Bag number 4 in the hopper since Sept 26th. Usually start burning the end of September to take the chill off. Dipped a few times down to 33 and the stove is on low and only kicking on overnight. Sets and Blazer only pellets in my stock. Puny ash, vacuumed just once and maybe will clean the glass this week. Nothing like premium pellets and good bourbon. Have two tons of Sets on order with a pickup due the end of next month. Nothing burns better or throws the heat like them in my Castilles.... Love those Mid-West prices on the Sets!
I dumped a bag of FSU's into the hopper last night and was surprised to see how much lighter in color they were from the Natures Own I was burning. I don't remember when I bought these but the date on the bag said 08-14 so it must have been that fall. Hopefully the lighter color leads to less ash and a little more heat. They're burning now but the stove is just idling (stove temp 1 with no blower) so it's difficult to get a good read on them.
couldn't have said it better! burning a couple of test bags of MWP blend, and some Blackstone. I'll get to the MWP softwood shortly that Scott B loaded in my truck. we'll be ordering some of those before long.
Finishing up my last ton of these now.. Don't think Energex is producing them anymore..for now... Only the're standard Hardwood and the Canadian Softwood blend.
Bag #3 of the year went in this afternoon and opened up one of the pallets of Crabbe. Only 2 bags burned so so additional cleaning at all before using these and there was no more than a pound of Lacrete in the hopper, so those burned up real quick on startup. Pellets look good although a bit inconsistent in size ranging from 1/4" to a little over an inch-acceptable with no excessively long ones. Very light in color as most softies are-no bark from the looks of them. No dust cloud when dumping the whole bag but seem to have some fines when digging through the pellets in the hopper-not excessive in any way and very acceptable. The real area is the heat. So far so good. These seem to be burning pretty darn hot-putting my hand in the output air and I need to take it way after about 5 seconds. I have had much worse where I could leave my hand there indefinitely. First impressions here are
Additionally, the Crabbe are well wrapped. I did like that there are 2 heavy pallet covers that seem shrunk to the pellets nice and tight. Pellet bag was heavy duty as well. All good things so far
Poured in the last bag of the crappy ThermGlo's into the P61a. I've had decent luck with those in the past, but last year's offering s*cked; while at full burn the P61 just throws off luke-warm air. Then I will move on to the Inferno's. I know they are much better than the TG's as I've been running them in the P43. Not a "hot" pellet by any means, but good for this time of year.
So on to bag # 2 of Crabbe last night. So far I really like these pellets-geat heat and little to no fines. As tt pointed out, the ash is very dark with what looks like a dense consistency until you touch it then it falls apart to a fine ash. Its not gritty like a hardwood tends to be and it tends to stay in the bottom of the burn pot but is blown clear of the air holes, unlike some heavier ash I have had with other pellets.
