Yeah... Can't remember if I posted the Lowes debacle last fall, but we went in person and ordered 5ton of pellets, and when the truck showed up they brought these absolute POS things instead of the ones we wanted. Not knowing any better at the time we kept them. After a bunch of mouth noise excuses from the store and corporate, all pellets are lumped in one SKU# so you get what they put on the truck unless you go get them yourself. If I were to guess, they are made from green wood and full of bark. They smell of burning sap with thick black ash that clogs the burn pot and a black sticky creosote that gums the exchanger tubes. It's bad enough that it's difficult to get the shaker to slide in my Enviro Mini, and was a difficult task to balance the amount of pellets to get any heat from ether stove, while trying to avoid having to scrape the burn pot every few hours all winter long. I know everyone has their favorite, but I have had great results from TSC/Maine Woods pellets. So yesterday we went to TSC because we are running out already, and wow what a difference! Clean hot heat again! The Mini is so much happier now, and I can't wait to get some in the Lopi in the basement. I'm not sure what we will do next fall, but I don't care if I have to truck them myself or not, but I will never be held hostage by Lowes again, and to be honest I haven't been back since and will do my best to never set foot in one of them again. I will suggest if you see these POS things run away as fast as possible.
haven't bought from BB'S in years... we always buy from a dealer.. if anything, dealers have more choices un- like HD or Lowes who stay with 1 middle of the rd hardwood year afer year. Actually, lowes does shift now/then... hello stove chows...now green supremes are HD's go to...
Premier Pellet Corp, Canada. Never had pellets burn so utterly poorly and smell of burning tree sap before, just awful junk.
There is a local hardware store that sells New England pellets, but I cannot justify the extra $75 a ton. Had I gotten the ones I thought we bought and paid for it most likely would have been fine. These things are a dark greenish color unlike the ones I (thought) chose, and have a weird odor about them. I found the HD pellets work pretty good until throttled down, then they get sooty, but nothing like these things. Next year Maine Woods from TSC pre-season sale, I can get 1ton each trip, more if I rent a trailer so, so be it... That's what I get for being lazy.
Yup,Good product.Most pellets from the great white north are above average.Premier pellet is Energex which makes Stove Chow and Fireside .Never had a bad ton from them.Love me some fireside ultra's.
Well so does the Lopi in the basement, the Enviro Mini choked on them badly and it was a constant battle of scraping the burn pot of heavy ash every few hours no matter what I did to the pellet trim, combustion blower trim or damper. However since running out the things and now burning different ones, there is noticeably more heat coming from both of them. I've also had to reduce the draft controls to normal levels and they are a nice white ash on the inside again. In any case I personally won't touch the blasted things again. Fool me once...
In that case, I got 5tons of rocks. We usually use about 4+ ton a season, so we went with 5 this time so we wouldn't run out end of season when nobody has any more. By the end of Feb those things were all gone so that tells me all I need to know. I was some angry when Lowes did the ol' switcheroo and the truck driver said we weren't the only ones PO'd about it.
Location, location, location - The closest dealer is just over 25 miles away. but they only carry NEWPS (the plant is practically next door to them) and they don't deliver more than 3 miles away unless they are delivering a stove at the same time. Hardware and agriculture stores (TSC, Agway) are only choices near me. Only TSC sells anything for less than $7/bag - and that isn't for the good stuff. I get BBS pellets if I am in the big city and they have something good like the La Cretes (whcih is not normal). Nature's own sounds like when I had the ThermaGlos's. My P61a burned them fine, but man they barely put out luke warm air. I'm surprised that those are a Canadian pellet - I've never met a pellet from north of the border that I did not care for (obviously I haven't burned the NO's though)
