Harman P61 blue flame

More info? Is this all the time? Is this just while it is ramping up or down?

I would start looking at what fuel the stove is consuming.

When my flames are running high, I usually have some blue at bottom.. white yellow rest of the way..

What is he burning and did anyone check draft and / or combustion blower voltage?

The pellets he is using are probably releasing a gas that shows up as as blue flame. Free heat with no weight. I bet if he burns a different brand of pellets the blue flame will go away.

Give him a bag of your pellets and see what happens. Get one his pellet bags and burn it in your stove. Report back here with the scientific results.

Back in my wood burning days I would often get blue and green flames from different logs of wood containing some sort of gas. My apple wood logs had a lot of these gases, probably from all the chemicals sprayed on apple trees year after year.

Blue flame at the bottom of the pot likely means the hoppper seal is compromised or stacked with pellets, allowing in copious amounts of air.

This highly acceleates the demise of the transfer tube int the weldment that the auger rides in.

Tonyray said:

When my flames are running high, I usually have some blue at bottom.. white yellow rest of the way..

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forgot to mention that my blue is deff never 2" high,,,

Tonyray said:

forgot to mention that my blue is deff never 2" high,,,

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X 2

Some conifers have a high amount of copper sulfate. Makes for a good fungus killer too. Had a bad problem with fungus on peonies last season. If you ever buy color crystals for sprinkling on a fire that's what it is.

Waterworker123 said:

A friend of mine has a P61. Is it normal if the flame is blue. Maybe 2 inches high from the bottom?

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As bioburner notes, I would bet on possibly copper being the source of the blue flame.

It is sometimes pellet dependent. There a a couple of pellets I've burned where the blue flame is evident and others where it is not. I kind of like it. Both pellets that produced that blue flame effect produced very little ash. Sitting around a campfire, some wood will give off the same effect.

Bioburner said:

Some conifers have a high amount of copper sulfate. Makes for a good fungus killer too. Had a bad problem with fungus on peonies last season. If you ever buy color crystals for sprinkling on a fire that's what it is.

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Maybe there's a market for pellets with copper sulfate added, for decorative effect.

If we are gonna make Gourmet pellets, I want them to smell like stuff, Steak house, Coffee, Bread baking, Pie in the Oven, the list is endless, we can call them smellets

Doug Doty said:

If we are gonna make Gourmet pellets, I want them to smell like stuff, Steak house, Coffee, Bread baking, Pie in the Oven, the list is endless, we can call them smellets

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I want them to smell like Hickory!

I prefer the pellets we put in the stove not to smell. Maybe the fresh pine like I feed the Elena as its open hopper seems to be aromatic. Can buy a freshener or two or open up the twice smoked ham I did.

I usually get an inch or so of blue flame in the P61 with some hardwood pellets. Less so with softwood. Also after a full cleaning I can get a little space between the pellets and the start of the flame on ramp up of flame after first ignition. Right now, this minute, I have a mixed blue and yellow flame dancing over the pellets on a low burn with Energex Hardwood. When this ramps up for heat I will have a lot of yellow flame over a blue base. I take this as all good, I consider that a clean flame. There is plenty of ash in those Energex but the flame is clean.

alternativeheat said:

I usually get an inch or so of blue flame in the P61 with some hardwood pellets. Less so with softwood. Also after a full cleaning I can get a little space between the pellets and the start of the flame on ramp up of flame after first ignition. Right now, this minute, I have a mixed blue and yellow flame dancing over the pellets on a low burn with Energex Hardwood. When this ramps up for heat I will have a lot of yellow flame over a blue base. I take this as all good, I consider that a clean flame. There is plenty of ash in those Energex but the flame is clean.

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EXACTLY!!

A Blue flame is a hotter flame, may not be a bad thing.

Tonyray said:

EXACTLY!!

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The hottest portion of a flame is blue. As it gets cooler it moves to yellow, orange, then red. The clear area is due to high temperature gasification of the fuel before ignition. Some other colors can be attributed to constituents of the fuel itself. In short, blue is good. So is light yellow.

Blue is good. I have had one brand that can only get to green. It is the pellet content. My guess on my green is bug remnants in the pellets from ash bore trees that have been infected. Hotter for me and good use of damaged trees. If you have blue then good for you and never change brands. One hot pellet.

TonyVideo said:

Blue is good. I have had one brand that can only get to green. It is the pellet content. My guess on my green is bug remnants in the pellets from ash bore trees that have been infected. Hotter for me and good use of damaged trees. If you have blue then good for you and never change brands. One hot pellet.

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Energex Hardwood and Maine Woods Blend both have given me a blue base to the flame. I don't recall off hand what other brands have done this. I'm burning the Energex now and a time last winter as well. The blue base to the flame is what drew me back to them. Incidentally both brands have their share of ash content. I'm thinking that also Tractor Supply's hardwood did this as well but that's a bit of fuzzy thinking, though I know they burned real hot..