My Harman XXV pellet stove

[ernie]

Here is a shot of my new 2005 Harman XXV. You may notice I am a real firebug, having a pellet stove right by my 1987 BIS (Built In Stove) made by Security Chimneys. Last Year I burned a Harman Accentra and have now traded for the XXV. Last year we heated the whole house with pellets, never turning the LP furnace on one time! I didn't keep good track of how many pellets I burned last year but will have an accurate count by end of the season.
We switched to pellet last year because my wife went to work full time and it was not convenient to keep the BIS going.
How would I compare the XXV to the Accentra? Wow, they are both great. I think the Accentra was a little quieter than XXV by a little bit. I like the bigger glass of the XXV and the one way glass. You can not see into the stove when its not on, thereby not seeing the dirty burn pot. The Accentra glass seemed to stay a little cleaner but being some smaller may be why. I have fallen in love with the new XXV's styling. That's the real reason why we changed. All in all, I think they are both equal in quality and both do what they say what they will do.
The XXV is a real heater!

 

[annette]

What a beautiful stove! I had no idea pellet stoves were styled that way--I've only seen a couple of steel ones. Yours may be steel, too, but it has an elegant look that is more like cast-iron. Will your stove burn corn, too? That's also the first I've heard of one-way glass on a stove--what a great idea.

 

[ernie]

Its basically a cast iron stove but the heat exchanger is steel and heats up a little faster than cast. I have not tried corn yet but may try a blend 75 pellet and 25 corn some day. Yeah, the one way glass is cool, you never would guess it was there when the stove is burning, you can see the fire perfectly but when the fire goes out, you can hardly see inside the stove.

ernie

 

[mrgoodwrench]

Nice stove! Do you use the room temp or stove temp setting? I"m still playing around with my P61A, still not sure which one I'm going to use. It doesn't look as good as yours, but it does throw out some heat.

 

[Corie]

Yeah the Harmann XXV is truly one of the best looking pellet stoves on the market, hands down.

 

[Corie]

AND it looks even better in person I might add.

 

[Tango]

I love that stove! It's a toss up between the XXV or a Quadrafire Mt. Vernon. The final decision will be on which dealer to choose. In our parts, stoves are hard to come by. One dealer (Harmon) says 8-10 weeeks to get one. The Harmon factory produces 200 stoves per day. They are taking in orders for 2,000 per day. Local Quad dealer has stoves in stock as long as you want black. 1-2 week installation. Our house will be ready the end of March so we are not in a rush.

 

[ernie]

mrgoodwrench I usually use the room temp mode but sometimes in the evening will use the constant stove temp mode. I think in the long run it my use less pellets if I run it constant on low rather than the thermostatic room temp mode.
ernie

 

[Darryl Rose]

Tango - I agree they are the two nicest looking stoves on the market - both are exceptional pellet stoves.

I opted for the Harman XXV and love it.

 

[FireJumper]

Sounds like their pretty busy. I heard they were sold out to march or april. they obviously have a good product if their sold out that far.

 

[HarryBack]

Yep, nice stove, and the cast iron is US made as well! Its quiet, quieter by far in my opinion than the rest of the line. Imagine how this thing will look when Harman comes out with their enameled version! Lovely installation as well. One thing though......it seems a bit close to a window....if outside air intake is installed, the outlet needs to be 18" from a window or door, if no outside air intake is added, then the outlet has to be 48" from an operable door or window. Im guessing its an operable window because it has a screen. ;-)

 

[moog5]

I agree, the Harman XXV is a great looking stove, I painted mine forest green (photo attached) and used the top vent adapter option. Would be nice if they had the enamel finish.

I bought the Harman this season to replace my 94' Whitfield Advantage III that I have been running for the past 10 yrs. I had never had a problem with the Whitfield, just no automatics, except for the thermostat option which would only turn it down to the #1 setting.

I went with Harman because I did quite a bit of research, and found most every one I talked to, or read about on the internet had good things to say, and primarily because this model looks more like a wood stove.

So far, I am happy with this stove, but not real happy, and here is why.

Immediately upon installation, the room distribution blower made a squeeling noise (extemely loud!) whenever it was turned up past the mid point. The installer worked on it for a good hour trying to get it to go away, but couldn't. Because of the good reputation this dealer has, I agreed to try the "wait and see if it goes away" method. Hoping it would work it self in (wishful thinking). After two weeks, it didn't go away, so I called the dealer and the service tech came back to work on it,. When the tech arrived, it wasn't making the noise (which happens about 75% of the time with the blower on High), so I guess he left without doing a thing (not sure as I wasn't there during his visit). During the 2nd visit, the tech replaced the blower motor (as I watched), and it appeared to fix the problem, at least until that night,....again the squeel (yes.. still extremely loud). They came back a third time, and I wasn't hear, I am not sure what they did, but it squeeled when I got home. Again I called the dealer, and they said this has been an issue with quite a few of the XXV models, and per the dealer, Harman recognizes this problem and is working on a fix. When they come up with it, the dealer said they will come back out and fix it. It would be nice to hear Harman confirm this, but no phone number to contact them, their website says call the dealer. Meanwhile I keep the distribution blower on medium and let alot of heat go right up the chimney. Anyone else having this problem?

 

[HarryBack]

Sold around 15 of them, am burning one myself, since Spetember, no squeel on any of them. As of yet, as a dealer, we've received no tech bulletins on them either, BUT it does usually take Harman some time to come out with them. Possibly a bad batch of motors? A distribution fan is really not repairable....any we change gets sent back to Harman, no questions asked. Fairly rare though in a new unit. Also odd that it doesnt do it all the time....possibly only at a certain RPM? And its for sure the distribution fan, not the gearbox? Most noises seem to come from the gearboxes on new units these days. XXV isnt a cheap unit, so if this is a real issue, and I think a squeel is, Im hoping someone fixes it!

 

[moog5]

HarryBack:

For sure its the distribution fan, the squeel coincides with the "distribution blower light". The service tech also confirms this. About 3 out of 4 times I try and turn it up to hi, it squeels, so I turn it back down to medium. Other times I can turn it up to high without the squeel and leave it there, but later it starts squeeling.

The gear box makes noise, but not more than I would expect (I think a lot of those noise complaints maybe from those who have not had a pellet stove).

I have a side question if you don't mind. Can you provide a quick explanation of how the feed adjuster works. I understand that with certain brands / types of pellets, some will burn quicker than others, so you want a mechanism which can be adjusted so you aren't shoving unburnt coals off the edge. I am trying to understand what type of mechanism the feed adjuster uses to increase or decrease the amount of pellets being dropped down to the auger. I thought maybe the slide plate would open more (or less) to regulate how many fell through each time the slide plate opens, but when I put a few pencil marks on the slide plate, the opening width didn't appear to change under different feed adjuster settings.

 

[F350R]

I shopped both the Harman and Quadrafire both had good reviews from friends and the internet. I finally decided on the Quadrafire Mt Vernon in the end the dealer seemed more friendly and knowledgeable he was also 45 miles closer.

 

[Xena]

Nice setup you've got there Pete S. Where'd ya get those king kong sized pine cones? Holy moly
those are the biggest set of cohone cones I've ever seen!

 

[moog5]

Thanks Zeta, those big cohones are sugar pine. I found them at Lake Tahoe, they are all over the place. I picked them up and brought them home because I always wanted big cohones.

As far as my install goes, I chose the Harman XXV because it looks like a wood stove, ...and especially with the "top vent adapter option". Just as Harman advertises, it work great for replacing a standard woodstove. BUT....in addition to the noisy blower I have one more gripe.

They require a 1' section of 4" pellet pipe be stubbed up inside the 6" single wall pipe to prevent the hopper lid from contacting hot 6" pipe when you open the hopper lid. This appears to be an after thought, because there is no way to securely connect the 4" pellet pipe to the "top vent adapter", it just rests free on top of the adapter and in the 6" pipe. If Harman knew that the one foot section was going to have to be used, I have to believe they would have provided a standard connection that a 4" pellet pipe section would snugly fit onto. As I have 6" pipe all the way up, cleaning the exhauset is going to be a big problem. I can see the process coming and am not looking forward to it. I use a 6" brush from above, and brush everything down, everything falls into the 1ft' high gap between the 4" and the 6" pipe. As leaving it there will prevent a fire hazard, I am going to have to disconnect the 6" pipe between the ceiling box and the stove to clean out the space (I am not looking forward to the mess that is going to make). When I do this, I plan to run 4" all the way up inside the 6", but still have to figure out how to securely fasten the 4" pellet pipe to the top vent adapter. By the time I get to this step, I would have to think Harman has recognized this issue and made the necessary change in the design of their "top vent adapter". If they are as reputable as their corporate image projects, they should offer to replace these poorly designed top vent adapters free of charge. (Harman...........are you listening?).

I am really venting now (no pun intended), but as I just spent $3k I feel I have every right to do so. Assuming they redesign the top vent adapters, how about providing 3 phillips head nuts instead of hex head nuts for the connection at the bottom. As presently designed, there is not enough room between the edge of the hex head bolt and the "top vent adapter" to fit a wrench or socket over the bolt head.

Except for the squeeling blower, and the poorly designed top vent adapter, I really like this stove. Before I bought this stove, I did think about potential problems by buying a first year model, but figured that with Harmans good reputation, they would remedy any issues.

As my serial number is really low (#1006), maybe I got a guinea pig model. Looking forward to hearing what Harman Reps, or any other owners have to say.

 

[FireJumper]

Actually Harman didn't have a "afterthought". The folks testing the unit wouldn't have approved it if they didn't add the vent pipe within the 6" pipe. Fortunately anything and everything on a stove that has to do with combustion of clearences needs to be tested and performed by a reputable UL listed test lab. Whatever test lab they used felt it was necessary to use the 4" pipe for proper operation and safety.

These stoves usually burn pretty clean (depends on the fuel) so I don't think you will be having any major issues cleaning the venting.

 

[Mo Heat]

I finally decided on the Quadrafire Mt Vernon...

F350R, I like that Saguaro cactus and kitty cat(?) you put INSIDE the stove. I assume those are NOT Quad options.

 

[F350R]

A friend of mine made the catus I don't have a plasma cutter. We had been talking about making something like that, soon after he saw some figures simular in a stove store so we decided to make our own. He has a plasma cutter so all we needed was some 1/8 material. I put the patterns together on the computer and he cut them out. Both cats were timid of the stove when we put it in this fall but both lay in front of it when it is cold out. The older cat seems smarter and sleeps on it when its really cold out. Both cats are black although one is about twice the size of the other so we call them fat cat and mini me.

Mike

 

[moog5]

I just spoke to one more person (by email) who has the same problem with their Harman XXV, a SQUEELING BLOWER>

Keep on posting if so.

Still no word from Harman or the Rep or the Dealer if they ever plan to make good on the claimed "gold warranty".

 

[FireJumper]

Pete S:

"Still no word from Harman or the Rep or the Dealer if they ever plan to make good on the claimed “gold warranty”.

I'm sure Harman will make good on their warranty as long as they know about the issues at hand. Did your dealer try to contact Harman about this?

 

[moog5]

The dealer told me they are in contact with Harman.

I am getting tired of having to call and ask them for the status. I just wrote them a letter today and cc'd Harman asking them for something in writing about what their plans are "repair or replace" per the warranty.
It's going on 3 months now, and this stove has had the probem since day one. I am getting tired of waiting. No communication at all from the dealer other than "we have to wait for Harman". Can't even get number for Harman, and if I suppose I did, they would just tell me to talk to the dealer. So far the dealer has been out 3 times (they have been great in trying to resolve this), but when they get a defective item from Harman, they have to wait for Harman for a fix.

Before I made my decision to buy a Harman, I read all their reviews on this site and felt great about choosing them. Currently I am not so sure. If they actually ever do make good on the warranty, I will follow up here accordingly.

 

[FireJumper]

harman has no problems with giving warranty, the problem is if they don't know they need to replace it then they won't. somtimes Harman is always the blame for something not getting done. Most times often then not if Harman is asked to have a part replaced under warranty by a dealer they aren't very quick on saying no. I know the person that runs there warranty dept. and he's not that harsh when it comes to warranty repalcement parts. He's a very trusting person.

 

[moog5]

The thing is they already replaced the blower once, and it didn't fix it. So either they got a batch of bad blowers, or it has to do with how the blower mounts in that box, or how the box mounts to the unit. Would you mind contacting your warranty rep to see if he has heard of this issue?