Still River Pellets - Anyone Used Them

[bogieb]

I think I just got into the end of that line. Vision is going. Aches and pains are appearing. Etc; Getting older is for the birds! A bigger problem is that at times I still think I'm in my 20's and routinely pay the price for it.

You, young pup, have just started getting there, hang on for the ride .

So I assume you are going to pass on the Still River pellets? I know nothing about any of the brands you northern folk are speaking of. It's Greek to me.

Yeah, I'm passing on the Still Rivers at this time. They are so expensive compared to the FSU's that I get at HD (by about $1.50/bag), that unless someone tells me a bag of them not only lasts 48 hours in -20*F temps, keeps the glass clean, and jumps out and dusts my furniture for me, there is no incentive for me to try them. The P61a loves the FSU's - they run nice and hot, and I get almost no ash. Seriously, I get no mustache on my pot even after running for 3 days. Although the glass does get sooty faster than other pellets (I've noticed that on other stoves too with the FSU's), all the other qualities of the pellets more than make up for it. I started mixing the FSU's with another really ashy pellet that I have tons of (literally), and the combo is to my liking - much better than I had hoped for.

 

[Pete Zahria]

Although the glass does get sooty faster than other pellets

That's something you can live with if the heat is good!


Dan

 

[bags]

My glass only gets hazy at the top third but I've always burned decent pellets. It gets that way pretty quick because many times the P68 is in a maintenance burn idle status most of the time. Now when it gets very cold and I up the feed rate it will scorch it off to a larger degree but still remains. just the nature of the beast and like Dan says. I do not care if it is pumping heat.

 

[womaus]

Still River pellets are still $5.00 bag / $250 ton at Leicester MA Walmart. Looks like they have more than a few...

I finally opened the bag I bought a week or so ago...whether or not it had 0.05 % or 0.5% fines I do not know, I should have had a more observant being there when I dumped them in.

Picked up two more bags today, along with a couple of other brands. To tide me over until the $4.00 a bag sale in Uxbridge on the 26th.

 

[lagger]

just had 2 tons delivered by Lowes here in the NE (Middletown store 10941), during the 19 dollar delivery sale, 5.29 a bag.. have not unwrapped them and it is 80 deg + today so no burn either. I will post a review here when I do burn some, still have almost a ton of Clean Energy (Hamer hot ones) left over from last year as well as 120 bags of Greene Teams, the GT's will be saved for the center of the season, the others for the shoulders

 

[lagger]

minor update... unwrapped the pallets today to stack the pellets, one bag had a small hole so I emptied it into a bucket, the pellets are light in color (possibly a good sign of little bark) and have a slight pine odor, no xtra long pellets (as I found in Timber Heats) were seen so far and very little dust was seen when pouring out the bag.. will post a burn \ ash report when I start using them .. way too warm out now to fire up the stove

 

[Paulfromct]

As I was pulling out of the local Aubuchon's, I noticed they have a pellet I don't remember hearing anything about; Still River. I did a search, but can't find anything on them. Anyone have experience with them or know who makes them?

We bought 3 ton from Lowes. I think it's a private label brand for retail stores. The sister product to Still River is Blackstone. The reviews I've read about Blackstone are not flattering. Ironically, both Blackstone and Still River are made at same plant. More ironic is the pellet plant is across the street from a pallet repair compnay. There's a red flag! Two companies with same owner. I didn't attempt to buy Blackstone because of negative posts. Still River are AWFUL. I'm burning almost double the pace as normal when using better quality of pellets. I have to increase auger speed to increase heat output which means I'm burning more than usual. Very lower than normal BTU and a ton of fines in each bag. I will NEVER buy these again

 

[lagger]

We bought 3 ton from Lowes. I think it's a private label brand for retail stores. The sister product to Still River is Blackstone. The reviews I've read about Blackstone are not flattering. Ironically, both Blackstone and Still River are made at same plant. More ironic is the pellet plant is across the street from a pallet repair compnay. There's a red flag! Two companies with same owner. I didn't attempt to buy Blackstone because of negative posts. Still River are AWFUL. I'm burning almost double the pace as normal when using better quality of pellets. I have to increase auger speed to increase heat output which means I'm burning more than usual. Very lower than normal BTU and a ton of fines in each bag. I will NEVER buy these again

I am having the same experience .. gone through about 30 bags so far .. I sift my pellets and have filled a 5 gal home depot pail 2/3 full already, they do indeed have a lower heat output and I have been finding a significant amount of overlong pellets in every bag. They have a distinct piney smell to them although the bag states hardwood. I will not purchase these again in the future either. My local lowes had clean energy last year (hamer hot ones) and they were much better, I still have over 1/2 ton of those left and 120 bags of Greene Teams, and will not use either until I burn through the last of these

I noticed in 2 bags several "exploded" pellets.. looked almost like they had gotten wet at some point prior to bagging

 

[Harmanizer]

Looks like I will cross these off my list.

 

[ParadiseFound]

huh, I picked up 8 bags from Lowe's in Manchester, CT, and I've been pretty happy with them. At this point, I need to purchase something and I haven't found anything better, for the same price, anywhere local. They're producing much less ash than the TSC pellets I have left over from last year. I'm still using about one bag in a 24 hour period. I did find some overlong pellets, but the auger on my Harmon is chewing them up without an issue.

 

[DrewBoogie]

A1 Pellet in Rocky Hill has Blackstones for like $240 a ton right now.

 

[DavidK]

I just picked up 10 back to give them a try. Dirty dirty dirty!

 

[scotthershall]

I was just about to start a thread about these when I saw this one pop up! I just burned three bags of Still River Pellets purchased at the Lowe's in Cromwell, CT for $5.19/bag. Light in color, pleasant slightly pine-y scent. Some fines in the bag, but nothing terrible. My stove (on a programmable thermostat) seemed to chew through them faster than other pellets. Left a lava flow in the burn pot that I had to break up, similar to Greene Team Platinums, Green Supremes, and ThermaGlo pellets I've tried in the past.

(See edit below!) In summary, I had high hopes from the piny smell but was slightly disappointed. Lower than expected heat output and lava flow in the burn pot. Just okay for the price; wouldn't pay more. Still prefer this year's Stove Chows and rebagged Maine Woods Pellets at TSC (if you can find them - the rebagged Currans are awful).

EDIT: The lava flow as due to the low temps overnight (single digits) on the days I tested them. Stove Chows and similar to the same thing in my stove, in my house. So I'd rate these on par with other BBS brands I listed in my first paragraph, with Stove Chows and TSC/MWP being better. So, with the piny smell, I expected more, but they're by no means awful. Still wouldn't pay more than $5.xx per bag.

 

[lagger]

Just an update on my experience with still river \ blackstone pellets: I had stopped using my programmable thermostat, on my lopi agp insert as it would start but a few minutes after flames were observed it would throw a fault code (flashing red stop light) and start to shut down. I feared a bad sensor (POF) or control board on my 3 year old stove, I spoke with the retailer \ installer and he agreed it could be a sensor. He suggested I do a thorough clean and try again. by the time (last week) I spoke with him I had used all of the two tons of the still rivers I bought at Lowes, and had started using Clean Energy pellets (Hamer hot ones) I had left over from last season. Long story short I routinely do thorough cleanings of the stove so I did that again, and set up the T-stat, nothing but the brand of pellets was changed. I had noticed the Still Rivers seemed to produce less heat and more ash than previous pellets. Outcome for a week now with the Clean Energy pellets, and some Greene Teams, the POF has not failed even once, this all leads me to believe that the lower heat output of the Still River pellets was causing the stove to not trigger the POF sensor as it did not reach the requisite temperature to maintain the start sequence (~ 180 deg F)

oh yeah the 2 tons of pellets, which were all sifted before use, yielded 2 full 5 gallon home depot orange buckets of fines and filled the attached shop vac with dust

 

[Pellet-King]

Bought 7 bags at Bloomfield B'lowe's to try, well compared to the Stove Chow and TSC there alot less heat, ash is about the same, glad I only bought 7 not a ton, Pellet's are getting heard to find with this latest cold snap were in?, What happened to Febuary and 75 °??

 

[chavev1]

As I was pulling out of the local Aubuchon's, I noticed they have a pellet I don't remember hearing anything about; Still River. I did a search, but can't find anything on them. Anyone have experience with them or know who makes them?

They burn but are dirty. They smell like pine or spruce, and leave a lot of carbon in box Not really thrilled

 

[Mobius1]

So I'm new here, so my pellet stove experience is light. Always had a standard wood burning stove until I recently bought a house with a Quadrafire Mount Vernon insert stove. I decided to take a gamble and try the Still River pellets. I've got 3/4 pallet of Okanagan Douglas Fir stashed away for the real cold season, and have been looking around at the local BBS stores for something else for now. I've tried Greene Supreme at Home Depot and now Still River from Lowe's.

I'm sort of indifferent to the two. They seem about the same. The Still River do seem to have more dust left in the bottom of the bag, but we're talking about a handful or so here. It's probably a good idea to sift these before putting them in because of the dust. That kind of makes them not worth buying, because the hassle there isn't worth the minimal savings over Green's(unless you buy like 6 pallets at Home Depot which is a lot and not worth $80 in savings). So I'll probably not sift them, and just vacuum out the extra ash that accumulated on the fake logs in the stove.

Neither put out as much heat as the Okies, (even though the BTU rating are very close) but that's to be expected, they are 1/3 less in price. But at the price of Okies, I might as well just burn oil.

But if they aren't hardwood as many have suspected, there is going to be a class action lawsuit headed their way pretty soon.

 

[dlavigne7324]

Yeah, at $7/bag, they better be more than just ok.

Was at Lowe’s in concord today they have the still river

 

[Mobius1]

So I'm coming back to update on my result with Still River, a couple of weeks later.

IF you buy Still River Pellets YOU NEED TO SIFT THEM. If you don't your box if going to fill up with carbon/ash deposits quickly (2-3 bags). Out of 10 bags, I've collected almost a full 5 gallon bucket of saw dust/ tiny pieces. Unburnable stuff. They do smell like pine, and I did call Still River and I didn't get a good answer on that.

I bought a ton a Lowe's, and I just returned 26 bags (that's all I can safely load in my SUV in one trip). I'm spending too much time sifting and picking the clumps out of the pellets before loading.

With Oakies, or Greene Supreme's I barely had to vacuum out the box or empty the ash pot once a week. With Still River, it's usually every other day. That's how much dirtier they are.

All in All, UNLESS THERE IS NOTHING ELSE, (or they are $1 a bag) DON'T BUT STILL RIVER PELLETS.

 

[bartelby416]

Hey Fellas. I've been burning pellets now for 26yrs and I've never had a worse pellet than Still River. It has absolutely NO BTUs and cannot keep my home warm. It's a dirty pellet with a lot of heavy ash, hardly any fly-ash, and the pellets are frightfully long and require some snapping prior to loading them into your hopper. Don't ask me how it is that pellet manufacturers cannot seem to understand that NO pellet should ever be longer than a half inch. Still River is out of control and I thank God I had the wisdom to buy only 2 bags to just test them out cause I will NEVER buy them again ; Horrible pellet.

 

[LobsterParty]

I have used 2 tons of the still river wood pellets.

I heard other people have found imperfections with them . Like recycled metal or plastic. I have never had a problem and I want to buy more. I got them from Lowes in Lowell Mass when the winter was coming to a close 1 year ago. I'm upset I can only get them 60 minutes away at the moment.
I paid an incredible price. They burned better than green supreme and I felt the extra heat. I had average to less than average ash. I have been using the home depot stuff green supreme and it's got tons of ash. And it works good and good prices. But I really want to get more of the still river because of the extra btu heat I felt. Minimal ash and the price was much better . I paid $239 a ton at lowes
In 2021

 

[Jigger]

After reading a lot of the comments on here all the way back to the beginning of the post. It appears that the manufacturer hasn't changed their way of packaging. I bought 25 bags recently and I've gone through almost 1/2 of them. But I have found problems with the pellets. For one I don't know what kind of wood they are making them out of. But it smells like your burning a wooden chair out of pine. They burn ok but produce very little heat. It probably be ok for a shoulder pellet. The pellets have a rough texture to them. So when my hopper gets about 1/2 empty they stop sliding into the auger. Which if I'm not home to correct it the fire goes out. The amount of fines and loss saw dust is unbelievable. It's as if they are packageing them up straight from the mill into the bag.