Dust at the Bottom of the Bag

Over time we add bag after bag and ton of ton of pellets. If you are one of the many people who poor the bag directly into the hopper, you may start to experience problems from too much dust. This is the fine saw dust we find at the bottom of each bag. Symptoms of too much dust include a "Min Firepot Temp" error, a low flame or stove not starting (not igniting pellets). Owner's who have a reset button may find that they need to push the reset button on each start up. 

After a few years, dust may build at the bottom of the hopper. The auger which is meant to feed pellets to the drop tube will being to turn dust rather than pellets. Your stove does not know how much fuel is dropped, only that the motor has turned. Dust might stay at the bottom of the hopper, work its way up to feed motor and could drop down to the firepot. If dust remains at the hopper then the symptoms you experience are from a lack of fuel. If the dust reaches the feed motor, it can build up. Dust built up around the feed motor often leads to Auger Jams. 

Upon noticing dust dropping into the firepot you may want to take action. Start with the hopper low on pellets. Either let the stove run empty or scoop them out. This way we do not waste perfectly good pellets. Vacuum out any remaining dust or pellets from the hopper and around the auger. When starting the stove again you will need to hit the reset button or hit "Retry" (for a Mt Vernon AE). Do this until pellets drop. If pellets fall but do not light. You will need to try one more time.