Help! New Harman Accentra has a noisy auger and a low rumble noise

[Matt715]

Hi everyone, I am new to Pellet Stoves and I recently purchased a Harman Accentra freestanding stove and the feed auger seems to bind up every once in a while. I have had the stove for about a month now and burned maybe 15 bags though it. I had a tech come out and check it out and he said it was due to me not cleaning it enough and burning it hot enough. So far I have been running it on room temp at 65-70 degrees with a feed rate of 2-3. At the time the service guy came out I had burned about 5 bags of Hardwood pellets so I thought I would just need to do a better job of cleaning the burn pot by the auger. He did notice that the slide in the bottom of the hopper was very sticky and worked a while to free it up a bit. He tested it out and said everything sounds/looks normal and about a half bag later the auger started to make a banging noise and hesitate again. I took the stove apart and spun the auger with the chain off and found it was binding when the outer end of the auger in the burn pot came around to the bottom of the pot and would get stuck on parts of pellets and the tiny bit of carbon build up that was there. So, I really cleaned the burn pot/auger and made sure it spun freely and also took apart the hopper slide and made it slide very freely- the bushing was very misaligned. The other thing I noticed is that after I clean the pot/auger out the auger drive motor is pretty quiet but as I get about half way though a bag it gets noticeably louder and then I start hearing the banging noise sue to strain on the motor. My other noise I am hearing is a very low rumble that sounds like a intake noise of some sort that seems to come and go as the fire gets larger/hotter. I have a through the wall exhaust/intake combo pipe that the stove company installed. Is noise normal or is there something I should be doing differently before I call the company back out?

Thanks!

Matt

 

[lecomte38]

I have to pay special attention to the build up of crud at the end of the auger tube in my insert. When running in the low end or letting it go out and restarting I have to vacuum it and scrape it every few days. When I ran it a little harder last week it build up was much less.

 

[redbird58]

I'm also new to pellet stoves. Just bought a Harmen Accentra Insert and wondering how others like theirs. Any tips or suggestions? I am having installed by dealer. Thanks

 

[GVA]

Hi everyone, I am new to Pellet Stoves and I recently purchased a Harman Accentra freestanding stove and the feed auger seems to bind up every once in a while. I have had the stove for about a month now and burned maybe 15 bags though it. I had a tech come out and check it out and he said it was due to me not cleaning it enough and burning it hot enough. So far I have been running it on room temp at 65-70 degrees with a feed rate of 2-3. At the time the service guy came out I had burned about 5 bags of Hardwood pellets so I thought I would just need to do a better job of cleaning the burn pot by the auger. He did notice that the slide in the bottom of the hopper was very sticky and worked a while to free it up a bit. He tested it out and said everything sounds/looks normal and about a half bag later the auger started to make a banging noise and hesitate again. I took the stove apart and spun the auger with the chain off and found it was binding when the outer end of the auger in the burn pot came around to the bottom of the pot and would get stuck on parts of pellets and the tiny bit of carbon build up that was there. So, I really cleaned the burn pot/auger and made sure it spun freely and also took apart the hopper slide and made it slide very freely- the bushing was very misaligned. The other thing I noticed is that after I clean the pot/auger out the auger drive motor is pretty quiet but as I get about half way though a bag it gets noticeably louder and then I start hearing the banging noise sue to strain on the motor. My other noise I am hearing is a very low rumble that sounds like a intake noise of some sort that seems to come and go as the fire gets larger/hotter. I have a through the wall exhaust/intake combo pipe that the stove company installed. Is noise normal or is there something I should be doing differently before I call the company back out?

Thanks!

Matt

First you do need to really scrape the burnpot quite a bit when you run it low, because you get more clinkers.
second if your slide plate was sticky with a residue you have a potetially serious problem and the dealer will have to address this..
third the banging is one of 2 things the slide plate cutting through a pellet or the chain is loose or not lined up...

so if the slide plate is sticky (with residue) your auger is too and this will bind the auger and drive.

some things to check for chain alignment
make sure the sprockets are lined up, the chain is tensioned and the insulator grommets between the motor and the mount are in good shape and installed properly (ie the motor is mounted straight).
with the stove off and the tension on the chain loose push and pull the sprocket on the gearbox and verify the shaft does not move too much as this causes misalignment.

if the stove sounds like a helicopter off in the distance and the flames dance it is "woofing"

 

[BurningMan]

Are the latest Accentra FS stoves direct drive?
Did they eliminate the chain?

 

[Matt715]

No, its still a chain drive. As far as the woofing goes, is there anything I can do to minimize or eliminate it? I sit in the corner of the room where the stove is and I can hear every nose that stove makes and it drives me nuts when I'm watching TV. As far as the chain alignment goes, when I had the sprocket off I used a straight edge to get it as close as I can get it. My auger drive motor didn't come with any grommets- it was solid mounted. I did, last weekend when I had it all apart, put some rubber washers in between the mounting bracket and the motor to try and isolate it. It helped but it still seems rather noisy to me sometimes. As far as the slide plate goes, it wasn't sticky due to residue, it was sticky because it was new and the bushing being misaligned so I think I have that issue fixed. When I get a chance this weekend and its still light out I will take the stove apart again and check out the slop in the gearbox. I guess my question is, is it normal for all the popping noises that I am experiencing or is it supposed to run quiet?

 

[mooserdog]

I have been burning my Harman Accentra for 4 months and it has heated my 1500 sq. ft. home very well. I started to use the room temp. setting and the auger started to rumble and squeal. I give it a good cleaning every week. I have burned 1 1/4 ton so far. I ran all the pellets out of the stove today and scraped down the end of the auger and jiggled it back and forth with the scraper tool. I then ran it through several cycles in test mode and jiggled the auger again when it stopped moving. It has stopped squealing for now.

 

[stoveguy2esw]

No, its still a chain drive. As far as the woofing goes, is there anything I can do to minimize or eliminate it? I sit in the corner of the room where the stove is and I can hear every nose that stove makes and it drives me nuts when I'm watching TV. As far as the chain alignment goes, when I had the sprocket off I used a straight edge to get it as close as I can get it. My auger drive motor didn't come with any grommets- it was solid mounted. I did, last weekend when I had it all apart, put some rubber washers in between the mounting bracket and the motor to try and isolate it. It helped but it still seems rather noisy to me sometimes. As far as the slide plate goes, it wasn't sticky due to residue, it was sticky because it was new and the bushing being misaligned so I think I have that issue fixed. When I get a chance this weekend and its still light out I will take the stove apart again and check out the slop in the gearbox. I guess my question is, is it normal for all the popping noises that I am experiencing or is it supposed to run quiet?

the "woofing" noise can be attenuated by restricting the intake air just a bit right at the back of the stove, take your "oak" inlet off at the back of the stove with it up and running and making the rumble, cover about a 4th of the opening with a piece of tape, see if the noise quits , if not cover just a bit more, usually between 1/4 and 1/3 covered you will hit the sweet spot where the fire is still active and the woofing has stopped. once you have dialed it in with the tape, just reconnect the oak back over the tape and leave it there.works well on our stoves when they do that , i expect it would work on most any of them.

 

[cac4]

so this "woofing"...is too much air??

I've noticed it, very slightly, when the stove is really crankin'. yeah, it kinda sounds like a huey in the distance....WAY off in the distance. very subtle. I could totally just live with it. its that slight.
I have the harman oak installed...thing with the tape trick is that the oak pipe fits inside the intake flange, rather than outside, so I'm not sure that would work too well.

I did hear a "groan" for the first time, last night. I just cleaned it thoroughly on friday, too. maybe I'm not getting the auger/auger tube well enough.(?). it looks like there's some carbon build up, but its really hard to get any leverage on it to get it off. I'm not seeing any big "clinkers", like others have described. just a little bit of stuff on the burn pot that scrapes off, but it seems very minor.

 

[Matt715]

I ended up calling the dealer for the woofing and they came out and covered the intake with tape but the service guy covered it up about 3/4 of the way and the flame was getting lazy at times so I opened it up to about 1/2 covered. It still woofs every once in a while but its pretty quiet and I can stand it now. As far as the auger, most of my problem was that I was running the stove at too lowof a feed rate and the fire was burning back into the auger tube creating all the carbon build up. I just bumped the feed rate to 3 from a 2 and run the stove mostly in stove temp mode (especially when its warm out) and I haven't had a problem for a long time. It also turns out that a lot of my clunking and binding issues were due to my slide plate in the bottom of my hopper binding up. What I did to fix that was I filed the edges down, filed the slot where the lever drives the slide plate and I beveled it so it could move freely throughout the whole range of motion, sprayed the bottom of the plate with graphite, and aligned the bushings for the slide plate lever so it moves very freely back and forth. So far its running very quietly now and as long as it keeps it up that way I am pretty happy with the stove. As far as the groaning cac4- mine was doing that too until I put the graphite on the plate and it solved that issue. You may want to try it out..

Matt

 

[cac4]

well, the groaning seemed to be a transient thing; I didnt' touch it, and last night, it wasn't making any noise at all. probably just some sawdust caught up in something somewhere, and it passed on its own.
The manual says to set the feed rate to 4, so thats where I've had mine set.