We are on our third heating season with a quadrafire insert. We heat the main part of our house--an area of approximately 1300 square feet. Noise was a consideration in our puchase (it is in our TV room) as was quality and looks. We have been extremely happy with our stove. We program the thermostat just like we would for our oil boiler. The hopper holds one 40lb bag of pellets. The burn pot is self cleaning. Once per week we thoroughly vacuum the burn chamber, clean the glass, and empty the ashes from the lower tray. We have it serviced annually. The amount of ash in the tray and dust in the pellets varies with the brand of pellets you burn. This year we found a dealer (in CT) that offered several different brands of pellets and detailed the wood and size of pellets. Our price for pellets was about $2.25 per bag--purchased by the ton. We will burn just over 2 tons. Quadrafire Mount Vernon insert. (60,000 btu)

Be aware that access to experienced repair and maintenance on pellet stoves is essential. You WILL need maintenance to keep them going, and should expect to need repairs from time to time as well. I'd shop around at local fireplace shops for equipment, and get straight answers about the availability of service as well. You might want to call people who have had service on their pellet stoves recently and ask them if they have been happy. That's especially important if you are really relying on a stove for heat. If you have to wait weeks for service and parts, or repairman can't fix the problem, you will be an unhappy pellet stove user. How long has your son had his stove? Has he had maintenance done on it, and if so did he get service on a reasonable basis? There are a lot of pellet stove users who run the equipment withoput maintenance until it quits. That is not a good practice. It should be cleaned and maintained on an annual basis by a qualified repairman.

Anyone replace their auger on a Harman Pellet stove Accentra auger and know the procedure? Mine never really looked right from the start, it look liked you took a file and filed it thin on both sides about 11-15 mm on the end, looked flat spoonish on the end. You coud see the metal curl over time and sure enough the tip has broken off. I am not sure if it hurts performs having the tip of the auger missing but at some point I would like to replace it. Anyone have instructions on doing this. About Harman, this is a love/hate relationship: Couple of things I dislike about Harman and something to keep in mind, Harman Company itself will not help you, if you do get replies they are vague to the point of useless, usually referencing you to a local dealer as the main point. What local dealer? I had to drive 3 hours to the nearest retailer to buy the stove. Many Harman dealers will give you the cold shoulder if they know how far away you are from them. They see less interested in selling you a part and instructions wanting to install it, having one of their people work on it. With my old sheet metal Breckwell that rattled like a tank, Breckwell listed each part number in the manual, if you were the orginial owner and could prove it they would sell you the part at a huge discount, give you instructions. Most of the motors in a Breckwell are standard stuff and working on a Breckwell is like working on a lawn mower. Breckwell seem to understand local dealers come and go, not located in every city, people move with their stoves, aka move away from dealers, and that these things are long term investments. I like the auto running model of the Harman over the Breckwell but if I were located in Alaska I would take a Russian like built Breckwell over a Harman any day. I gave away my old Breckwell, it was a 1990 model, it is on its fourth owner. Gee.

I've been grilling BF the past couple of days on his views about getting a grill. He says, "We don't need one, we won't use it." But I know he has been eyeing that little Weber one whenever we go to K-mart or the hardware store. I like the little front tray part on the marine one Tricia posted. I think the cheif plus for us about having a gas grill would be ease of use and the chance to have some outdoor cooking space to supplement our tiny kitchen. My stove area is claustrophobic to say the least. It would give BF a chance to cook without having me in the way making the salad or whatnot. As it is, cooking together is a study in patience in my "one butt" kitchen. We dream of having our own place someday, with room for a big garden too. I've had some rounds of illness that have made it hard just to keep up with what I have here. BF is my rock, G-d bless him! BF has a covered back patio at his house just off the kitchen back door so he can grill year round and he definately has used it as a kitchen extension since his kitchen is almost as small as mine, albeit maybe a little bit better laid out. I don't see us grilling in the winter when the patio is full of snow. We'll not be covering our tiny patio for a good long while, if ever. I do have an extra patio umbrella though, so maybe I could leave it set up over the grill in the winter, lol! BTW, anyone who doubts the benefits of vegetation for combating the heat island effect should hang out in my yard. It is probably 10 degrees cooler out there than it used to be when I just had a big ol' wooden deck on the back of my house. I never went out there in the summer, it was hot and I felt like I was on display for the whole row/neighborhood.