Damper question

[hockeyfun1]

I have a St. Croix Ashby pellet insert. Not sure if I have an OAK (I'm guessing no?). I live in a 2.5 story colonial house with the stove in my living room. I was under the impression that I should keep the manual damper closer to the bottom of the hill to give it less air. If I do this, the pellets pile up in the burn pot after a few hours on manual heat setting 3 to 5. If I put the damper closer to the top of the hill, I don't get any backup in the burn pot, and the stove appears to function good. I've had it on setting 3 for the past 24 hours and haven't even burned through a whole bag of crappy pellets (Timber Heat). Seems I would burn through more before for the same amount of heat. The burn pot is not backed up at all. I can still turn the damper up, which I'm sure I'd have to do if I wanted heat setting 4 or 5. Not sure what damper settings I would need to run on 1 or 2. Any idea why this is all happening?

Is it also normal for the fire to wax and wane maybe every 30 to 60 minutes? It burns a lot and normal, then maybe 30 minutes later, it goes down, then a few minutes later it's back to normal, and this repeats.

If I can keep my house at 70F with one bag a day on setting 3, I could actually save money over my natural gas furnace by using setting 1 or 2 and guessing it would keep the house at 60 to 65 which is what I keep the furnace at. It's nice to give the furnace a break on 20 degree days since it runs constantly. In a way I'm actually annoyed that NG has dropped in price because pellets haven't. $249 for a ton is the cheapest around me. I saw $199 at the end of the season last year since it was so warm and everyone had overstock. Never seen it that cheap though and I've had the stove five years. Prices traditionally have been $229 to $279 in Rochester, NY.

 

[corkman]

By closing the damper all the way you are choking the stove and that's why you're seeing the pot fill up. By opening the damper all the way you are losing tons of heat out the vent pipe.with the damper fully open you will see pellets flying out of the pot because it's getting too much air. Start with it in the closed position and adjust a little at a time till you see the pellets dance in the pot but not get ejected. Start off with a cleared burn pot and allow stove to settle a little after each adjustment till you get to an active flame. Orange and lazy not good

 

[hockeyfun1]

I appear to be in the middle right now. I started with it mostly choked off (maybe at 15% open) with it piling up, but now I'm at 50% and it seems to be good. I'm not sure what you mean about the pellets flying out? I basically kept adjusting it 10% until the pellets didn't pile up anymore. Should I leave it or can I get better?

 

[corkman]

The more you open it the more air to the pot. Too much air and it will blow decent size pellets out of the pot before they burn thus wasting fuel.you can open more if you want. If you see pellets being ejected from the pot then close it back up some. You want to see pellets dancing a little in the pot. Each time you see pellets fed to the pot you will see embers fly out of the pot. That's a good thing.

 

[hockeyfun1]

Will I need a different damper setting for the different heat settings? Such as if I go from setting 3 where I'm at now, to setting 4 or 5 (5 is max)?

 

[corkman]

My guess is you'll have to adjust as your add more fuel as you step up to 4/5. But having said that in my last stove I didn't have to make any adjustment. Once I had the draft set I just tightened my set screw on the draft adjustment and left it there. Every stove is different and will burn different. A lot of trial and error to start but once you get it dialed in you'll be s happy camper. Play with it on different settings to see how it reacts

 

[hockeyfun1]

How many days should I be able to go with the burnpot not getting too much ash/clinkers in it? Meaning how many days in a row can I run the stove without turning it off?

 

[corkman]

You shouldn't have to shut it down to clear the pot. Just put it to lowest setting and let it burn down. Then clean the pot out. Some even remove their pot at this point with pliers of some sort and dump ash that way. Quality of pellet is a big factor also. Try some Douglas fir pellets and you'll see next to no ash and longer burn time between cleaning. Feed her crappy pellets and be a slave to your stove

 

[hockeyfun1]

If I put it to the lowest setting, it still gets fed new pellets so can't always burn down to nothing. Where do I get said pellets from?

 

[corkman]

So set it to lowest setting and clean it out as best you can. Or just shut it down to do so. Call around to see what you local dealers have. Look for lacrete ,spruce point,lg granuals to name a few. What are you burning now

 

[hockeyfun1]

I have Timber Heat which seem crappy and then Stove Chow. Not sure how the Stove Chows are yet, only ran two bags.

 

[corkman]

From lowes I presume. Those are both higher ash pellets with the chows being the hotter of the 2. Try to find a dealer that carries better stuff and give something else a shot and report back