Evidence of small leaks all around stove?

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madge69

Member
Nov 18, 2010
67
central ma
Hi all,

I'm new to this whole pellet burning club and have a question now that we've put about 30 bags through our stove.

There's evidence of slight leaks all around the stove. What I mean is there's a very fine white dust (ash?) around where the door frame is mounted to the stove. Also, there's white dust along the one edge of the hopper lid (definitely not pellet dust), as well as around the gasket for the ash pan. When burning we can smell a VERY faint smoke smell.

My question is, is it normal for these stoves to leak a tiny bit? It's a VistaFlame VF100 FS manufacturd in 2008, but just installed last month.

Did I get a bad stove?

Thanks in advance for any insight and advice you guys can share...
 
The stove should not leak while burning.

It will however quite easily put ash on the outside of the stove when the door is opened for any reason.

Have you checked your gaskets and door and ash pan latches?

You can also after dark, kill the lights in the room and go looking for evidence of smoke leaking starting at the combustion blower (well actually in other places but the bulk of issues are found on the vent side of the combustion blower). You use a flash light to provide a back light that will make the smoke look dark. I prefer a red light but what counts is it be used as a back light.

You also might see a grey or black V shaped patch on things like drop chutes were they join other parts of the stove. The bottom of the V points directly at the leak, clean the area, dampen it slightly and apply some RTV sealant. Most folks use the red stuff.
 
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