Update: Harman Accentra keeps shutting down with the same error code: “Incomplete Combustion”

[vferdman]

Well, I have cleaned the stove's feeder and auger tube with hot water. It is now drying. Lots of gunk came out indeed. After I removed the burn pot in order to do this job, I realized that there is a gasket between the burn pot and the feeder. The original gasket is deteriorated and can not be reused. I called my local dealer and he is out of these things and can get one within a week. Argh! I will call another dealer tomorrow. I just can't imagine a week without this stove! Does anyone know if it would be ok to run the stove without the gasket for a week? I can reassemble without it and then pull the pot again and add it when it arrives.

I also performed the bypass mod. I did not bother with the tube and went straight for the 1/4 inch hole in the auger tube. It accomplishes exactly the same thing creating a shunt between the intake and the auger tube. In fact, post-2007 feeders all have this hole from the manufacturing. We'll see. I hope it all worked. Will keep everyone posted on this thread and after it's all done will probably post a new thread with my story. Hopefully it will have a happy ending.

 

[Dougsey]

Vlad- Any pics?

 

[vferdman]

Vlad- Any pics?

No pics yet. It is really hard to work in that space. I will try, though. Taking pictures of the feeder windows is nearly impossible and that's where all the crud was. Now the windows look clean to bare metal. The mod I did was fairly simple to do and I will take some pics of that. Jury is still out on if it will work. I have not re-assembled the stove yet. I need to find that burn pot gasket and my local dealer is out of stock. Hang in there. I will follow up. Just a bit flustered right now with trying to find the gasket and re-assemble. It's cold and my wife is complaining...

 

[Dougsey]

It would be a drive but Home and Hearth in Hampton Falls, NH would probably have it.

 

[vferdman]

Hello, all. As some of you know, I have completed the cleaning and modification of my sticky/gummy Harman Accentra-2 stove. I have not posted in a couple of days in order to be sure that the results are not statistically insignificant. As of right now the stove has been running for several days without a shut-down of any kind. I have it set to 63 degrees in room temperature mode and outside intake air connected. This setup has never worked for me before (I've only had this stove for about 2 months) and it always shut down on lower temperature settings, especially if the outside temps were in the low-30's like the past few days. Low demand caused shut downs. Also, outside air caused a lot of smoke in the hopper (most noticeable when the fuel level is below 1/3 of the hopper capacity). I have taken the slide plate and auger out and have determined that I have the dreaded "gummy stove" syndrome. So, I set out to remedy the situation. The problem is that all the combustion gases backing up to the hopper (and filling it with smoke) eventually cause the feeder to get filled with gummy crud composed of pellet fines coagulated with combustion gases. When this gets bad enough the pellets do not come down the feeder into the auger as they should. In my case it was not bad enough to effect high demand situations where the stove is feeding lots of pellets. In low demand when stove only wants to keep a small fire going and feed a few pellets at a time it became a problem. I got shut downs every time there was low demand for heat on the stove (i.e. if the outside temps rose or I turned the room temp setting down or both). After several days of continuous running set to 63 degrees with outside air and no sign of any smoke in the hopper at any level of pellets (I almost let it run out of pellets and still no smoke) I am ready to declare success.

I have started a new thread that outlines the process I went through with some pictures, explanations and hopefully some discussion to follow. I hope this will help others as it helped me. I thank everyone who piped in with suggestions and helpful info as well as some (electronically) printed materials. The support I got from folks here has gotten me through this very new to me experience with great success. In the past few days I have become a very happy Accentra owner, which is a stark contrast to what my experience has been up to then.

THANK YOU, ALL

Here is the link to the thread describing my cleaning and modification:

https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/50345/

 

[dannjennyn]

You need the updated feeder installed that includes air tube. I had the same problem as you. I had smoke in the fuel hopper and what it was is the chamber above the auger and under the slide plate has creosote build up in it. This will start a fuel hopper fire if not attended to! Clean out the auger, auger tube, slide plate and that chamber by spraying creosote cleaner in it then put the air tube update on your stove and you should be good to go. The air tube update forces air into the auger tube and keeps the fire burning hotter and farther forward in the burnpot.