell from the literature, there is no way to make it feed less unless you change out the auger motor to a slower one like the older 6 RPM version that myself and others have with the finned cartridge ignitions.

Check out this thread, is it similar to the issues you are having?

https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads...and-consuming-more-pellets-than-usual.117166/
 
The dip switch settings set at off, on, on,(this is where my settings are) minimum amount of pellets at startup, when the auger stops feeding pellets, prior to smoke, look through the glass in the firebox door with a flashlight to see if you can see the level of pellets in the burnpot. When I do this on mine I cannot see any pellets in the burnpot even though I know pellets have been fed into the burnpot, with smoke prior to actual ignition. Also, you need to confirm the ignition type in the boiler, I know its a new boiler but........ I suspect that some of the pb105 boilers being sold may have the finned ignition, depending on the period of time when the dealer received it.

IMHO, in order to find out what is causing the overfeeding that you have, you will have to look through the glass in the firebox door at startup of the boiler to see the quanity of pellets in the burnpot prior to ignition, after ignition, watch to see the quanity of pellets being fed into the burnpot to confirm that pellets are not being pushed into the ashpan due to the feed rate setting. This is going to take a little time so, be patient, report back with your findings.
 
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how do i find out what kind of ignitor it has.

When i have watched it before when its running normal theres hardly any pellets i nthere before it fires up, so little you cant see looking through the door. But when i notice it has fed pelelts into the ashpan and then look into burnpot its fairly full
 
Open the firebox door, just above the burnpot cleanout plate held in place by 2 wing bolts, check to see if 2 bolts are present holding the cradle for the finned igniter. If no bolts are visable you have the pressure ignition.

If you can't see pellets in the burnpot on startup, great, this is good. Now, you need to continue watching the feeding of pellets after ignition to see when the unburned pellets are pushed into the ashpan. I suspect the overfeeding maybe caused by the feed setting. Shorter pellets feed faster than longer pellets, meaning if the pellets being used are short the auger will feed more pellets per revolution. What do you have the feed set on? If you while watching see pellets being fed past 1" of the lip of the burnpot on high heat demand, you need to lower the feed rate.
 
Just give it a good cleaning put in MWP watched it light, went back down a few minutes later and the ignitor light is still on and you can hear it. Thoughts?
The ESP will turn the igniter off when the exhaust rises in temp.
 
You have had this such a short time I would start to really complain to the dealer and get them out there. It will be cold soon.. quite cold..

You spent a crap load of money on it I would hope a couple courtesy calls are built into the cost.
 
went down again and theres quite a few pellets in the burnpot partially burned out to the tip and theres a few partial burned in the ashpan
If this is the case, lower the feed rate a tad, watch to see if it stops the overfeeding, lower it again if needed. The key to resolving this issue is to pull up a chair next to the boiler and watch what is happening or get the dealer out to check it out.
 
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The dip switch settings set at off, on, on,(this is where my settings are) minimum amount of pellets at startup, when the auger stops feeding pellets, prior to smoke, look through the glass in the firebox door with a flashlight to see if you can see the level of pellets in the burnpot. When I do this on mine I cannot see any pellets in the burnpot even though I know pellets have been fed into the burnpot, with smoke prior to actual ignition. Also, you need to confirm the ignition type in the boiler, I know its a new boiler but........ I suspect that some of the pb105 boilers being sold may have the finned ignition, depending on the period of time when the dealer received it.

IMHO, in order to find out what is causing the overfeeding that you have, you will have to look through the glass in the firebox door at startup of the boiler to see the quanity of pellets in the burnpot prior to ignition, after ignition, watch to see the quanity of pellets being fed into the burnpot to confirm that pellets are not being pushed into the ashpan due to the feed rate setting. This is going to take a little time so, be patient, report back with your findings.


I have only caught my stove once. It seamed to overfeed pellets by running continuously...I interceded and stopped the feed motor with my hand . It only did this a couple of times last year. I'm kinda afraid of messing with the dip switches ( the engineer in me wants to know what each switch does...bla bla). So now... manual is working for me, till its fixed .
 
should you see alot of smoke coming from the vent outside when its running?
No. The only time I see smoke is for a min or so after it lights
 
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