# United States stove company 5502M problems



## Hatepropane (Nov 9, 2014)

Hi I recently purchased a United States stove company 5502M "king" from my local tractor supply. I've ran it for almost a week now and it's been heating great and I love the stove. Only issues I'm having is the glass gets dirty quickly after about 5 hours of running. Also, I seem to have some glowing pellets fly out of the pot. I run it on auto all the time and on heat setting 1. It has the newer inducer that's modulates up and down instead of running continuously


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## mustangwagz (Nov 9, 2014)

THe pro's will chime in before to long so dont worry, however im pretty sure as for the glass...thats a fight you'll prolly never win. Ive read SO many threads about dirty glass that its unreal. lol These things are NOT like a wood stove with a glass door. on a stove with a dirty door it means your burning wet wood or not hot enough..on the pellet stoves its just seems to be nature of em. my buddy has a really super nice harman that he paid A LOT for, and it does the same thing..sucks yes i know. it'd be cool if they stayed clean. haha. 

as for pellets hopping out, sounds like the combustion blower might be to high sometimes. Might be nature of the beast since its on auto? Like i said, the pro's will step in im sure and help ya figure it out.  Ive got an older 6039 and i love it so far (gonna need a new board soon tho...) so im worried about changing mine cuz im used to this old one lol


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## Hatepropane (Nov 9, 2014)

Yeah me Dad has one that's probably 8 years old.. Crazy hoe different they are now. I think you're right about the glass


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## Owen1508 (Nov 10, 2014)

On the door check to see if you have a 4-5" gap in the window gasket at the center bottom part.  If not cut one out about 4" center bottom  this will create a good air wash and help keep the glass cleaner.


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## Hatepropane (Nov 10, 2014)

There is a piece of metal that has probably and 1/8" slice about 4" long.. There is gasket material behind it. Is this what you're talking about?


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## Owen1508 (Nov 10, 2014)

Yeah  should be a 4" gap in the gasket material


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## Hatepropane (Nov 10, 2014)

I'll take a picture later to make sure I'm cutting in the right place.. Looks like they had the metal piece cut that goes over the gasket but never cut the actually gasket


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## mustangwagz (Nov 10, 2014)

Yah pictures needed for sure. Will this help with mine also???!!????? Lol


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## Johnny_Fiv3 (Nov 10, 2014)

If you are running full auto on HR-1 the glass will get black in mere hours. If you need to run on HR-1 for extended time periods, I really suggest setting the Draft Fan to 3 manually. Mine has been running for days like this and the glass just has a slight (and normal) haze to it like when running on higher HR settings. Also be sure to clear the gasket away from the airwash slot as suggested. It makes a huge difference.

Owen1508 - Is there a way to change the programmed DF setting for HR-1 so that one does not have to set it manually? I really want to hook up this t-stat, but the glass getting black so fast keeps me from doing it. If I could change the programmed DF setting for HR-1, then I would be a happy camper.


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## Owen1508 (Nov 10, 2014)

Draft fan down arrow and Aux down arrow at the same time.  The range is 0-500.  500 being 100% cap. and 0 being 0%   I'd try just moving it at 10-20 at a time.


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## Hatepropane (Nov 10, 2014)

Correct me if I'm
Wrong, but turning up the draft fan will result in more heat going out the chimney, thus being less efficient?


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## Owen1508 (Nov 10, 2014)

Hatepropane said:


> Correct me if I'm
> Wrong, but turning up the draft fan will result in more heat going out the chimney, thus being less efficient?


It can.....the idea is to get the right balance.  if the flame is orange and lazy...you'll need more air
If it is white hot then too much.


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## mustangwagz (Nov 10, 2014)

hmm...must be different then mine assumingly then? i know the board is obviously but was just curious about the glass. lol  so far i love mine, gonna milk out this old board as long as possible. ive learned it pretty well.


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## Hatepropane (Nov 10, 2014)

Yeah mine is getting the orange flame.. Guess I'll need to adjust it


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## Owen1508 (Nov 10, 2014)

mustangwagz said:


> hmm...must be different then mine assumingly then? i know the board is obviously but was just curious about the glass. lol  so far i love mine, gonna milk out this old board as long as possible. ive learned it pretty well.


That 6039 before the manual draft control was a great unit


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## Owen1508 (Nov 10, 2014)

Hatepropane said:


> Yeah mine is getting the orange flame.. Guess I'll need to adjust it


Orange to yellow is good  as long as you are not seeing soot or black smoke coming off the flame.  If you adjust it I would do a small adjustment.  Is the flame moving or lazy?


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## mustangwagz (Nov 10, 2014)

Owen1508 said:


> That 6039 before the manual draft control was a great unit


so far i agree! lol ive only had to take it to heat range 5 so far. we had a few nights that were in the 20's here and it kept house at 71 even withotu plastic on windows. Now they're all plastic covered and we got some 20's coming real soon. Time will tell in this old dump! lol im loving the crap outta it FOR SURE!


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## Hatepropane (Nov 10, 2014)

I guess it's more of a yellow then a orange.. The draft motor goes on and off so it seems that when it almost gets to a lazy flame the draft motor kicks in


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## Hatepropane (Nov 10, 2014)

sorry the glass is dirty.. This is about 24hrs of operation so didn't do to bad this time. You can see how the flame surges from the draft motor going up and down.


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## Bob E (Nov 11, 2014)

This is what my 6039 looks like after one 40# bag on Hr-1.



From what I've read dirty glass seems to be a U.S. Stove trait. I would be happier if my stove had a solid door with one little sight window right above the air wash.


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## Owen1508 (Nov 11, 2014)

Bob E said:


> This is what my 6039 looks like after one 40# bag on Hr-1.
> View attachment 143920
> 
> From what I've read dirty glass seems to be a U.S. Stove trait. I would be happier if my stove had a solid door with one little sight window right above the air wash.


Not really true.  I burned a 6041 from fall 2009 til spring 2014 glass stayed clean.  This year have a 5500m so far good glass.  I think with both of these models the air adjustments and installation are key.  Learning the air adjustments and dialing in the setting will get the most BTU's per pound and keeping it clean.


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## Hatepropane (Nov 11, 2014)

What's a good method to dialing it in to know you have a good air to fuel mixture?


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## Bob E (Nov 11, 2014)

I guess people with clean glass don't start threads to tell everybody about it 

I'm new at this too but I've been using a meat thermometer stuck in the room fan vents. Since the amount of pellets that drop into the burn pot is constant and determined by the heat range setting it is going to use the same amount of pellets whether it burns them clean or dirty. I try to adjust it to get the most heat into the room.


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## Owen1508 (Nov 11, 2014)

The feed rates and the combustion air rates are adjusted on the lowest level and highest level only.  The in between HR (2-4) are proportioned equally.  To adjust the feed rate you press and hold the HR up arrow and Aux up (for high end) and The HR down and Aux down for the low end.  These will range depending on the stove from 0.1 to 13.0 plus.  They say it's pounds per hour but due to density it's not really so, but is a good number to scale by.  You should set the HR1 to the lowest feed rate you can do for shoulder season  this way it won't heat you outta the house.  The high end should be set for the worst case cold....this setting should only be used for short periods of time not for days.  Then adjust the air rate for these setting.  As I've said always good to have a little notebook by the stove to track the adjustments and results.  When adjusting always try to let the stove run for at least 1 to 2 hours before making any observations.  If you have a bright white blow touch flame too much air....orange lazy and sooty is too low.  You want to get the flame to just past the lazy orange sooty flame.  Ir should move well look orange to yellow and not produce any smoke or black soot off the tip of the flames.  This should be right on the sweet spot of getting the most from the unit.  If is also good to monitor the temps coming from the output in front and the temps in the flue.  Too much air will give you higher flue temps (wasted heat)  Best thing is to learn the stove....if at anytime it gets messed with the setting...pressing and holding the Aux up and Aux down arrows at the same time for 3-5 secs will reset the board to factory setting...so it can always be started over.


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## Hatepropane (Nov 11, 2014)

If I adjust the fuel rate and exhaust rate on setting 1 it looks like it puts that on all the heat ranges??


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## Owen1508 (Nov 12, 2014)

well if you lower or raise it on the low setting the HR2-4 will adjust as well....it balances out the heat ranges so there is equal increments.


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## Hatepropane (Nov 12, 2014)

Thanks Owen I ended getting figuring that out. Thanks for all the help. Much appreciated!


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## ad356 (Nov 13, 2014)

i had a us stove company king 5510. i used it two years in the house, i never could get it to burn properly. that stove was a constant clinker producer, i had it in the barn for a year and it wasnt near enough heat. i ended up selling it for $400, the good news is i bought it in one of those tax incentive years so i didnt loose too much. i have a US stove country hearth cord stove in my barn and it does well but i dont think i would consider that brand ever again for home heating. i must say considering how bad of a design that 5510 was they must have re-designed their current stoves, as least i would hope so. i had wished that the only problem i ever had with that stove was dirty glass, i could have lived with that considering the low price of the stove. that stove, once a day would have a larger clinker covering all of the airholes in the bottom of the burn pot. 

i now have a harman P61, yeah it was expensive but im on year 3 and i will probably have the stove for a long, long time. its a manual light stove that i got at a discount due to it being discontinued. its a nice heating unit, heats the entire house no matter how cold it gets, it's reliable, fairly quite and efficient. i have it hooked up to a wall thermostat as well, keeps the house at the desired temp. harmans arent cheap but they are well built and well designed which is why they havent changed the design in such a long time. they did it right in the first place.


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## Hatepropane (Nov 14, 2014)

Owen1508 said:


> well if you lower or raise it on the low setting the HR2-4 will adjust as well....it balances out the heat ranges so there is equal increments.



Got a question for you. I posted a new topic earlier about the air wash on my stove. Am I supposed to totally cut the gasket behind the slot on the Metal piece that hold it's on? Or notch out the gasket where the slit is only? Thanks


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## Owen1508 (Nov 14, 2014)

The "air wash" on that unit should be bottom center about 3-4" long the entire gasket width


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## Hatepropane (Nov 14, 2014)

Owen1508 said:


> The "air wash" on that unit should be bottom center about 3-4" long the entire gasket width



Okay thank you. Do you know why the gasket doesn't come from the factory cut?


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## ad356 (Nov 14, 2014)

if the 5502M is anything like the 5510 was, it didnt seem like the thing had any factory testing done on the design, non what so ever. it had a terrible ash pan design that leaked air into the combustion chamber, a burn-pot design that wouldnt completely burn the pellets and expel the ash properly. also had a poor latching door design. the ONLY good thing about that stove was the hopper capacity. it would also eat that capacity up pretty quickly. it was loud, in-efficient, difficult to get any usable burn time without having clinkers. it was a terrible design and im glad i got rid of it. my advice to anyone with one of these stoves that is having problems with it, is to sell it and buy a better stove even if its used. look for a used harman on craigslist or even a used englander. there is an englander locally here for $300. pretty much anything is better then a junk USSC pellet stove. their wood stoves are fairly nice but the pellets stoves, i dont care for. i actually woke up one morning to that ussc 5510 having so much clinker in the burnpot that pellets were dumping over the burnpot and burning in the bottom of the stove where clearly they arent supposed to be burning.

bought a harman and wouldnt look at much else. never a clinker, ever.


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## Johnny_Fiv3 (Nov 14, 2014)

Yes 5502 is nothing like what you describe.


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## Bob E (Nov 14, 2014)

Is cutting out 3-4" of the window gasket specific to a 5502 or should I also do it to my 6039?


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