Old St Croix - Lazy Flame and Pellets pile up in burn pot?

Hello
This one bag of pellets created a lot of creosote in this St Croix Hastings since the last time it was cleaned!!
See pic of exhaust blower!
After cleaning the stove again and using new different pellets and a new exhaust blower it seemed better but after an hour the pellets built up, the flame was a little lazy still!!
Finally found the cleanout cover behind the ash pan. Stuck a brush in there and some more hard black chips of creosote came out and all of a sudden we felt the cold air from outside! Bingo the stove works fine and the flame is dancing again!
Has anyone seen such shiny black creasote and the hidden cleanout behind the ash pan on these old St Croix Pellet Stoves??

Could it be that the wood pellets had tree bark with creasote mixed in???

 

Holy crap is that creosote caked onto that fan?

 

Looks like it.

 

Yes, and the fan was nice and clean before those cheap pellets from the variety store were burned!!

 

My former 2008 Hastings had 3 cleanouts; one to either side of the chute (basically) and 1 behind the ash pan (I had to search since manual isn't real good at telling you exactly where that one is at). I not only had to empty the ash pan weekly (faithfully), but I had to clean out the 3 ash traps and baffle plate at least every other week or it would burn poorly. Also, any time I changed pellet brands I had to mess with the damper or it would burn poorly. Once I got the damper dialed in for the pellets it would be okay - but made it a PITA at times.

Just some of the reasons I jumped at the opportunity to get the P43 when it came up on CL (and negotiated a great price for it)

 

There's a fine line between that type of negotiation and stealing in some jurisdictions..

 

Only time that happened here w/ the Francesca was when we started burning in '15 , w/ those chit P$%^@!nnton pellets that were loaded w/ Bark and Plastic bits. It took hours to clean all that crap out, even on the small stove here.

 

No lead throwers or pointy objects involved, so that fine line wasn't quite crossed . May have been a bit of coercion since they had no other recourse . . .

 

Did your Hastings small opening on the drop tube give you any trouble BogieB?
See my new St Croix thread with pics.
What happens when pellets have high moisture in top feed pellet stove - Auger Jam - see pics

 

I never had any issues with it feeding, but I only used it for one season and pretty much stuck to FSU's that I got from HD

 

I think that stove was run for a long time with a vaccum leak... loose ash pan door or versa-grate cleanup rod pulled out. I had that happen right after I installed my stove... but one service call and some directions from the service tech fixed that. He also taught me the leaf blower trick.

 

Have a St. Croix Afton Bay stove. Do they all have the third ash clean out behind the ash pan?

 

The older stoves do Not have the cleanout behind the ash pan. Therefore for those stoves you must remove the exhaust blower and brush out this area as deep as you can go and then blast it with an air compressor.