My first post - Englander 25 question

[Leadfoot]

Greatings and Happy holidays from S. E. Oklahoma!

I've been lurking for a few days reading lots of good information. I just bought my first pellet stove, a 2 year old New England 25-pdvc/55-shp10. I'll have to admit I'm not all that impressed. It makes plenty of heat but eats pellets. I was hoping to get 24 hours from of a bag but not there yet. I have the stove set on heat range 1 the fuel feed at 5, air at 7 and air on temp at 1. I've tried all the settings but cant get what I would call a proper burn. The problem is, I'm getting clumps of pellets. The fire dies down to glowing coals then here comes a big load. I can run the fuel feed at 6 and it runs better but I'm getting more heat than I need for mild days. Its almost like the bottom screw is running too slow but from what I see if the top screw was to run all the time they would be the same. Anyway I'm getting about 16 hours from a bag. The set screws are tight, nothing is slipping. I'm burning Heat Resource oak pellets made just over in Arkansas.

The image below is on startup but you can see how full the screw is. It will empty and we'll get a few pellets on the flights after but not enough to keep and even flame.
I'm expecting all the flights to have the same amount of pellets, maybe I'm asking too much?

 

[thinkxingu]

Lead,
Welcome! I think your post should be in the pellet-burning section--hopefully a mod will be by soon to send it over; you'll receive better responses there.

Good luck!

S

 

[Leadfoot]

Thanks thinkxingu, you know how those noobs are

 

[Jags]

Man - you must have a tiny saw to cut those pellets to length like that. %-P

 

[begreen]

Welcome. Moved to the pellet forum.

For our house and stove, when it got below 30 we would call it a 2 bag day. If the stove is burning cleanly, then you could be doing fine.

 

[gripper93]

I have the same stove and I run Greenway pellets and I have it set on 4-4-1. I get a little clump but I just scoop it out and on with the burn. At the #1 setting it will only put a few pellets in at a time so the bottom auger will push those pellets out thus your big clump and then a few. I don't know if you'll get 24 hrs out of a bag but it should be close. Englander guys say you can get 17 hrs. I'm also new to this so stick around this web site is full of good people that can help.

 

[Leadfoot]

Our house is 1500 sf heated. There is no way we could burn 2 bags a day. The cost would be less to run the heat pump.
We bought the stove for a test run to see if we would like it. I was thinking of removing the fireplace in installing a zero clearance
model. Maybe my expectations we're too high or I need a different stove. Today the temps were 49°F | 35°F so later in the day I didn't need all the heat
I was getting but I needed heat. If I could have had a more consistent feed and kept a smaller flame everything would have been just right.
There must be a stove out there to fit my needs.

 

[Marko8589]

Leadfoot ,

I bought a second 25-PDVC for another part of the house this year and have the same issue. Stove ran fine with a lower grade pellet (50% hardware 50% soft) , now that I upgrade to Maine Pellets I am getting this situation you described along with the left side of the blower output good and the right just barely warm. I increased my cleaning schedule figuring it was this , however after a full cleaning I am still getting a significant difference in heat output from each side. I can not seem to see anywhere that I might have missed when cleaning , removed impingement plate and vac'd all behind and up etc. removed burn pot etc. looked like a new stove when I was done. I did notice that the lower grade pellet was a smaller diameter then the new stuff I just bought. Wondering if I have a feed issue due to the larger diameter pellet.

 

[rottiman]

Leadfoot ,

I bought a second 25-PDVC for another part of the house this year and have the same issue. Stove ran fine with a lower grade pellet (50% hardware 50% soft) , now that I upgrade to Maine Pellets I am getting this situation you described along with the left side of the blower output good and the right just barely warm. I increased my cleaning schedule figuring it was this , however after a full cleaning I am still getting a significant difference in heat output from each side. I can not seem to see anywhere that I might have missed when cleaning , removed impingement plate and vac'd all behind and up etc. removed burn pot etc. looked like a new stove when I was done. I did notice that the lower grade pellet was a smaller diameter then the new stuff I just bought. Wondering if I have a feed issue due to the larger diameter pellet.

Englander stoves do blow harder on the left vs. the right. They all do it from what I have learned. The lower three settings are effective only when the upper heat setting is on 1 or 2, Above that they have no effect on heat production.

 

[Marko8589]

rottiman ,

When the stove was installed the lower three settings were 4-6-1 , this worked good for the lower (Home Depot) pellets. However the Main pellets are larger diameter and I am getting a similar situation as reported by Leadfoot. Would an adjustment to either LLF or LBA be required to compensate ? Also does anyone have an idea of what the numbers for the settings on the lower three buttons are ? For example , if my LLF is current at 4 , if I increase this am I feeding pellets faster. In other words is the higher the number reflect increasing the rate of feed ?

Strange this is that the first 25-PDVC stove I bought last winter seems to produce / blow equal heat out both left and right sides and that stove does not seem to have the feed issue that this new stove does and it's settings are 4-6-1 , however its MFG date is older 8/08 for the stove bought last year and 4/09 for the new one bought this past October 2009.

Another strange thing is that the older stove does not have the hopper switch. New one does. Old stove will not allow heat setting to be higher than the blower setting. New stove allows for setting the blower setting lower that the heat setting. This seems reverse logic to me , however I follow the rule of never set the blower speed lower that heat setting anyway : )

Why does Englander Stoves have all these differences ?