Usual cleaning tricks aren't working - any thoughts?

[pourlepayssauvage]

First question is are these two bags of Maine Woods pellets the same pellet in a different bag or a different product?

My guess is same pellet different bag but I don't know that for sure. I typically buy pellets by the week at Home Depot or Wal Mart and I usually buy the bag on the left. With the pellet supply shortage this year I decided to stop playing the I hope home depot has pellets today game and ordered a ton from my local EBS who said they had just gotten in a trailer load of Maine Woods, and they showed up as the bag on the right. My last few bags of the left picture I started getting signs of a lazy flame and black glass and it was almost time for a deep cleaning so I did one -- I do one every 3-4 weeks and consists of vacuuming out the interior, taking off the heat exchangers and vacuuming inside, banging on the back wall to release anything else, running a pellet brush thru the vent, vacuuming out the vent, and finishing off with the leaf blower trick. I'm running an Englander 10-cpm btw. When I started using the bag on the right the problem got worse. I assumed I missed something in cleaning and repeated. Problem persisted so I decided to try turning up the air to see if that would help with combustion -- had the bottom buttons on factory set 1-4-1. Switched to 1-4-3 first to see if increasing the AOT would help break up the ash in the burnpot since I've read that it makes the stirrer run faster. Then went to 1-5-3, 1-6-3, and finally 1-7-3 last night - which seemed to help a little but not much. When I turn the stove on around 4pm till I go to bed around 10 pm the flame is very happy and dancing around. When I get up around 5 am the glass is black and the flame is lazier - here is what my glass and burnpot looked like this morning after being on about 14 hours -



I'm starting to wonder if it's the pellets themselves - wonder if they had a lot of bark or moisture in this batch or ? Would it be ok to keep cranking up the air - or is that going to just send more heat out the vent ? Any thoughts/comments greatly appreciated.

 

[pourlepayssauvage]

Forgot to add that the door gasket passes the dollar bill test as well.

 

[hyfire]

Well your door gasket looks like its leaking at the seam, but the black soot is a sign of not enough combustion air...your sure everything is clean? Maybe combustion blower is weak?

 

[CladMaster]

Both those bags of pellets burn 'dirty', I have the ones on the left, and I have the same problem with black soot at the back of the stove. I did have the issue with soot on the glass too, but killed that issue with my modified burn pot.

The pellets are not as dense (heavy) as other pellets, and the bags are loaded with fines which in time clogs up the hopper and has to be cleaned out with the vacuum.

 

[CladMaster]

Well your door gasket looks like its leaking at the seam, but the black soot is a sign of not enough combustion air...your sure everything is clean?

The door gasket looks good in the picture, so I don't think that's the problem.

 

[Lake Girl]

UPC codes usually help to determine if they are the same company. Two search engines from the sticky thread "Need some help getting UPC code of pellet bags"
(broken link removed)
http://www.upcdatabase.com

These will identify the manufacturer. There has been mention that stove shops wanted different bags than box stores (keeps us confused and they can charge their premium price).

Not sure if pellet quality may have suffered due to shortage and hustle to catch up but you definitely have issues with air.

Not sure if it is the same with your stove but Englander factory settings are always supposed to have last number as 1?
PS - from what I've read - those settings are only relevant to the two lowest settings on upper controls...
Sure others will chime in...

 

[CladMaster]

Not sure if it is the same with your stove but Englander factory settings are always supposed to have last number as 1?
PS - from what I've read - those settings are only relevant to the two lowest settings on upper controls...
Sure others will chime in...

Yes, that last number should be set to '1'

 

[pourlepayssauvage]

UPC codes usually help to determine if they are the same company. Two search engines from the sticky thread "Need some help getting UPC code of pellet bags"
(broken link removed)
http://www.upcdatabase.com

These will identify the manufacturer. There has been mention that stove shops wanted different bags than box stores (keeps us confused and they can charge their premium price).

Not sure if pellet quality may have suffered due to shortage and hustle to catch up but you definitely have issues with air.

Not sure if it is the same with your stove but Englander factory settings are always supposed to have last number as 1?
PS - from what I've read - those settings are only relevant to the two lowest settings on upper controls...
Sure others will chime in...

Correct - air on temp should be at 1 -- there is some evidence on threads on here that raising it can help with ash clogging the burnpot b/c the stirrer moves a little faster - it does seem to help with clinkers etc...

 

[pourlepayssauvage]

Both those bags of pellets burn 'dirty', I have the ones on the left, and I have the same problem with black soot at the back of the stove. I did have the issue with soot on the glass too, but killed that issue with my modified burn pot.

The pellets are not as dense (heavy) as other pellets, and the bags are loaded with fines which in time clogs up the hopper and has to be cleaned out with the vacuum.

I've had them burn dirty before but not quite this dirty -- is your burnpot similar to that of the 10-cpm? How did you modify it? Is it ok for me to keep cranking up the air? I have a feeling they're putting through whatever they can find to make pellets at the moment.

 

[CladMaster]

I've had them burn dirty before but not quite this dirty -- is your burnpot similar to that of the 10-cpm? How did you modify it? Is it ok for me to keep cranking up the air? I have a feeling they're putting through whatever they can find to make pellets at the moment.

https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/25-pdvcs-original-burn-pot.123615/