Tonyray
Minister of Fire
OOPS
That was wrong.
....Meant to say," Wouldn't have an INSERT" . Too small of an Ashpan..... I have a P61ASo why is Harman the only Manufacturer with a bottom feed design?
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That was wrong.....Meant to say," Wouldn't have an INSERT" . Too small of an Ashpan..... I have a P61A
Bioburner
Moderator
No they don't, at least their Flagship model the original corn burning stove line the Countryside
Lake Girl
Moderator
Enerzone & Osburn are both produced by SBI...
LuvMyPellets
Burning Hunk
Many more bottom feeders are available than your realize. The popular Lopi AGP being one of them as well as quite a few brands I call boutique as they are not well known and not sold in many stores.
Tonyray
Minister of Fire
LuvMyPellets
Burning Hunk
And to kind of answer the original question. The first 5yrs I put up with the Afton Bay and I mean put up with. Exhaust fan replaced 3 times. Minimum once a week fairly major cleaning. Glass filthy after one day burning. I know a lot of others own them on this forum and no disrespect but I think they are a smutpot. And for the Harman. Just finished my 3rd winter. It used to grate on my nerves the continual bragging from the Harman owners. You know "the fanboys". Well guess what I guess I am one of them now. The first thing I noticed was the flame seemed to be very different. I went a week and the glass has one spot on it in the upper corner. I started cleaning once a week and found out I was wasting my time and now I clean around once a month. Any time it shuts off I scrape the pot and thats it. One thing I noticed was interesting. My ignitor quit also on the Afton Bay and I said heck let me see if a propane torch will light the pellets and then just shut the door. Nope, wouldn't work. Just for the heck of it I tried it on the P61A. Yep hold it on there for about 4-10 sec till one or two glow and shut the door and it fires right up. That led me to the belief that the Harman draft is set up much better to draw the air over and around the pellets and that is the simple reason it burns so well.
Yes Enerzone, Osburn and Drolet are all manufactured by SBI and all have bottome feed technology available.
alternativeheat
Minister of Fire
Yeah, the P series Harmans are work horses, for sure the P61 is. And sometimes I think you could dump leaves and uncompressed hay in the hopper and still burn and make heat LOL. I've literally run decomposing pellets through mine , just dumped them in the mix, swollen and breaking down. Never saw a change in flame. I wouldn't get carried away in doing that but it's nice to know it burns with that kind of stability.
alternativeheat
Minister of Fire
Maybe ( yes I said "maybe", as in also maybe not) finer pellet drop control, Tony .
Peterfield
Minister of Fire
Ok. so there are more than I realize out there for bottom feeders (both in Pellet stoves and in the general population), but you are kind of proving my point, if the "other" bottom feed designs out there are boutique brands or not well known, they "almost" might as well not exist to the average consumer. It's not until you are into pellet stoves for a few years that you may even know those brands exist. I would liken it to Mac and PC (Harman and Quadrafire "and other top feeds") that most people think is all that is out there... and then a computer guy comes along and says don't forget about Linux! (boutique brands other than Harman that have bottom feed). Basically all I am saying is that if I walked into a Pellet Stove superstore, 98% of the "non-harmans" would be top feed, and that puzzles me (OK, maybe 97%).
alternativeheat
Minister of Fire
Top feeders can be a bit more interesting to watch, with the random dropping of pellets, shower of sparks and gentle clinking sound. That's the only advantage I can think of.
heat seeker
Minister of Fire
alternativeheat
Minister of Fire
Tonyray
Minister of Fire
heat seeker
Minister of Fire
lagger
Feeling the Heat
indeed .. I have the agp insert and it is a bottom feeder ... as well as a reliable stove
Its not a bottom feed, it's a horizontal feed. There are no more bottom feed stoves being made.So I'm curious. I am pretty new to pellet stoves in the last year, and I hear the Harman vs. everybody else arguments, Harman is the best, blah blah blah. Now it may very well be that Harmans are the best, and they seem well built and the design of the bottom feed is interesting, vs dropping the pellets in like every other manufacturer does. So that begs the question, why is Harman the only one that does that type of pellet delivery and burning system? Why are 99% of all other pellet stoves the drop in a burn pot design? I would assume that the patent expired a long time ago for Harman's design, so others should be able to copy it or whatever. I mean, if it is better, why aren't other manufacturers doing so? I'm sure somebody here has an answer...
yes, we do produce a few models that are bottom feed. or "horizontal feed" seems like years ago there was at least one stove that pushed fuel up into the pot from underneath, so I guess that would be a true "bottom feed"
ours push the fuel directly into the back of the pot instead of dropping it in from above
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