i have a 5 year old Harman P68, it is in my shop and I rarely use it. Only put 2/3 of a ton through it. On July 5th I began to smell smoke, thought it was wildfires. I have not used this stove since early March. On July 16th, noticed creosote leaking from door of stove. Opened the door and major smoke. The entire firebox was full on black pellets, the waste can stuffed with black pellets. The burn box was hot. The switches of the stove were OFF. Somehow, it turned itself on, but very low feed rate???? It fed about 50lbs of pellets. I have a call onto service to find out what happened. I unplugged it and left it as I found it. This is just bizarre.
Harman P68 mystery problem
- Thread starter brada
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Here is what happened. As you know the entire load of pellets burned very slowly and created a smokey creosote mess. The pellets burned or smoldered over a several week period. The technicians showed up today, the circuit board was fried and the wire harness melted too. Pulled out old board and found a FROG had crawled behind the board and shorted. The frog was crispy.
The stove is in a shop, insulated with concrete floors, dont know where frog came from... Went to install new board and harness and no joy, igniter was always cold. Found new board was bad.
Installed second board, now igniter was hot, but would not start. Found fresh air inlet flap glued shut from all of the previous creosote. Fixed that. Now everything seems to be running. I am curious how a frog could have gotten in there??? kudos to coastal farm supply technicians.
The stove is in a shop, insulated with concrete floors, dont know where frog came from... Went to install new board and harness and no joy, igniter was always cold. Found new board was bad.
Installed second board, now igniter was hot, but would not start. Found fresh air inlet flap glued shut from all of the previous creosote. Fixed that. Now everything seems to be running. I am curious how a frog could have gotten in there??? kudos to coastal farm supply technicians.
Most likely a tree toad, not a frog. They look the same when toasty.. I get them in my shop all the time in the summer. They eat bugs which isn't all bad. Yours tried to eat your circuit board and got cooked...lol
ABusWrench
Feeling the Heat
Toad was looking to stay warm. They're all over around here. Brown ones, green ones and black ones. They help take care of the bugs. They're all around my detached garage. Mice too! Chipmunks too! Then the snakes chasing the mentioned critters! I always have visitors in the garage. Wife doesn't like them. Oh well. Part of living in the country.
With 10 cats outside, mice are a non issue. Cats don't eat toads or snakes far as I know.... 
Cats keep the mice out of the tractors but they have a bad habit of sleeping on the hoods (cab tractors) and hoods and seats (open station tractors. Have to put trash bags over the seats on the open station seats or they get festooned in cat hair.
Mice don't stand a chance here. Least the squirrels are safe, cats are scared of them.
Did I say I don't paticularly like cats? I don't but they are a good deal when it comes to tractors. Mice like to chew on the wiring in the winter and build nests in the most unusual places, like air cleaner intakes for instance.
Cats keep the mice out of the tractors but they have a bad habit of sleeping on the hoods (cab tractors) and hoods and seats (open station tractors. Have to put trash bags over the seats on the open station seats or they get festooned in cat hair.
Mice don't stand a chance here. Least the squirrels are safe, cats are scared of them.
Did I say I don't paticularly like cats? I don't but they are a good deal when it comes to tractors. Mice like to chew on the wiring in the winter and build nests in the most unusual places, like air cleaner intakes for instance.
ABusWrench
Feeling the Heat
Unless you keep the cats inside around here, they're just coyote bait! Lots and lots of coyote around here. Also a pair of mountain lions/cougar too! Had a feral cat family living in my pallet pile a few years ago. Even feed them. But one by one they disappeared. Just part of the food chain around here.
Yotes are not an issue here. It's open season on them all year. Don't even need a hunting license. I have a 22-250 Savage with an ATN night vision scope on it. Yote death machine.
We loose one or two every year but more seem to come. Think we have a sign out by the road that says.. Stray cats welcome My wife must have put it there, not me.
We loose one or two every year but more seem to come. Think we have a sign out by the road that says.. Stray cats welcome My wife must have put it there, not me.
Don't believe in fences though they do show boundaries. Out here it's a given where property lines are because we farm so we all respect each other's property. Kind of the unspoken rule.
So did we until about a month ago. Sold the entire herd and the containment fencing is coming down to be replaced with timothy / alfalfa hay.
bogieb
Minister of Fire
That certainly was an interesting explanation for your stove woes. Frogs/toads will hop in when a door is open and people won't tend to notice unless they are looking down at their feet. And if there is an overhead door, a tree frog could be hanging out on the outside of the door, get a ride when the door is opened, get onto the rails before it is closed, then it has time to find its way down (as long as they stay out of the area of motion anyway).
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