Personally, I doubt you are going to be made whole here...another member here got nowhere with them on this issue...IIRC, the problem is the clips are too small...I think I would just make bigger clips and move on. My 2 ¢...
3 calls in so far today. Guy on the phone says he is forwarding the info to “the powers that be”. Gotta say I’m not too impressed.
Customer service guy rob told me yesterday that they have never heard of the glass falling in, today Sam told me they had 4 calls yesterday with this problem and they are waiting to hear from the higher ups on a solution. It will most likely be sending out longer tabs. poor Sam, I had a rough day today and he was my punching bag.
Yes, the tabs barely make contact. ESW has not redesigned the retainers. However, I did draw up a design of a bar with two tabs as a possible replacement. I was going to sketch out the dimensions and then see if any of the metal working guys on here could make two of them, one for the top and one for the bottom; me paying for the cost of materials, shipping, and of course their time. I just don't have the tools for metal working. Here is why the glass falls out. The tabs are not long enough to properly make contact with the glass. Ceramic glass has a very low expansion index; which is why you use it in a stove; some ceramic glass can be heated very hot and then have cold water thrown on it without cracking because it doesn’t expand. However, the door will expand, the opening in the door gets large enough that it pulls the tab away from the glass. The glass stays the same size, the door opening gets larger. What I don't understand is why ESW has not made better retainers for the stove since this is a serious flaw; glass falls out, air bypasses the damper, fire runs away, stove overheats, possible house fire, ESW knows of the design flaw so therefore ESW could have a very serious lawsuit on their hands. If it resulted in deaths, that lawsuit gets extremely serious. I was told by ESW that they could send me some more retainers but they would be exactly the same as the ones I had. How about, "We got several reports of this issue and have redesigned the retainers and will ship some out to you ASAP." Compare the retainers on your stove to the retainers on the NC-30; you will be blown away by the difference.
I wouldn't sell the stove because of the glass retainers. I think a long metal strip with two tabs that fit in the current slots with the metal strip a bit wider than the current tabs. One for the top and one for the bottom. By the way, I would have reinstalled the glass making sure the retainers made proper contact. You can remove the retainers without taking off the entire door gasket; because that is what I did. Just lift up the gasket where the retainers are located and you can access the screws. There is a gasket that goes on the glass. Take the door off, place on a flat surface where you can allow the door handle to hang off the edge. My glass has stayed in place but I do check it at times. The Summer's Heat is a good stove as far as producing good heat on less fuel; I kept my house a nice toasty 80 F all winter. I may just make some longer tabs, I could do that using the tools I have. I like the idea of having a strip that goes the length of the glass. I have not had the glass to come loose this winter so don't think that it is constantly going to come loose.
Simply cut a strip of sheet metal to tuck behind the existing retainers? Would only take a pair of common tin snips...which many people already own, or available at many stores for $20 or less.
The bigger question is how this slipped through the cracks during testing of this stove? This particular stove it happened to in this thread didn’t see much use until the problem reared it’s head. This is a major...MAJOR...safety concern that ESW needs to address ASAP!!!! They also need to get on the ball with replying to Warner. I think Warner did the right thing by replacing the stove with his older stove.
Yeah while I did buy the stove knowing there could be an issue I certainly didn’t expect it to happen within a month. And ESW’s customer service is horrible at best. This POS is going down the road for sure. Tho when it was working properly I did see the light and this isn’t the end of the road for me as far as a more efficient way to burn goes for me.
FYI, the Englander NC30 (3.5 CF) is a very stout and proven workhorse...and their CS used to be quite good...but it seems like since this new model you have came out they just want to ignore its problems. Just FYI, AMFMEnergy sells factory seconds with cosmetic damage only (sometimes cant even find the issue) shipped to your house for cheaper than what you can buy in store for...still full factory warranty. Here is the 30...when they run out, they are out for the year normally. 50-TNC30 - EPA Certified Non-Catalytic Wood Stove - Heats 1800 to 2400 sq. ft. (F2)
I have one of these stoves and I wouldn't call it a POS; yes, it does have some issues but I think they could be easily corrected to have a top notch stove at the price point of this stove. I may see if adding another three feet of chimney will improve the draft for me; I see a lot of smoke spillage with my stove. The large door is nice but that may contribute to the smoke spillage and I would be just as happy with a shorter door; and a shorter door wouldn't hit the damper knob.
For roughly $400-450 more than the Summer's Heat 2400, Lowe's has a Drolet that I looked at and seems to have good reviews.
I will never buy another esw product again. And I will share my experience with them with as many wood burners as I can.
That's understandable...but just so you are aware...prior to this "smart" line of stoves coming out, I had never heard of anyone having a problem with their products or their customer service...not sure what's happened since. And as was mentioned, Drolet also makes some excellent stoves at a reasonable price...and can't say I have heard of anyone critical of their CS...just the opposite actually...they came out with a BB store wood furnace line in 2012, and being a new model, they ended up having some cracking issues...they tried to pay for welding repair at first, but ended up replacing almost all that had issues with a whole new unit...most of them upgraded to the new improved model, except maybe right at first, when there was no new improved model yet...
