PelPro glass is black

[fish03]

Hello,
I am new to using a pellet stove as we bought out PelPro pp 130 back in December 2016 and have now burned about 2 tons in it. We've burned American Wood Fibers - Premium Hardwood the entire time. We don't have room to store it so our local feed store just keeps a running tally for us and we pick up about 10 bags at a time to keep in the house. Recently our glass has turned black within a couple hours of burning. I feel like there is a problem but have no idea what it might be. Last night it was set on 4 and burned through 2 bags from 8pm to 7am and the burn pot was full!

We clean the burn pot and vacuum out the ash every night. We've kept up on most of the recommended maintenance in the manual except cleaning the blower as we can't easily get to it due to the stove's proximity to the wall. Is there other maintenance that we should be doing? Are the pellets bad?

The glass has always been "dirty" but never this black. I should note that the company that installed it stated we did not need a return air as our house is very old and drafty enough. Also, we keep the trim at -2 or -3 otherwise the fire is roaring and burning inefficiently. Sorry for so many questions but we are total newbies to this!!

 

[alternativeheat]

After burning two tons of pellets you can pretty well bet that you need to do a deeper cleaning and also a vent cleaning. I'm not familiar with your stove but usually there will be deeper chambers that need cleaning out beyond what you can see in the burner compartment. Sometimes passages that run next to heat exchangers and such and also the pathway leading to your vent system. After two tons you can bet it's dirty in there.

4" venting I brush out after two tons, if I had 3" I'd do it more often, till I got a handle on just what it requires. It's generally a simple task if a bit dusty LOL . Usually you will have a clean out cap to remove and run a pellet vent brush through to get all the ash out.

A sign of restricted passages is lack of air movement which manifests itself with a dirty burn and black glass. Since you have never fully cleaned the whole system as yet, do that first. Leave your imagination for later ! We have a saying around here: " when in doubt clean it". And also: " a clean pellet stove is a happy pellet stove ". We have a couple of guys on the board who are stove techs, they say about 80+% of the time they are called out to a misbehaving stove, it needed cleaning. New owners always want to think there is something wrong with the stove. And they are right ! It's dirty !

 

[fish03]

Thanks for the response. We are slowly learning to be much more mechanically inclined since we moved to the country and bought an old house!

In regards to cleaning the vent - I've read some posts about using leaf blower or shop vac to suck everything out. We don't have a leaf blower but do have a decent shop vac. Do you think we should slide the stove off the vent pipe inside and clean from that end or from the top of the vent outside? There is a lot of black soot in the vent cap outside so I can see how that would be an issue blocking good air flow.

 

[alternativeheat]

Have you watched this video ?

 

[alternativeheat]

What is your vent configuration (IE up and out, out and up , straight out, up through the roof etc and also how long is it). Do you have a clean out T ?

 

[fish03]

Yes, I've watched that video. Wow that thing looks squeaky clean compared to ours! We do all the daily maintenance it's referring to just haven't done the seasonal maintenance yet.

We have so much buildup though we have to empty the burn pot every day otherwise it's overflowing. We run it about medium to medium-low to heat the entire house.

We vent out and then up about 6 feet. We had it installed by a certified chimney company with experience in installing these.

 

[alternativeheat]

Sounds like you could lower your feed rate a bit if that stove has the adjustment for it. And maybe bump the air up. Again I'm not familiar with the stove. Anyway, start with a full cleaning, including the vent. If the vent goes out and then up you must have a clean out outdoors at the bottom. You would open that and brush any ash out from inside the stove and house to that t and let it drop out. Then brush up to the top or from the top down. Check that black topper you have , it probably has a screen inside it, make sure it's not plugged. That's it, close it up. And of course clean the stove.

 

[Lake Girl]

seasonal maintenance yet

The word seasonal is misleading ... each stove manufacturer has terms of reference ie after 1 ton, 1000 hours, once a month. If you are burning steady it usually equals once a month. As alternative mentioned, a larger vent can usually be put off longer.

Time for a serious clean! The vent cap is trying to tell you that

 

[fish03]

Well a good deep clean will get done tonight then! Thanks for all the advice. We absolutely love our stove and the savings it's given us versus running our very old inefficient heat pump on emergency heat anytime the temps are under 45, which is most of the winter in Ohio. We just want to make sure it lasts for years to come. So time to bust out the cleaning tools!

 

[Lake Girl]

I have a dryer lint brush that I use to get into the internal exhaust passages followed up by a hose attached to the microtool kit for the shopvac (drywall bag). YMMV From the manual maintenance section #8...

 

[alternativeheat]

How did the cleaning pan out ?

 

[fish03]

Well about an hour later and covered in soot we had a clean burning stove again! The clean out cap was full! There was so much buildup in the entire vent and behind the panels. I feel bad we didn't take better care of it sooner but lesson learned! We bought a pellet stove vent brush from our local Lowes and that did the trick to get it all out. The fans looked good with minimal buildup so we will take those off and give those a good clean at the end of the burn season (I did stick the shop vac in there and vacuumed up all the loose dust). This site is a saving grace for newbies like us and I'm sure I'll be back for more answers over time. I appreciate all your feedback!

 

[alternativeheat]

Awesome ! Hey now you know your system fails the stress test at two tons. Do those major cleanings at one ton and all should be well. Most of us also do a weekly, not quite so deep, general cleaning. Actually I have my general cleaning out to two weeks now and just daily scrapings of the burn pot which I do with the stove running.