In case anyone is interested: http://firewoodhoardersclub.com/forums/threads/stove-chow-wood-pellets-review.8174/
IIRC, and that's not always possible , FSU and Chow are both made by Premier, right? And Premier and Energex are one in the same? So are they basically the same pellets?
Ener Energex hardwood = Stove Chow and FSU's = Nature's Own......................maybe??? Don't think we ever got 100% verification on that but I believe that is the case.
Pretty much where they are made tells us whats in the bag. The PA Premiers(Stove Chow) are the same as the Energex hardwoods. And the Canadian Premiers(Nature Own and FSU) are the same as the Green bag Energex.
I threw in a bag of the chows from the batch of 10 bags I just picked up at HD. Good news: They are as good as the original 5 bags. Loving the heat output from these things! Notably more ash than the pellets I was burning before these (Platinum Pellets) but I don't mind at all because the heat is superb!
Finally finished off the Chows I bought earlier in the season. Here's my $0.02 on them. The heat from these was fantastic, loved it. However, over time I found out the ash builds up so fast in the burn pot, I have to scrape it *at least* every 6 hours to maintain a good burn. No complaints about the overall volume of ash, in fact I didn't really notice it. It's just that heavy kind of ash that lingers in the pot. Here's a typical scenario: Scrape the pot clean at 11:00pm before bed, so I can see the first 3 rows of holes. Stove temp 450 degrees. Get up the next morning at 6:00am, the ash in the burn pot extends all the way to the very edge, covering all holes, and of course the flame is lazy, so now the stove temp is 380-400 degrees. Since the stove temp is down, obviously the ESP sees that temp drop as well. So...the stove does what a Harman does and feeds more and more pellets into the pot in an attempt to satisfy the configured temp, which only further exasperates the ash and lazy flame issue. In the end, the chows keep me warm on weekends when I'm around to scrape the pot often. Other than that, I need to burn pellets with a different kind of ash consistency to keep warm without tending to the stove frequently.
For comparison purposes, here is the burn pot after 6 hours of burning stove chow: This is after burning combined Vermonts and Okie DF for 15 hours. There were some Vermonts in the hopper and I dumped a bag of Okie DFs right on top of them.
Yikes, I thought the Harman is supposed to only have an inch of ash? Is that correct? That looks like a lot more than that.
It will fall off, right now mine has a build on the lip ,but I can still see most of the burn pot holes through the ash , like pizz holes in the snow . The softies I burned this year ,my burn pot was similar to td bergs I think because the softies ash compared to hardwood ash is less by volume and weight so it just blows out of the pot and doesn't build up . From my Harman manual " If at the #6 setting [ feed rate] a 1" ash bed is not obtainable ,it is not a problem. The 1" ash bed is only a maximum burn rate and at most normal setting the ash bed will be larger.
