Giving up on pellet stoves

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My Harman eats anything I throw at it. Never tried wet pellets tho.
I've never burned wet pellets in my P61 but I have burned water damaged pellets ( puffed up) that dried back out. It burned it all up even though they crumbled down like sawdust in the hopper. Wet pellets might be a notch over the top though !
 
Same here. Shut it down around noon every 4th Sunday, do a thorough cleaning and good to go for another month.

Regarding the OP, when we were considering going to pellet heat I spent a long time on this site reading through a gazillion posts to try and learn everything I needed to make an informed purchase AND to understand just what is involved in owning/running a pellet stove. Being an electro-mechanical tech by trade the ability to do my own repairs wasn't going to be an issue when needed and I came to the opinion that spending the $$ for the Harman was going to be worth it in the long run. 3 years later I have no reason to question my choices.

Sam
pretty much posted a word for word example same as you a while back...mine is P61A and I spent weeks going over all the posts from years back to get familiar and also confirm that I would be getting a Harman Free standing stove.. too many positive posts about them.
 
pretty much posted a word for word example same as you a while back...mine is P61A and I spent weeks going over all the posts from years back to get familiar and also confirm that I would be getting a Harman Free standing stove.. too many positive posts about them.
I took about 3 months to decide and buy. Did the same as you guys, came here asked questions, read old postings etc...
 
Pellet stoves do require more attention than any other heat source. They are not everyone. Myself, i dont mind the extra work. Woodstove is out of the question for me. Getting the same heat from a propane or oil forced air burner is almost impossible without costing a fortune in fuel. I like the constant warmth. I dont mind getting my hands dirty unlike 99% of the people who swear pellet stoves are junk..and i have noticed most people who ditch the pellet stove due to maintenace requirements and problems are people who have more money than they have in mechanical skills. But i dont blame most of them since when they go shopping for a stove the seller stands there and explains how simple pellets are and require no attention.. heard it too many times.

But since im fairly close to you at78rpm... what do you have for sale??? :)
I could see this claim last yr, but oil at $1.40 gallon and propane at 99 cents dont see where your coming from dude
 
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I could see this claim last yr, but oil at $1.40 gallon and propane at 99 cents dont see where your coming from dude

For 1, i have electric for main heat. I ditched the old oil burner years ago. I dont have the luxury of switching between whatever fuel is cheaper each season as most of you do.
No way is lp or oil heat going to compare to the amount of heat given from a pellet stove. With it on low keeping the living room at 79-81 degrees at the stove, puts other rooms at 72ish and my bedroom the farthest at 66. No way in hell i would be able to keep up with oil having it set to a comparable setting ... i dont live in a new tightly sealed house with new costly high efficiency heaters as some do.
Oil is around $2. No clue about delivered propane. $2.29 last time i filled a bottle
 
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I wrote my post after having spent the entire day today doing just that. And I had vacuumed and scraped the entire chimney system in late October. If it's not working because of a clogged exhaust, believe me, it requires more work than any typical homeowner would want to put into it.
Entire day to clean your stove? Gosh I typically clean 4-5 stoves in an entire day.
 
My Harman eats anything I throw at it. Never tried wet pellets tho.

I tried Maine's choice premium wood pellets the other day from Home Depot. One of the bag of pellets were wet. I said, "what the heck". I threw them in the hopper anyway and the pellets burned! The flame was a little retarded, and they were crumbling but it still produced heat. I will go back to Home Depot and let the staff know their pellets were wet and asked them to store their pellets in that dryer place.
 
Hmmm. Had my Harman 16 yrs. and it has never left me without heat. Sure I've replaced a couple parts as necessary, but it never died. I've since had a heat pump and new furnace installed though, and am thoroughly enjoying the peace and quiet and the ability to go away on weekends without having to bribe a neighbor to keep my hopper loaded, and enjoy having even heat distribution throughout the house. But, I knew going into the game that a pellet stove is just a space heater, and enjoyed it for the most part. I still use it on and off for the ambiance of a fire, or if everyone else is away and I don't need to heat the whole house.
 
It seems that pellet fireplace inserts act more like a space heater, only heating one room for the most part. As oppoosed to a free standing pellet stove. My serenity ps, which is a free standing stove heats my entire 1,500 square foot house. Maybe im wrong about inserts.
What say you?
 
It seems that pellet fireplace inserts act more like a space heater, only heating one room for the most part. As oppoosed to a free standing pellet stove. My serenity ps, which is a free standing stove heats my entire 1,500 square foot house. Maybe im wrong about inserts.
What say you?
Only had an insert, but I can say that my M55 heats all of my downstairs with ease on fan 3 and pellet feed 1 and occasionally 2. In fact I have never run settings higher than that except experimenting. Now to be fair, our main family room, eating area and kitchen are the warmest and as you venture away into other rooms the temp drops. During the cold weather my downstairs rooms vary anywhere from 69-70 up to 74 with enough residual heating spreading upstairs to hold about 65....Like most folks, I need to figure out the best way to distribute the heat more evenly throughout the house.
Bill
 
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If you are the person that takes the car to get the oil changed, you may not want a pellet stove.

I do and I do.
 
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I've been heating with pellets for 8 years using one of the cheapest pellet stoves made. Sure it takes some maintenance but so far it has never let me down. If I had nothing but trouble, I can certainly see the OP's point. I do have to wonder how much trouble was man made though.
 
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If you take your car somewhere to get your breaks done
What kind of breaks? Most vehicle stopping systems now are more of a swap of parts and one can get pre painted panels and bumpers and youtube can get one through many repairs. A $6 blue tooth OB2 adapter and a app can get into detailed diagnostics
 
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If you take your car somewhere to get your breaks done a pellet stove may not be for you
I no longer lift a finger on car maintenance aside from checking fluids and tire pressure maybe once per month, and don't even cut my own grass any more (all because of time spent running a business, and the fact that I don't much enjoy those things anymore). Yet I still find time for the two pellet stoves in our house (soon a third, as my beloved old Whit moves out to heat the garden shed, where I'll putter around a bit on weekends.

I basically dump pellets in the top once per day (30 seconds each, and with recent weather its more like every three days), vacuum out ashes once per week (5 minutes, if I stop to check things over while I'm doing it) and then a more thorough cleaning about once per month (30 min each). Once each year I clean the vent and stove thoroughly (90 min each). It's harder than just touching a dial, but it's still about as easy as home maintenance tasks can go.
 
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If you are the person that takes the car to get the oil changed, you may not want a pellet stove.
Don't have the time, space, tools or desire to change my own. Plus, when I take it in, they rotate the tires and can check other stuff over. Back in the 70's and early 80's I did my own oil changes, but that was before engines became more complicated and I didn't have skid plates in the way - and oh yeah, I was much younger and didn't have money to pay anyone else to do it. And the days were much longer, they have gotten so short as time has gone on :)

Pellet stoves are much easier to maintain
 
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If you take your car somewhere to get your " breaks " done a pellet stove may not be for you:p He He
Give me a brake.....geez!
Got to go moe the lawn...
Bill
 
I was being sarcastic. From the comment above.
Lot of tongue in cheek in this thread. Best has got to go to BB with Santa clad donkey's
 
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