I have noticed the hard black buildup with pellets but just knock it loose every day to keep the air holes open. I really think that you should call Mike and talk to him as he is very knowledgeable. The kit that is available works and I still would recommend it. Good luck! -CC

I think Mike at State Line Cornburners has boiler tanks if you need to replace it. Maybe it will stay dry when in use. Have you needed to add water to your system? Good Luck! -CC

WOW Stiney, interesting thread! I am no expert but I picked out a couple of things that Nogas told you that I might expand on a little but first: It doesn't appear that you have installed the necessary conversion kit, am I right? That would be a good place to start and then unplug the holes in the burn pot and go forward from there.

Nogas mentioned the settings for the blower fan and I personally moved mine up to I believe, 160 degrees on the hot side and 110 to shut off. It puts a little warmer heat to the registers. Is the air coming out now feeling a little cool? This might help. I agree that the blower on a typical gas furnace is much stronger than the blower on our units. I have an LDJ and it may be different than yours.

It sure sounds to me like the lack of the proper conversion is causing a couple of problems:
1. Combustion air not re-routed to the feed side which will improve your fire quality and prevent the low fire/melting/burn back/smoke problem that you have experienced.
2. The kit increases the size of the feed auger tube allowing more fuel into the unit.
I would guess that the low fire pot level due to insufficient fuel in the burn pot is the cause of a lot of your problems.

I have a thread which gives this info. on conversion kits but call Mike at: www.statelinecornburners.com to get the kit to convert from corn to pellets. Good luck! -CC

Yooper, Mike at State Line Corn Burners installs a short piece of 2" inside of the 2 1/2" tube for the 165K units if the customer doesn't want to change motors to restrict the feed rate.

With the kit installed that is available from Mike, you really should have no issues burning 100% pellets in an A-Maize-Ing heat unit. I still cannot say if the heat output is the same as corn but, STINEY, your results don't sound typical and maybe you have an issue with your setup or fuel that is causing your lack of heat output. The heat output from quality pellets seems to be very similar to corn. Good luck! -CC

Corndust, Yooper has the 100k furnace so he would be running a 2 rpm motor, yours for the 165k boiler would be 4 rpm I believe. Your unit also feeds from the rear so the kit looks different but works the same. The clear PVC auger tube is 2 1/2" and you can really use the same settings that you do for corn and just fine tune it the way you need to. The wood pellets are very forgiving and easy to burn with the kit installed compared to corn. Good luck! -CC

Welcome to the forum! A good starting point on the timer is 2 minutes "on"(red pointer) and 6 minutes "off"(green pointer) but you will need to learn the settings that work the best for your situation. You will need to run .04 to .06 draft on your manometer. Burning 100% corn is more involved than burning 100% pellets and a mixture is used by quite a few on this forum with success. Just keep asking questions along the way as there is a lot of good information available from our members. Good luck!!-CC

Well....it sounds to me like your fire is low on heat. I would "soup it up" a little by cutting your "off" time back to 6 and try that. If your fire is low in the pot you are also short on fuel and shortening the time off will help that also. You must have nice dry corn because it is burning down with just the draft and not any combustion air. You may need to open the gate on your combustion blower a little too but make only one change at a time and give it a few hours to see what changes, re-diagnose, and make necessary changes and wait again. Good luck-CC

There currently is no information on the website about the pellet conversion kits. Anyone interested will need to call Mike.

Nogas wrote:



You need to call and talk to Mike. There is no information about the conversion kit on the web site.

Yes and no. No, they are not out of the fabrication business but yes, they quit manufacturing corn burners. I posted contact information for a source for parts and accessories a couple of days ago and please check it out, the website information is in that thread.

I have considered retro-fitting my furnace to be able to burn pellets for the last couple of years. Last year, LDJ was still in the corn burning business but now, it appears they have made a fast exit. I contacted the guy that I was thinking about buying the conversion kit from and he now is handling LDJ parts as well. He has parts and accessories along with the pellet conversion kits and here is his website: www.statelinecornburners.com in case anyone is interested. With the low price of gas I might not get too serious about the pellets this season but I might get the kit and experiment a little so that I am prepared if LP spikes up in price again.

My first question would be: do you have a loop that is circulating water through the boiler at all times? I'm not a boiler guy but I am fairly certain that you need this to keep some "load" on the boiler and dump some of the heat. Secondly, do you have the aquastat set properly to control your water temperature? I do know this: if you have your settings on 165k and you idle alot, when your t-stat (or aquastat) calls for heat and you go to high fire, your fire probably won't be good enough to handle all that corn. You need to have a hot even fire at all times. You can try a few things: more combustion air, but it might cause problems while idling with the fire getting too low in the pot. Turn your settings down to 90k or 100k to feed less fuel. Setting your idle timers differently (where are they set now?) to keep a hotter fire. You have not provided any information on the way that your boiler is plumbed in and you will have to provide more so that the boiler guys can help you diagnose your problem. Good luck!-CC

I just answered some of my questions by reading the post up above about GAD's experience.

Good to be back online here again! I called LDJ and the kit price is $165 for my 100K furnace. Is that what you guys have paid and does the price include new auger motors or aren't they necessary. There is no information on their website. I could get by with less than a bushel a day of corn in normal winter weather, how much will that increase with pellets? Sorry to ask all these questions but I sure would like to find a way to make it cost effective to use my furnace instead of LP.

Hi guys, I am not burning due to the high corn prices. Burning pellets sounds like a temporary fix until corn prices come down some. Are the conversions only available from LDJ or is there an aftermarket kit out there too?

I just checked prices for the heck of it and was surprised to see corn under $7 for a change! I didn't burn last year because of the price and am hoping to see a further reduction. Let's all keep our fingers crossed.

I have not personally had any problems (yet). It seems like the motors are available from Grainger, probably other places too.

If I am understanding your question, the level of the fire should be approx. at the second set of holes in the burn pot or just between the two sets of holes. If the fire is lower, you are using too much combustion air and your fuel is burning too fast. Is this what you were asking??

Hey Scott, you have probably thought of this too but I just use the timers instead of running upstairs to my t-stat. I leave the t-stat all the way down when lighting and I just turn the red timer to zero off so it runs all the time when I want to feed corn. Then I just shut the switch off and re-set the timers to 2 on and 5 or 6 off and turn the switch back to "on" or "start", whichever I think that I need. I sometimes will turn the green "off" timer all the way up while I am doing this until I am ready to start idling. When I need to feed corn again I just go back to zero with the red arrow and it starts feeding again. You do need to shut the switch off to reset the timers. I agree with you that the fire has to be good enough to accept the corn feed at a high rate or the result will be no fire and alot of beautiful golden corn in the fire pot!!