Pellet Stove Questions (1) Fan Speeds and (2) Smoke on Startup

Hi Folks,


I was running my pellet stove (Quadra Fire Classic Bay 1200) last night and noticed a couple of things:

1) Smoke on Start-up: When the stove first fires up, obviously it creates some smoke in the chamber. It actually gets quite smokey in there for about 5-10 seconds. What I noticed was that near the end of that 5-10 seconds (where its pretty smokey in the chamber), I get a little (and I do mean just the little) whisp of smoke out of the stove. It's so slight that I can't even figure out where it's coming from...It's just enough to barely smell and see. I also have a smoke detector and CO detector near the stove which never goes off it's such a small amount (and this is in a basement with little air movement). My question is...is this normal? It only happens at the peak of smokey start-up. My concern comes around based on my last post:

That post

Is this something that I should be concerned with? I'll keep looking to see if I can see where it's coming from, but since it's such a small amount...it's hard to see. I'm mostly concerned with CO...if this is indicating a leak somewhere (maybe in the stove pipe), I don't want to be pumping CO into the room.


2) The Fan Speed: This stove has 3 heat settings (H/M/L), which from what I can tell just adjustes the auger speed/feed. It also has 2 convection blower settings H/L. The manual states that this allows 6 different settings (2 speed on each of the 3 heat outputs). On the High heat setting, this is VERY noticable. Low speed fan is pretty quiet, and High speed goes up in volume noticable, however, on Medium and Low heat settings...I can't hear/feel any difference in the blower speed at all. Is this normal...or is there something wrong with my fans and/or control box?


Thanks in advance!

JP

Thanks GotzTheHotz,

Glad to hear that the smoke in the firebox is somewhat normal. I did decrease the feed a bit, mostly because my flame level on high was way to high (manual states 4"-6" above firepot and mine was licking the top of the chamber and rolling all the way around and back down to the glass...so it was more like 10"-12". Hopefully that will help.

As for the whisp of smoke coming out...Hopefully decreasing the feed will help that also (in that not enough smoke will be generated to come out). Of course, I'm still a little concerned with CO. I did confirm that the pipe was free of obstructions so that's cool. I also (just now) reapplied hi-temp silicone sealant over all the joints on the pipe, just to be cautious (no harm in a little extra seal there). Hopefully that will do the trick, but since it's still drying....I won't be able to fire it up for an hour or so. We'll see.

Anyone have any ideas on the blower speeds?

Thanks!

JP

Thanks guys,

Well, I ran this again yesterday, and the same thing happened, although less now that I reduced the feed. I did reseal all the joints on my pipe...I'm fairly certain it's not that. I'm thinking this isn't anything to worry about. Here's my rational:

I only get a whiff of smoke at the very end of the ignition cycle where the box if FULL of smoke, right before it lights. If there was a leak in the pipe, it would stand to reason that I would see smoke coming out from the very beginning of the ignition, until all the smoke is gone after ignition..but I don't. It's only when the fire box is FULL of smoke. So, I'm thinking that when it's got all that smoke in there, it's finding a way out....maybe through the auger or something. From my observation of this stove, the airflow within the chamber is fairly gentle, which probably works fine when it's lit, but when it's smoking up a storm...I'll bet it can't pull it out fast enough before it finds a way out. I can't imagine that this thing is so air tight that smoke couldn't find a way out if it was being generated faster than it could be expelled. I also held my CO alarm right next to all parts of the stove (especially the stove pipe) for quite a while, and the thing never went off. I also held a cig next to the pipe and it didn't appear that there was any leaks affecting the smoke.

Does that reasoning make sense to you guys in the 'know'.

JP

The stove is in the below ground basement, so there is about 5 ft (approx) straight up from the stove, then a 90 into the thimble, then a 90 on the other side of the thimble (to point up outside), a 3 ft lenth, and another 90 into the horizontal end cap. So all told, it's about 8-9 ft vertical, with 3 90 degree elbows. Hopefully not a problem. There is a slathering of sealant where the stove pipe meets the exhaust collar...maybe I'll see if I can scrape off what I can and re-do it. No harm in spending an hour to be safe...I'll also check the door, but if I had to guess, I think the smoke is coming from the back (but then again, with the blower air coming out of the heat exchangers above the door, it would be pretty hard to tell).

Thanks guys.

JP

Thanks Again MountainStoveGuy,

Actually...it's already 4" pipe. there is some sort of 3-4" increaser off the stove, and everything is 4" from there.

JP

Ok, so after a few more days of looking, I finally found the problem. There are 2 45's sections in my interior section of pipe. They connect together, to sort of jog the pipe out a bit, so that I can maintain all the proper clearances (kinda hard to explain, but it works). Anyway, I've been looking for the leak source for days and I finally found it. There was a slight leak coming from the manufacturers joint in both those 45's. So minor the smoke just appearing from the side of the 45 with almost no draft. So I used some high-temp silicone and sealed those joints. Voila! No more smoke from the pipe. I still smell the 'faintest' smell of smoke on start up (and I mean faint), but there is definitly no smoke coming out that I can see.

Thanks for the help folks.

Oh ya, and I found that when looking for a leak, the best thing to do is shutoff ALL the lights in the room (even cover the windows that let other light in if doing this during the day), and use a flashlight to track down the leaks. When I had a moderatly lit room, with such a little amount of smoke...it was impossible to find the leak. Doing the room light/flashlight trick, it only took me 3 start-ups to find it, and I got closer to the leak each time. First time, I found it was coming from the left side, 2nd time I found it was coming from somewhere near the 45's, and the 3rd time...I found the problem. Not too bad consider after 10 startups with the room lights on...all I was able to figure out was that it was coming from the stove

JP