Fire in the auger

[Flammam]

Hi
I have a friend who is running an older Whitfield Advantage+. She was having problems with the stove not putting out any heat and drownding in pellets. Come to find out the stove hadn't been cleaned in 3 years. Cleaned the stove and pipe and adjusted the air shutter. Everything was fine for about 3 weeks and I got the call that it "just stopped working". I got there and fired it up...no pellet feed, looks to be a jammed auger. Pulled the auger and the whole top end of the auger tube was full of carbonized pellets? I cleaned it out and refired the stove, everything appears to be working properly now. What causes the fire to work its way back up the feed chute to the auger??

JOhn

 

[BrotherBart]

The pros will be along shortly but my guess is that there is an air leak somewhere in the hopper gasket.

 

[webbie]

Does the venting have a "rise" as described in some of the sticky posts and others here? Even 5 feet or so? A lot of earlier stoves were installed this way - perfectly legal by the manual, but many people are finding this to not work out well in the "real world".

 

[Flammam]

Yes there is a 5ft or so of rise after the vent leaves the side of the house. I did find the ash pan was open about a 1/2 inch or so. I closed it all the way and latched it before I fired the stove back up.

 

[stoveguy2esw]

usually this is caused by a few factors;
1. poor maintenance a dirty stove with clogged air passages during a malfunction , the heat builds in the burn chamber causing pressure that will releave wherever it can find an air path, carrying heat with it.

2. improper installation , lack of vertical rise or a downward vent (unbelievable? ive seen it) not allowing natural convection to move heat and smoke out through the vent in the event of a shutdown.

3. unsealed hopper, along with the aforementioned issues , this allows airflow through the feed system sometimes even accentuated with negative pressure in the structure pulling it.


very seldom does a well maintained pellet unit suffer this issue, this can show just how important it can be to maintain your unit and inspect wearable parts such as gaskets regularly