Harman 52i OAK installation question

[armstrom]

Hello!
I've recently purchased a floor-model (2014 build date) Harman 52i insert. The stove came with an outside air kit that I'm trying to install prior to having a chimney sweep come out to drop the liner.

Does anyone have access to the installation instructions that would have come with the OAK? It appears to be pretty straight forward to install but I need to verify I'm supposed to drill for the inner-most screw. After removing the little stubby pipe that comes installed on the stove only two of the three holes for the OAK flange line up with existing holes. The bottom hole lines up with the same hole used by the stubby pipe, the hole toward the left edge of the stove lines up with an existing hole but there is no hole for the screw in the center of the stove. I removed the left blower fan to get better access to that area and there's nothing. The screws are self-drilling sheet metal screws so I'm wondering if I'm supposed to just drive them in like the two smaller screws that go into the back of the hopper.

Anyone installed one of these kits themselves?

Thanks in advance! I've been reading tons of great posts on here in preparation for having my stove installed but this is my first post. I will be making another post soon for the DIY service rails I built. Thanks to all the regulars on here who provide so much good information!

-Matt

 

[Cody901]

Hello!
I've recently purchased a floor-model (2014 build date) Harman 52i insert. The stove came with an outside air kit that I'm trying to install prior to having a chimney sweep come out to drop the liner.

Does anyone have access to the installation instructions that would have come with the OAK? It appears to be pretty straight forward to install but I need to verify I'm supposed to drill for the inner-most screw. After removing the little stubby pipe that comes installed on the stove only two of the three holes for the OAK flange line up with existing holes. The bottom hole lines up with the same hole used by the stubby pipe, the hole toward the left edge of the stove lines up with an existing hole but there is no hole for the screw in the center of the stove. I removed the left blower fan to get better access to that area and there's nothing. The screws are self-drilling sheet metal screws so I'm wondering if I'm supposed to just drive them in like the two smaller screws that go into the back of the hopper.

Anyone installed one of these kits themselves?

Thanks in advance! I've been reading tons of great posts on here in preparation for having my stove installed but this is my first post. I will be making another post soon for the DIY service rails I built. Thanks to all the regulars on here who provide so much good information!

-Matt

I can’t find my directions but I don’t recall making a new hole on the lower part. Can you add pictures?


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[armstrom]

I'm not at home right now but it's hard to take pictures in that area anyway. I've cleaned up an exploded drawing from the manual that shows what I'm talking about. The two green circles show the holes that do line up with the OAK flange (not shown). The bottom hole is the same as the one used by the removed stub pipe (shown as 8.15 in the picture). The hole on the right is an existing hole that was not used before but lines up perfectly with the OAK (the stub pipe was bolted to the hole just to the left of my green circle). The red circle shows the rough area where a hole needs to be to match the pattern of the OAK flange but there isn't a hole. Now that I've seen the exploded view I think I'll just drill the hole. There's literally nothing behind that sheet metal that I can mess up.

The screws used appear to be self-tapping and self drilling. My stove appears to be a newer design than some of the other 52i models I've seen pictures of on this site (though not the brand new design with the clear hopper cover and the touch screen). For example, my frame has a large sheet metal base as seen in the attached drawing while other 52i frames I've seen seem to be made of narrower bar stock (this is an example: https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/img_6145-jpg.137642/ )

Oh, and my insert is actually bronze in color (not the enamel finish, just a matte bronze finish) so there may be some differences.

-Matt

 

[Cody901]

Now that I’m thinking about it I did self tap a third screw in my 52i.


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[armstrom]

Excellent. Thanks for the feedback! The smaller screws that go into the hopper are self-drilling for sure, I just wasn't sure about the larger screw for the flange itself. Now I just have to make it through another crazy cold weekend. I finally have a chimney sweep scheduled to come install my liner and OAK next Wednesday.

-Matt

 

[Cody901]

I am interested in seeing your plans for the service rail. Ive burned over a ton now and would like to pull it out and do a good cleaning. I installed my liner and OAK myself. It wasn’t to bad took about 30 ft of 4” and 10 foot of 3”. I also used Harman’s chimney top intake cap.


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[armstrom]

I'll take some pictures and make a separate post once my stove is installed. I actually built my rails in stages. If your stove is already installed building a rail system to suit is dead easy. Mine was just more complicated so I could have two different heights for install.

The main part of the build is a pair of 36" long 2" x 1/8" thick steel "C" channels I bought from home depot. They are wider than the 1 5/8" channels Harman use but it doesn't matter since only the inside edges need to align to the frame rails. I also kept them 36" long so I could fully support the stove on my rails rather than having to leave it attached to the frame. For a service only build you could make them significantly shorter.

I then mounted the C channels to a 2x4 frame with caster wheels on it. That was built to match the height of my uninstalled stove sitting on a furniture dolly. I extracted the stove from the frame by sliding it onto my temporary dolly. Now I can just drag the frame around by hand for installation and I rolled the heavy part of the stove out of the way. My final rails will be taller to match my hearth height and probably won't have wheels. To transition to the final height I will have a slightly precarious operation where I will use my low-profile automotive floor jack to raise the existing rail system to the final hearth height and attach the 4x4 legs. My all-in cost was $30-40 for the steel, some off-cut 2x4 and hardware. The caster wheels add about $20 but since they were only temporary I won't include them in my final build tally. I already had the drill/tap/screws so you can tack on about $10 tooling if you need to buy it.
-Matt