Harman P68 Slow Startup

Holy crap!! That old pusher arm has quite the wear pattern.

 

ditto!

 

X2

 

Good to hear TT. Now that beast will drive you out of the house.

 

Did someone say Beer?????

 

Nice to come to a conclusion, quite a few bright minds involved. The story is on hold for the moment, we still have wear issue to contend with. In the mean time, have a cold one

 

Good to hear you're stove is back to "normal" TT. Now enjoy the heat & have a brewski.

BTW, I might get in contact with Harman.....from what I've read in this thread, that wear seems severe, and is obviously not normal or something that happens much. Might have been a defective part.....maybe get Harman to reimburse you for the new one??

 

Working on the root cause of the wear. Since replacing the pusher arm, I have noticed that at irregular intervals, the stove makes a pretty loud "click" sound. Last night I got behind there and watched. What's happening is every few auger turns, the wheel hits the short end of the pusher arm and appears to come up against resistance, as if it has pushed the plate as far as it can, and is still wanting to push it further. Over time, this appears to be what caused the pusher arm wear to occur. It is not a regular occurrence. For instance, it will happen on the 3rd turn, then the 8th turn, then the 6th turn and so on. I think it's happening too often to be a pellet getting caught or ground up in the auger. I also noticed when it happens, I can see the auger motor move as if it hit a small bump. The other thing I noticed is on the P43, when the auger motor turns, it is nearly silent. On the P68, I can hear it much more clearly when it runs. There is also grease residue collected on the outside bottom portion of the housing, but that's probably normal for a motor this age (7 years).

Anyway, I'm going to pull the motor off later today. Having never held one of these in my hand, I'm not exactly sure what to look for, but I suspect a replacement is in my near future. If that doesn't solve it, then the only other thing I can think of is the auger arm itself has become "warped" so to speak, and needs replacement. Seems unlikely, but let's see what happens with the new motor.

 

Dunno if it helps, on the Ecoteck stove here, the top auger is exposed and secured w/ a C-clip on the outer housing - this section, being exposed for the duration of the stove's life had a lot of residue, and some rust on it. The main auger motor was always louder than expected: I had cleaned that area up after receiving the stove Dec. '14 as part of the rehab on it, but the issue persisted. Lightly lubing the auger motor a few times with Anderol seemed to 'help' quiet it some, but you always knew the auger was turning during last burn season.

This year I tried something a little different - I have used a product called Liqui-Moly for many years as a motor oil additive in our (older) vehicles and small engine equipment here, it's basically pure Moly lube suspended in a 20 weight carrier oil.

I re-cleaned the auger ends and all exposed bushing area w/ Non-Chlorinated Brake Cleaner (stove off and cold of course), and added several drops of the Liqui-Moly to the exposed ends, using a re-tasked syringe that formally was for refilling Ink Jet cartridges, wetting the surfaces / careful not to get any in the auger motor.

I did this 3 times over a period of 3-4 weeks, the auger is silent now. Good stuff.

Only post this because using a Moly-based product may help w/ your issue also, either this product or a 'dry' Moly lube, available in spray can (I think Don222 recommends the CRC=brand here)

Here is a link to the product I use here:

http://www.amazon.com/Liqui-Moly-2009-Anti-Friction-Treatment/dp/B003U4O414

Great detective work TT, I'm sure you'll get it sorted out soon.

 

The slide gate assembly is attached to the auger system so added things that could go wonkey. Kind of pellets could play a role in the equation. Cleaningness another. The slide gate has to move freely but you know that already. Keep doing what you're doing, it should appear in your face eventually.

 

Holy crap on a stick. That's a pile of wear. Have to keep this in mind if I ever have issues with the P61!

Nice to see everyone one out to help out with issues like this. Just more reason that I'm glad that I joined up.

The only issue I have, is trying to give a good enough answer to the g/f's "what the hell do you spend so much time doing on your computer" end quote HAHA. I've shown her, but she just shakes her head and walks away.

 

Ive found its easier just to say I am looking at porn.....

 

Plenty of "Pellet Porn" here LW...

 

X2

 

I hope the OP is out of the woods, so to speak, with his issue. If not, its a new motor/gearbox issue....easy repair really.

 

Probably an easy repair, but I bet it's not easy on the wallet.

 

HAHA

You're probably right. I think to her it'd be more believable!

 

Small update. The loud click/bang continues. If I get behind the stove, I can occasionally see the little auger wheel "snap" off the end of the pusher arm short end, because there is some resistance. That's when the click/bang happens, and it's loud enough that it can be clearly heard from the next room over. I ended up taking the slide plate out of the P68 and looked for burrs or anything that would explain resistance to moving on occasion. Nothing obvious there. And when I take it apart and move the plate by hand, it moves quite freely with no obstructions as I mentioned in the past. So I took the slide plate out of the P43 and compared them. These two stoves take the exact same part. In appearance, they look similar, however the slide plate from the P68 is just a hair over 3/16" longer than the slide plate from the P43. The P43 slide plate is 5 9/16" long and the P68 slide plate is ~5 3/4" long. I got to wondering if that was the cause. Like maybe the extra length on P68 slide plate was causing it to bind up occasionally, when the plate is at full extension and maybe a pellet gets jammed between the "step" end of the plate and the auger shaft wall? So I put the P43 slide plate in the P68 and ran it like that for a few days. The loud click / bang noise was *much* less frequent and less pronounced when it happened, but it *did* still happen from time to time. Also replaced the P68 auger motor with a new one, and other than the fact that the new motor is quieter, there has been no other discernible difference. So now I have a spare auger motor! Kind of driving myself crazy with it now. Starting to wonder if an occasional click/bang is to be "expected" and I'm chasing a red herring with thinking this is the cause of the pusher arm wear in the first place. Here is a picture of the two slide plates side-by-side. It's not as easy to see the length difference in a picture, but here goes. Wondering if anyone can comment on whether the extra length on the P68 slide plate is a manufacturing defect, or if it's normal for slide plates of the exact same part number to be different in length by as much as 3/16"?

 

Interesting, the clunk noise sounds like pellets getting cut as the assembly is moving in/out. The length difference is probably slight engineering modifications if using the same Part #'s. But you never know if manufacturing switched to another plant(china) and quality control as slackened Try different pellets to see if noises changes is the only thing I could suggest(cheapest troubleshooting)