As stated in previous posts corrosion should be taken seriously. Below is some information to consider when purchasing a corrosion resistant pellet burner.
Heat Exchanger
Within pellet boilers heat exchangers are most at risk from corrosion. As they contain the heated water, if they corrode through the boiler will require extensive repair, or the boiler will have to be replaced.
Stainless Steel
Some manufactures will state that using stainless steel makes their burner more resistant to corrosion. Which is partly true, however the stainless steel instead of corroding will tend to crack, which is equally as bad.
Heavy Engineering
For a burner to be resistant to corrosion it simply has to be heavily engineered, something that today isn’t found in many appliances. These issues of corrosion were the same when burning coal, which is a highly corrosive fuel. Many coal boilers last decades through heavy engineering, take the coal boilers in ‘Local Biomass used in Local Boilers’. Heavy engineering in this sense means where some pellet burner manufactures may choose a steel depth of 2-3mm, another will choose 6mm. This extra depth of steel will take longer to corrode away, resulting in an extended burner life, and the ability to burn a wide variety of fuels.
Summary
Our view at PelHeat is that if you wish to burn a wide variety of fuels, you will require a corrosion resistant pellet burner. Some manufactures may try to sell you the product on ‘new technology’ to withstand corrosion. Our advice is go with the same proven principles of purchasing a boiler during the coal generation, find a pellet burner that is heavily engineered and constructed from the heaviest gauge steel available. This is only way to guarantee a respectable life expectation.
To offset the corrosive qualities of a biomass raw material it can be mixed with another biomass, I will explain this in more detail in:
1. Mixed Biomass Pellets
Thank you for your interest
