It seems, at least on my stove, that pellets in the hopper do not flow toward the auger as easily as corn. I have thought about installing slick sheet metal on the hopper floor. Or maybe graphite paint. Anybody else experience this? What have you tried with success or failure?

I put metal/aluminum tape in mine. It's been in since the first year and works great to this day. Sticky side down, of course.

Great idea, thanks!

Not my idea, I got it from the old forum first year I started burning. WE need to thank those guys. I'm just a messenger passing it on in this case.

I used the tape for a while works somewhat. Cleaned out the hopper and tried the graphite spray worked also but you have to reapply every month or so. Overall the tape worked better but pellets still did not slide enough in my ussc 6039.

Sorry, mine slide right down to the center, and burns all but a couple pellets. I thought about something along the line of parchment paper for cooking. Real slick, but keeping it in place might need some double sided tape.

Bought some aluminum tape today. Will apply it this weekend at cleaning time. Thanks for all the input.

FirepotPete wrote:


Which way did you put tape in horizontal or vertical?

AC wrote:


Horizontal, from the bottom, overlapped just like laying shingles. It's not the cure all but better than how they slid in the hopper without the tape.

OK that is what I also did, and you are correct better than it was but not perfect in our 6039's. Thanks I was starting to think I did something the wrong way again.