Seeking pellet sifting suggestions

Depends on your stove and pellets, but I don't bother. Never had an issue from the fines. They burn too.

use the search box above.Search pellet sifters,and pellet vacuum.Most of us use nothing.

All my stoves eat pellets and snort fines lol none used here

I don't sift my pellets but I keep 2 bags in a bin near the stove and fill from that, fines settle to the bottom of the bin.

I️ use a homemade pellet vac . I️ have issues with the fine dust jamming my top auger on my pdv 25. Haven’t had an issue since

gotta say also that the fines burn up with the pellets with no problem and i use ezblaze premium softwoods
which are quite dusty with lot of fines..

I have to admit,my Integra doen't like large amounts of fines,did the bucket thing like rich,but as that stove is secondary,now,not like when I was burning 8 tons a year in it.When I had damaged bags,didn't want top waste them,and were wet,I took a 5 gal bucket,drilled bunch of holes in bottom,set inside another buckett,worked ok,but would not want to do it everyday.

does anyone with a Harman free standing have any auger problems with fines?

Tonyray said:

does anyone with a Harman free standing have any auger problems with fines?

Click to expand...

Yes,when they burn 5 tons and forget to clean the fines box.

bob bare said:

Yes,when they burn 5 tons and forget to clean the fines box.

Click to expand...

not a problem but,
I was very surprised when i went to clean the fines box last week..
been burning ezblaze softwoods which are very dusty but hardly any fines in the box.
say that because with hardwoods i always have lots of fines and broken up little pieces of pellets in that area..

Tonyray said:

not a problem but,
I was very surprised when i went to clean the fines box last week..
been burning ezblaze softwoods which are very dusty but hardly any fines in the box.
say that because with hardwoods i always have lots of fines and broken up little pieces of pellets in that area..

Click to expand...

all softies out here,i ignore the fines box,hit it once a year

My stove burns everything also, but my first year I was concerned after reading of others having problems. Saw a lot of solutions from using a modified gutter with hardware cloth in the bottom (hole cut out of gutter) so the fines would fall out.

Vacuum devices. If you try this route make sure you have a hole in the uptake for makeup air or you may just smash the pellets worse, I know, I tried this method. One season I decided to mix 2/3 corn 1/3 pellets when corn price was high. Even with my cornvac system it would destroy the pellets if I didn't throttle the vac by letting more air in.

Or if you are lucky and can find an old manual winnowing machine they seemed to work pretty good. You might find one cheap as the have little practical value, but they might be expensive as they are also considered a collectable by some.

FirepotPete said:

My stove burns everything also, but my first year I was concerned after reading of others having problems. Saw a lot of solutions from using a modified gutter with hardware cloth in the bottom (hole cut out of gutter) so the fines would fall out.

Vacuum devices. If you try this route make sure you have a hole in the uptake for makeup air or you may just smash the pellets worse, I know, I tried this method. One season I decided to mix 2/3 corn 1/3 pellets when corn price was high. Even with my cornvac system it would destroy the pellets if I didn't throttle the vac by letting more air in.

Or if you are lucky and can find an old manual winnowing machine they seemed to work pretty good. You might find one cheap as the have little practical value, but they might be expensive as they are also considered a collectable by some.

Click to expand...

You got me here,what is a "manual windrowing machine?" thanks

bob bare said:

You got me here,what is a "manual windrowing machine?" thanks

Click to expand...

Winnow, winnowing. It's how they used to separate the grain from the chaff, they were first used as far back as the ancient Egyptians.

You can use the natural wind currents, a bellow, or in modern times a fan driven winnower.

Think of it as a cleaner using positive pressure instead of how we do the same thing today with a negative (vacuum) pressure.

FirepotPete said:

Winnow, winnowing. It's how they used to separate the grain from the chaff, they were first used as far back as the ancient Egyptians.

You can use the natural wind currents, a bellow, or in modern times a fan driven winnower.

Think of it as a cleaner using positive pressure instead of how we do the same thing today with a negative (vacuum) pressure.

Click to expand...

yes,i know windrowing,but think that you are thinking of a separator,that was used inside a barn,hand or belt run?windrowing is transferring the product into a row,not dividing it.

bob bare said:

yes,i know windrowing,but think that you are thinking of a separator,that was used inside a barn,hand or belt run?windrowing is transferring the product into a row,not dividing it.

Click to expand...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnowing

Maybe people have different names for it, but winnowing is the name I learned.

FirepotPete said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnowing

Maybe people have different names for it, but winnowing is the name I learned.

Click to expand...

Winnoning vs windrowing,my mistake!lol thank you,i think the old hand run machines were seperators.Gret,have a great evening

bob bare said:

Winnoning vs windrowing,my mistake!lol thank you,i think the old hand run machines were seperators.Gret,have a great evening

Click to expand...

No problem. I remember those also, I had to actually think for a few minutes (more like 20) to remember the name "winnowing" before I posted. It was like I had a brain stutter. w,w,wi, win...then it hit me. Weird as it puts me back in time to certain things, the smells, bright day, stuff that I hadn't thought about in years.

We had a winnower early on, it was an electric fan forced air one. Don't remember were it went or why we quit using it, but I do remember it. I do remember it was dusty as anything on the farm, worse than bailing hay. But the smell from the grain was something you just don't get with the modern separating methods.

I run Castle Serenity stoves. Fines are not and issue, but I make some effort to remove some of them.
So, I bought a course screen colander. Not the drilled hole type, but the old fashion screen type. The first one i bought had too fine of screen and would not let the fines through. So found another with a much courser screen and it works good.
I have to use a hand truck to bring two bags of pellets at a time up from the semi trailer I store them in down in the barn. The bumpy ride sifts some of the fines to the bottom of the bags. Then when pouring into the hopper, the last 5 pounds or less, I run through the colander over a 5 gal Homer bucket. The Coastal farm and ranch Premium pellets that I run are 100% douglas fir advertised on the bag. They have been working very well and have very few fines. In truth, the amount of fines I remove is small enough that I am actually sorta wasting my time, but I have the time to waste when the weather is such that I have to run the stoves.

I use a vac system I made, to clean my pellets. Mostly for the dust. I also use a Kanburn cleaner/mover, to move and clean my corn. And when I dump my mix into the hopper, I have a vac hose there to suck up any dust that might try to escape. Keeping dust out of the house, keeps the wife happy, and you know what they say. lol kap

I also use a vac system like kap does. I’ll attach some photos. Wife complained about the dust, and I didn’t want my auger and what not to clog up over the years so I figured what the heck. My procedure is this: I have a large trash can on wheels with a flip cover (Rubbermaid) that I keep filled with my vacuumed pellets so the wife and I just scoop out of that and bring them in the house when needed. I just spend about 10 minutes every Saturday filling that container with vacuumed pellets so there are always some on hand. Not much work really and it makes a significant difference on the dust level in the house.

When I first got my PS a couple of years ago, I had to placate and convince my wife that there would be no pellet dust sent throughout the house. I got a pellet sifter on line somewhere. (I think eBay) Went a long time going through the bother of sifting the darn pellets. After about half a season I probably had a fifth of a 5 gallon bucket of fines and dust. Realized I was wasting my time and effort, so l quit doing it. Played Mickey the dunce and kept my mouth shut and Mama never noticed any problems. The PS ran fine. I know, a happy wife is a happy husband ! So, the moral of this story is: Google pellet sifter or get a better quality pellet.

I use the "dump the pellets into my stove's hopper" method...
Seems to work good so far....

Dan