Whitfield Profile 20 - 5 seasons and that’s it?

In 2003 I bought a Whifield Profile 20 to heat a great room we added to my house, paid about $1500 which was a fairly well discounted price (i think it was usually about $2200). For the first few years it worked fairly well, then at the end of last season I began having trouble with the exhaust fan slowing to a halt, the display lights flashing and the room filling with smoke, and at the same time the stove began to get fussy over which types of pellets I was using. It would shut down if I used some brands, and run ok with others (I only bought premium fuel of whatever brand they were carrying in the local Lowe's and HD). In December I swapped out the control board, and while the exahust fan problem seemed to be solved, I still had problems with brands of pellets. Now, at the end of the season, I have seen a recurrence of the exhaust fan issue, and the control panel lights flashing, and it also shuts itself off no matter what type of pellet I use. I already put in a $300 control board that is faulty after 4 months, I dont plan to pump hundreds of dollars more into this thing to keep it running when I dont know if it will fix the issue. This is the sole source of heat in the room, I dont need it cutting out on me early next season. Dont know of any techs in my area (Southeastern NY state) so I think it's probably time to look at a new stove over the summer. Any advice? Anything I should try before I give up on it? Has anyone seen/heard of problems with certain brands of pellets?

thanks

Hi, thanks for the responses.

I have not checked the exhaust fan for bearing issues, but will figure out how to do so.

And I have not had the stove serviced each year because there doesnt seem to be a techincian in my area who wanted the job (I called a few places and they would not make house calls if they did not sell me the stove). I do routine maintenence on the stove myself though, and keep it pretty clean. Just not an expert on all the moving parts.

Has anyone heard of the issue of certain types of pellets causing issues? Seems very odd to me, as I said I only buy premium fuel.

What happens with the stove is one of two things:
A>it will start up and burn as normal. After a time I will hear some 'fluttering' for lack of a better word and the combustion fan will slow and speed up, back and forth. The display lights on the control board will all be flickering when this happens, and the flame will get lazy also. In a short amount of time the window will blacken and the room will smell like I have overfired the stove (burnt paint smell). At it's worst the room will begin to fill with smoke. When I turn off the stove and it goes into shutdown, the exhaust fan will then begin to operate normally and the fan will go on high speed as it's supposed to.
b>What's been happening more often with the new control board is that that stove will begin to run, and then just switch off suddenly as if the high-temperature limit had been tripped. the auger stops, the fans go to very slow speed and the fire burns out. I have seen the control board lights flickering a few times with this control board but not as often.

I do clean the burn area every time I use the stove, and over this past winter I performed the yearly maintenence that is listed in the manual, although because of the position and weight of the stove I didnt do much of a job on the back/inside I will admit.

My stove is only vented horizontally through my foundation. I have the piping to run it vertically to meet code but it's in the back of the house so I just havent bothered, plus the outside pipe cover is above pavers so there is no fire hazard (ie lame diagram below). The point is, I can and do routinely clean the exaust pipe by snaking my shopvac hose directly into it.

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Update: I found a guy locally who said he serviced pellet stoves, including Whitfield. He came by, looked at it for a bit and said it just needed a cleaning, which he did a few weeks later for $250. Didnt really fix the problem, but the guy was awful at returning calls so forget him.

Now, the stove will work but not consistently. Pretty sure though, that I have identified one of the main causes of the stove going into 'fault'. Pellet size. My local Home Depot had Freedom Fuel pellets in stock, I bought a few bags. They are made of pine, and quite a bit smaller in diameter than other pellets I have seen. My stove seems to run pretty well with those, generally the stove works without a problem. I had another brand of pellets on hand & sifting through the bag, they were the usual diameter but quite a big longer on average than some brands. My stove hated those. Dropped into fault every time I started it, usually within 10-15 minutes. I did find another brand that the average pellet length was shorter, I get uneven performance with those, sometimes I get a half hour before fault, sometimes I can get quite a bit more.

Anyway - is there anything that can be done as far as stove/auger repair to accept the longer pellets? The Home Depot does not always have the small pine pellets in stock, I am at the mercy of what their distributor sends them.

thanks for your help.