THE PELLET STOVE CONCLUSION

[slickplant35]

First of all I want to thank you all for giving me such great advice. The guy I bought the stove from was here yesterday. The problem was the auger was jammed. He had to take out all of the pellets and take that cover off inside and unjam all of the pellets. He thinks that this will happen again, because I guess they redesigned the stove with a fuel chamber or gate thing and he never saw that before. Well I hope this isn't a continuous thing because he will get this stove back.

 

[j00fek]

how are the quality of your pellets? are they generally the same size through out the bags? i would do some investigating

what kind of stove is it?

 

[slickplant35]

This is a avalon astoria. He gave me 2 bags of alleghany pellets to start. I have 4 tons of pellets that I bought. I bought barefoot and lignetics. 2 tons of each. I don't understand the whole thing.

 

[woodsman23]

This is a avalon astoria. He gave me 2 bags of alleghany pellets to start. I have 4 tons of pellets that I bought. I bought barefoot and lignetics. 2 tons of each. I don't understand the whole thing.

All the pellets you have mentioned are of great quality and should give you problem free operation from a pellet standpoint. Sometimes engineers over engineer things and make it worse, just keep an eye on that flapper and have you or your hubby knowledable as how to quickly fix the problem, (maybe a love tap or a wire pushed up the front?)

 

[imacman]

A bit of an update on the new flapper thing Travis installed in the '08 Astoria stoves....it was meant to stop fire from reaching the pellets in the auger tube. I have an '05, which doesn't have the flapper.

I put a call in yesterday to Travis Industries customer service, and the tech there said that as long as I "keep the stove clean, and you shouldn't have any problem".

I even inquired into getting a flapper that I could retrofit into my stove, and he said " a dealer can do that for you, but you'll have to pay them for the part and labor" (and I assume the service call fee)....latr on that....I'll just keep the stove clean.

 

[slickplant35]

Well the stove ran for about 3 hours tops maybe a little more and that's what happen to jam the auger. I hope this doesn't happen all winter I won't be a happy customer

 

[imacman]

Well the stove ran for about 3 hours tops maybe a little more and that's what happen to jam the auger. I hope this doesn't happen all winter I won't be a happy customer

Are you saying it jammed again? Or are you talking about the first time?

 

[DiggerJim]

Sometimes engineers over engineer things and make it worse, just keep an eye on that flapper and have you or your hubby knowledable as how to quickly fix the problem, (maybe a love tap or a wire pushed up the front?)

Or she could just take out the flapper door - a single screw holds it in place. Since they didn't consider it a big enough safety issue to retrofit old stoves, I'd guess she'd be no worse off than if she had bought a stove last year without it. If all the folks with older stoves are still safe enough without the flapper, she should be too.

 

[woodsman23]

Sometimes engineers over engineer things and make it worse, just keep an eye on that flapper and have you or your hubby knowledable as how to quickly fix the problem, (maybe a love tap or a wire pushed up the front?)

Or she could just take out the flapper door - a single screw holds it in place. Since they didn't consider it a big enough safety issue to retrofit old stoves, I'd guess she'd be no worse off than if she had bought a stove last year without it. If all the folks with older stoves are still safe enough without the flapper, she should be too.

I agree with you but what if something were to happen then what??? Personally i'd take it out and hit a couple times with a BFH.

 

[imacman]

.... Personally i'd take it out and hit a couple times with a BFH.

I agree :exclaim:

 

[JBlank912]

I have a new Lopi Yankee (same manufacturer as Avalon). LIke yours, the pellets seem to jam after a short usage. I ran it for the first time yesterday for an extended use - afternoon into the night). It jammed sometime during the night. I watched it this morning, and sure enough no pellets dropping but I thougth I heard the auger turning, it tough to hear over the blower. I used a long thin screwdriver up the auger chute to clear it. It seems to be feeding Ok now but i will see tonight.

I have Pennington pellets and the installer put in 2 bags at start up but they dumped the bags in and I noticed fines going in. I would have held back the bottom of the bag to collect the fines rather then put them in. If the stove runs thru, I plan on letting the pellets run out and vaccuum the auger unit tonight to clean out the fines. I think this is the issue.
As for the gate/door on the chute, I just lifted it out of the way and was able to push the screwdriver up. Does anyone know how far up the chute I should be able to push something before hitting something like the auger itself?

 

[SteveT]

There's a recent thread on this site by a guy who built a pellet vacuum. I was thinking that getting rid of the dust was mostly so that filling the hopper wouldn't put dust in the air.

This thread has me wondering if dust-free pellets will make jamming the auger less likely in these stoves.