I had a hard time measuring the valve opening using the dowel method, but the best i could guess it was about 7/32nds open.

Since I am using this as an insert, the fresh air draw is in the fireplace. I have a ~40 foot chimney and this seems like a long way for the fresh air to travel down. The dealer who serviced the stove when i first got it told me there should'nt be any problems though. And there does not seem to be any problem with the stove getting enough fresh air as it burns clean and fast, just not hot.

The auger is the split kind, i might consider welding that up.

As a note, when i first fill the burn pot to start it, and the burn box is very full, I have a huge blazing fire, and the air coming out is >220f. But this is with a giant fire burning. the flames are pretty much engulfing the heat exchanger tubes. I would not expect to need this level of burn for these temperatures. is this wrong? I want that kind of heat with the stove on 10. I would think it would go through a bag every hour with the amount of fuel it takes to make that fire.

Also, when i cleaned out the tubes, there was tons of rust. it was like birch bark flaking off the stove. Has any tried to repaint the inside of their stove to seal it back up. I might try it this summer with some of that ultra high temp paint. it's gonna be a b#t*! to clean though.

I would also guess this is because of the thick brick walls. there is a 1780 stone house in my family which takes about a week to cool off or heat up an appreciable amount. This is great om the summer since the lack of AC is never much of a problem, but it never really gets very warm either.

So after reading these replies, I cleaned out the whole thing really well. behind the baffle and all around the top tubes. this was much more cleaning than I normally do. started it up and was only about 5-10 degrees warmer. So i started adjusting the throttle adjustment screw on the back. at first I tried closing it a 1/4 turn, waiting, and measuring the temp. This however made things worse. so i started opening it. i found that i could not make it any hotter than i already had it.

I am thinking this is primarily a feed issue. now that i think about it, the first year i had i burned corn, and i could not turn it up to 10 b/c it could not burn it fast enough and the feed chute would eventually back up and clog. with the pellets, I am not even close to that. I had thought this was due to switching to pellets but now I am not so sure.

my only other thought is that something is way wrong with the flow. and the heat exchanger is not having enough time to work because all the heat is getting sucked out the chimney.

Here is video of the stove running full blast. the fire never gets much higher than what is in the video except when I first light it and the whole firebox is full of unburnt pellets

I bought a used 4100 three years ago to replace a wood stove and I have been rather disappointed with it. The first year I got it I installed the negative draft kit and it just never heated my 1800 sqft home really. The wood stove it replaced was about 25 years old and inefficient, yet had no problem making it unbearably hot in the room with the stove. With this stove, the room that is in, is barely warmer than the rest of the house running full blast pretty much all the time. I ran corn the first year but pellets last year and this year with not much difference in heat. Yesterday I clipped a candy thermometer to the front of the upper vent and the air coming out was only at 135 f. Is this typical? It uses about a bag and a half a day on full blast. How does that compare to other's stoves? I am I expecting too much from this stove?