Gave everything a good cleaning when we had the sides off..and i vaccum it out once a week..
First off, no reason to take the sides off but once a year. I take mine off every spring when I remove ALL the components (convection fan, draft fan, auger drive motor and stirrer motor and clean them and lubricate the bearings (dry bearings are the number one cause of components failure on ANY stove), second is a buildup of lint and crap in the convection blower.
People on here seem to have a rather limited view of cleaning a unit. To me clean is removing the burn pot and stirrer, soaking it in warm water and removing all the baked on hard carbon (warm water loosens it so it basically flakes off). I run 2 pots, one in the unit and one soaking and 2 stirrer rods as well so there is always clean and carbon free parts to put back in after I clean out the fly ash.
To me, a regular cleaning involves removing the backer board, pulling the rear wall plugs, opening the ash dumps and sweeping the ash into the ash pan then taking a shop vac with a crevice tool and sticking it into the openings to the left and right of the back wall (after removing the covers and taking a bottle brush and sweeping it back and forth behind the wall accessing the passage through the openings and allowing the vacuum to suck out the fly ash. I take a small paintbrush and get behind the baffle plates on each side of the firebox and knock the ash down into the firebox floor. finally I take the crevice tool and stick it into the round hole on the right side of the back wall and into the exhaust plenum and suck that out too, replace all the covers, fake brick back wall, dump the ash pan and call it good. Whole ting taks about 15 minutes tops
Every week I pull the cover on the clean out tee (mine is outside) and dump the fly ash and I'll bang on the vent pipe with a wood stick to dislodge and fly ash inside. Every 2 months the venting gets sucked out with a leaf blower with the stove door open and all the cover plates removed and the stove OFF. End of season (spring) every components comes out of the stove except the control board and the switches (snap discs and vacuum switch), everything gets cleaned and oiled, the draft fan is pulled, plenum vacuumed and the venting is sucked out. Then when it's all clean and tidy inside and out, I fog the inside with Stabil fogging oil, replaced all the cleaned and oiled components, close the door and it's good to go next fall.
Additionally, all my outside venting comes apart and I pressure wash the interior with purple ZEP and all the venting gets stored in the shop. I cover the venting pipe from the stove through the wall thimble with a ziplock bag and duct tape to keep bugs out and call it good until next fall.
Timely maintenance is EVERYTHING. No stove is plug and play, well they are for a time, until they get plugged up or the drive motor bearings dry out and then you get to replace stuff. me, I'd rather maintain it. Much cheaper in the long run. I have over 20 years on mine with really no issues other than issues I caused myself, by me being stupid.
