Well since this was my first year with my Mt. Vernon I wanted to have my dealer come out and do the yearly cleaning so they could teach me.
I learned a lot.....
First, its pretty easy to clean your own flex pipe. I never did it before because I've got it in my head that a professional should do it. Not so... at least for a pellet stove. You can go buy those (fiberglass?? plastic??) threaded rods and the small 3 inch brush. Stick the vaccum at the bottom of the pipe, feed the brush up until it stops. Suck the crap out.
When he cleaned my heat exchanger and baffle, he used a wire wheel on a cordless drill. Works better than the brush I was using.
He was able to take the combustion blower off without destroying the gasket. He brought me the new reusable gasket. I asked him to leave it as I'll probably destroy the gasket when I do it.
He also sucked out all the pellets I had in the chute. Said its not a good idea to leave them in all summer because if you get some moisture of any kind the pellets could expand and that will probably block your chute and the pellets won't feed anymore.
He painted the inside and said that's the best way he's found to take care of rust (as opposed to the PAM method)
He also showed me that for hard to reach or for those tiny crevases he had a small automotive vaccum hose with a rubber stopper on the end which made it fit on the shop vac.
The stove looks like the day I bought it.......Now I can do my own next year....
I learned a lot.....
First, its pretty easy to clean your own flex pipe. I never did it before because I've got it in my head that a professional should do it. Not so... at least for a pellet stove. You can go buy those (fiberglass?? plastic??) threaded rods and the small 3 inch brush. Stick the vaccum at the bottom of the pipe, feed the brush up until it stops. Suck the crap out.
When he cleaned my heat exchanger and baffle, he used a wire wheel on a cordless drill. Works better than the brush I was using.
He was able to take the combustion blower off without destroying the gasket. He brought me the new reusable gasket. I asked him to leave it as I'll probably destroy the gasket when I do it.
He also sucked out all the pellets I had in the chute. Said its not a good idea to leave them in all summer because if you get some moisture of any kind the pellets could expand and that will probably block your chute and the pellets won't feed anymore.
He painted the inside and said that's the best way he's found to take care of rust (as opposed to the PAM method)
He also showed me that for hard to reach or for those tiny crevases he had a small automotive vaccum hose with a rubber stopper on the end which made it fit on the shop vac.
The stove looks like the day I bought it.......Now I can do my own next year....