Pellet heads!! What's up today?

I just noticed your join date. Welcome aboard to another com-padre- the more, the merrier !!!!

 

37 F out this morning.

The big Whit is happily churning away on a lovely diet of hazelnut shells this morning.
First night last night to run the big Whit through the night.
Been chilly, but the little Whit has been handling things OK until now.

Below 45 F the little guy just can't hack it at night trying to heat 24oo sq ft
Been struggling the past week and I finally said ENOUGH and stoked up the Big stove yesterday afternoon.

We get down into the low 30 F or below then the Little Whit will be back up to help out.

I don't run either of our stove above the #1 setting for more than a short time, as the heat output on the shells is higher than pellets.

Just add another stove when it gets colder.

If I had my way, we would have a stove in every corner

 

Save money

We used to have just one Big Earth Stove pellet burner.

The house was roasting or freezing, so we added a Quadrafire 1000 the second year we were here after we built the place.

We used the Quad most of the time on pellets and when it got cold we used the Earth on nut shells.

Was impossible to keep the house at an even temp with the big Earthy.

Ended up running the Quad most of the time except if it was COLD

Finally in 2009 I got tired of the high cost and decided we needed several stoves.

We kept the Quad as a backup and a helper and added the little Whit in the living room (Opposite end of room from Quad)
This really helped during the "Shoulder season" but still left us wanting.

Finally yarded out the old Earthy and built a raised hearth then added the Whit Adv 2 T in the family room (opposite end of the house)
Now we're railroading.

A perfect combination that covers all the weather conditions.
The little stove is great down to upper 40's F and then we trade off to the big Whit.

When temps drop into the 20's F we fire off both Whits and this works well until we get into the LOW temps F outside and then the Quad will likely help out at night.

A great combination.

Nice part is, if one stove quits, we are not really fouled, and can limp along until repairs can be made.

The more the merrier eh

 

So glad to have you here. Last time we wrote, you had a health battle going on. I hope you are able to get some help with your nut shell gathering. I changed out my stove. Now run a p68 which heats this place very nicely. If the temps go below zero, our new furnace will back the stove up. Things changed a lot here for me. I fell nearly two years ago and haven't recovered. My son and his family now live in half this house, we have the other half. Works out good for both of us.
Welcome over to FHC. Hope you continue to participate in the fun we have here.

 

Finished the leaves today, what a PITA.

 

Got an updated combustion blower impeller for the furnace today. Thanks don2222. I'm hoping it will help move a bit more air through the furnace and help the burn.

Now I've got to try to get the old one off. I hosed down the lock screw with penetrating oil and it's sitting now.

If that doesn't work I may have to go medieval in it.

 

Will be firing up mine when I slap it back together. Upgraded my fan and made some adjustments on the fire pot. Take your time on the stubborn nut they say you want him to suffer

 

I ended up going medieval. After digging more crud out I noticed it was a torx head, not an Allen head on the set screw. I managed to snap off my torx bit inside the set screw. Out came the cut off wheel and I had the old impeller off in less than two minutes.

New impeller is on the motor. I'm going to clean everything out before putting it back together. Sounds like highs in the 30s this coming weekend, so maybe I'll get to test it out.

I figure a couple more nights of tinkering and cleaning and I should be ready to go.

 

My wife says that all the time.. Way to go medieval w/ the cut-off wheel 343amc, no messing around there !

 

This is the aftermath/remainder of the original and the new one.

Looks like it should help move a bit more air.

 

That is the reason I run in stove temp when I'm home.

 

Hello
Here is a sure fire way that I got the old blades off using my Air Cutter!
The combustion blower's impeller blades that are enclosed in an exhaust plenum or housing seem to be almost welded on from the heat!

I finally got the the impeller off with the Air Cutter! Looks nice when done with the new impeller blade! Changing these impeller blades can be more of a challenge!

Here is what I tried.

PB Blaster, Wire Brushing and then the wrench did not crack it!

Drilling it out did not work very well either.

It finally took the air cutter making 2 cuts!

Click to Enlarge

 

After the two cuts, I poped it off with the claw of a hammer!

Last pic - is
Ta Da!

 

You might want to get some dry Graphite or moly spray and give those new blades & the surface of the motor housing a good coating......seemed to stay much cleaner when I did it on mine in the past.

 

Same here last weekend...and my back is paying for it more than usual

 

It sounds like any combustion impeller that has years on it will most likely need this type of removal