So, I think we almost burned down the house this morning

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northernnjnewbie

New Member
Oct 8, 2008
10
Northern NJ
I've searched on here and can't find anything exactly like what happened, so here goes:

Firstly, we just got the stove this Fall -- a US Stove 6039HF. It had a professional install. Also, even though I've never had a pellet stove, I have used a woodstove before.

It's been burning fine, but as I left for work this morning, I smelled a REALLY strong woodish smell, I went around the side of the house and say a HUGE amount of smoke billowing out of teh vent. I ran in and started the shut-down, and felt the wall, which was cold. As the smoke dissipated, I saw alot of embers at the inside teh top of the vent pipe. I took off the clean-out cap and peered up and saw more higher up the pipe. There were scorch marks on the outside of teh vent hood. I know enough to know this wasn't good.

The inside of the stove had a bunch of embers on the floor of the stove and kind of "zipping" around inside. Needless to say, I was late for work.

What we did: have the stove shut down fully, which took a long time -- we had to clean out the hopper because the auger wouldn't stop feeding. The stove shut down finally, and teh pipe outside was almost cool, and the inside pipe was, too.

So... I love the stove, but this has scared the heck out of us -- we don't want it burning down the house at night or during the day when we're gone. We've only been burning it about ten days, and have been using Lignetics and Big Heat.

Any ideas? Have we somehow not cleaned it prooperly? The embers in teh vent pipe REALLY ahs me spooked, as I'm sure the scorch marks and billowing smoke meant there was an actual fire about the start in the vent pipe.

Thanks -- and Happy Thanksgiving!
 
The very first thing you need to do is contact your installer who is ultimately responsible for the proper installation of your stove.

Steve
 
Shortstuff said:
The very first thing you need to do is contact your installer who is ultimately responsible for the proper installation of your stove.

Steve

i second this
 
My first impression was that the "Big Heat" pellets were appropriately named.
 
I had just bought a new American Harvest 6039 free standing stove this year and had about the same thing happen that you did. I am not sure abut the ambers in the stove vent pipe. I had a burn pot full of glowing ambers. I also shut the stove off and went to work. This happened over night.

I got home that evening and cleaned out the stove which was a mess and some what sticky mess. I started up the stove and didn't think that it was burning quit right. I went out side and noticed a car sitting at the end of my driveway and I saw the stove was smoking very badlly. This guy stopped because he thought my house was on fire.

I called a local store I bought the stove from and asked some questions about the problem. I did not demand a new stove but sugggested that thats what I would like to do which they had no problem doing. So I swaped it out as I really liked the heat it was doing.

The new stove is installed and running great. The new stove I got is the same stove as the other one except the controll pannel is differnt which I didn't notice untill i got home. I found out that the new stove has the older control panel with the ABC buttons on it.

My question is did your sotve have the older or newer control pannel.

I really like the stove. This new stove burns hotter than the old one. The old one had about 180 deg comming out ot the heat exchanger onsetting 3 and to new on has 240 deg coming out on setting one and I had to slow that sown whit the oger down chit the A button.
 
Geeze....just when I get done telling myself "don't be paranoid about the pellet stove".....
 
kenzmadie said:
Geeze....just when I get done telling myself "don't be paranoid about the pellet stove".....
Are you worried about the oil burner going up or the propane furnace blowing the house up (just did that here in CT last week with the family inside) or crashing your car or.........no matter what you do someone is likely to have been killed or seriously injured doing the same thing - I remember when I was doing my scuba training learning that more people get killed or injured by vending machines falling on them than shark attacks but guess which one gets your attention? Life's too short to worry about all the ways it can end. Just be sensible and enjoy today.
 
10 days into a new stove...pellet newby......scared to death of the thing.....havnt burnt it at night while sleeping or while away at work...max. time gone while burnmig---20.min/5 miles from home(listening for fire alarm)..........maybe I shouldnt have got a stove.......PELLETS FOR SALE>>CHEAP :)------stove for free lol
 
Are you sure the pellet feed just stuck to "ON" and it just kept feeding pellets.....
 
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