For those out there that have a draft inducing model of the Pinnacle (Traeger) PB150 boiler, you will be interested in this... Pinnacle is selling a new draft fan for the PB150 that is going to make maintenance a breeze. I have had my PB150 for two years and I needed a new fan for this year after two years of cleaning the old one damaged the impellers on the squirrel cage style fan. The new fan has a couple of great features about it:
1) Advertised as self-cleaning (we'll see). Fan is not a squirrel cage style.
2) Heavier duty impellers should stand up to wire-brush cleaning. Looks/feels much thicker gauge than previous.
3) Removable plate w/ lytherm gasket. The plate allows you to pull of the motor with attached shaft/impellers for easy cleaning! Not more pulling the whole fan assembly off, just remove a few bolts!
As any PB150 owner can attest that the worst thing about this unit is pulling the draft fan off to clean it, or trying to clean it without pulling it off if you are daring. I was thinking about ordering a spare fan and modifying it to do exactly what the new fan does, so this saved me a lot of time. The new fan is not an exact match to the old one and there is some work required to get it mounted... but not much. The rectangular section of the chimney adapter (rectangular to 4" pipe) is too large for the new fan but you can either stuff it with some fireproof filler and then silicone it up to seal it tight (method indicated by Pinnacle), or if you have a welder just weld a peice of steel on to the collar to make it fit tight and then silicone it up to seal it (this is what I did). Another nice thing is that Pinnacle sent me some extra lytherm gasket material that I used to make a gasket for chimney adapter rather than using silicone. I fired everything up this weekend and no leaks! Monthly cleanings will be much easier now. Note, I also found some sheets of lytherm online that I ordered so that I can replace the gasket from time to time, no more scraping silicone off the chimney adapter.
No pictures yet, but I'll see if I can get some to post.
1) Advertised as self-cleaning (we'll see). Fan is not a squirrel cage style.
2) Heavier duty impellers should stand up to wire-brush cleaning. Looks/feels much thicker gauge than previous.
3) Removable plate w/ lytherm gasket. The plate allows you to pull of the motor with attached shaft/impellers for easy cleaning! Not more pulling the whole fan assembly off, just remove a few bolts!
As any PB150 owner can attest that the worst thing about this unit is pulling the draft fan off to clean it, or trying to clean it without pulling it off if you are daring. I was thinking about ordering a spare fan and modifying it to do exactly what the new fan does, so this saved me a lot of time. The new fan is not an exact match to the old one and there is some work required to get it mounted... but not much. The rectangular section of the chimney adapter (rectangular to 4" pipe) is too large for the new fan but you can either stuff it with some fireproof filler and then silicone it up to seal it tight (method indicated by Pinnacle), or if you have a welder just weld a peice of steel on to the collar to make it fit tight and then silicone it up to seal it (this is what I did). Another nice thing is that Pinnacle sent me some extra lytherm gasket material that I used to make a gasket for chimney adapter rather than using silicone. I fired everything up this weekend and no leaks! Monthly cleanings will be much easier now. Note, I also found some sheets of lytherm online that I ordered so that I can replace the gasket from time to time, no more scraping silicone off the chimney adapter.
No pictures yet, but I'll see if I can get some to post.
