I wish Heatmaster could access turbulators this easily. Thanks for the video

Good video, I bought a central boiler because of this video. I wouldn't go through that at -20 below. Again thanks for the video.

I currently own a central boiler. Big mistake,several water leaks into the firebox and just super thin chine steel,garbage. Now looking at a polar G3,came to same conclusion as you that polar is just a small step above the heatmaster. Funny how they call the flex augers turbulators :)

h norton 4 weeks ago... you are gang on man! That bent #7 sticking turbulator went back in a different cylinder and it was a bit bent at about the last 8-10 inches at the bottom. That means it will create a slight resistance at the best of times and stick solidly (again) at the worst. I too can't be sure that Greg checked it (at the bottom access point) as that wasn't in the video. If he did and he may well have, and didn't witness much difference between it and the others, it could be deceptive when seen in the summertime when freshly cleaned, as you wouldn't really feel it when turning the clean sweep handle. It would suc for that problem to show up again the following winter after the solid troubleshooting and maintenance Greg did on a hot Manitoba summer day in June! Having said that, I too want to help and critique and I thank Greg and his helper/wife for the video. He is right in saying there isn't much of anything online to help with this issue on gasifier burners. I have a two-year-old Heat Master G7000 with a similar issue. Turbulators gum up and on two occasions have become locked solid in the down position making them inoperable. Only an overnight burn freed them up one time and the second time I had to look at my options as that didn't work. In my case, I don't have a section of roof to remove to get at the turbulators and I'd have to pull the entire roof off-off. I did consider the torch option but there's no access port at the bottom like on the Polar so I'd just be hoping for the best while blasting my torch at only the top 2-3 inches and I'd be worried about overheating causing warping the tubes. I also pondered the diesel option. However, in the Middle of January in Ottawa, it's not feasible to shut down for that long so I tried upping the tempo to 177 F, knowing it would top out at around 180 F or so. I don't want to mess with getting the pex close to 200 F so kept it to just that. I tried increasing the O2 from the factory set of 5% to 7% and then to 8% but had only limited success. Decided to do a major cleanout in the chamber that houses the turbs and discovered that the exit port to the stack was significantly narrowed and gunked up (a kind of hardening of the arteries for a wood burner) with only about a 1 and 1/2 inch diameter exhaust opening through a cake of suit, rather than the rectangular 2 x 4 inch opening. Long story short, I cleaned out the suit, returning the exhaust port to its original dimensions then pulled off the short stack and rain cap to clean them. Then it occurred to me, knowing that everything runs stronger and better when you run a straight pipe, that if I keep the rain cap and short stack off, it might loosen up the turbs when fired up again. It worked!! And can you ever see a difference in draw when you crack open the door with the chimney bypass off. Who would have thought that a rain cap would create that much back pressure to clog things up? After, exhaust rolled out just great with it on... and now it shoots out like a locomotive!! Fingers are crossed that this is a permanent fix as I don't think I'll get my wood any drier than the 20% that it is. Thanks again, Greg. Very helpful!!

Thinks for your honest review of the furnace. I think a seller or designer said he could not get the turbulator to stick. Then he said. “ users error” LOL. I really came on to speak about the video you made four months ago on this topic. Chinese made products are getting better and better every year. We can no longer call it junk. We need to support the best. Something you can past down through generations. No more quick fixes. Keep up the good work!!!

Glad you had success with clearing your turbulators, i am not sure if I can remove mine. I have been thinking about what I might do to get the ones clear in my G4000. I have started by setting the time it is on and off between burns to 10m on and 20m off along with a 20F degree differential. I will add another comment after I have worked on mine.

I have a feeling you will have a bigger supply of firewood for this coming winter. Add 50% to what you bought for last winter. Left over wood will just add to your next heating seasons seasoned supply. With a regular wood stove the chimney is supposed to get up to around 400f to keep creosote from forming. Green wood is not acceptable in gasifiers or wood stoves. One trick for gasifiers is to shut your boiler off and let the water temp get down to about 145-150f and then start it back up. Hovering at a 10F differential does not allow for a long hot fire to clean your tubes. Another trick is to buy some charcoal briquets say about 10 big bags or in early fall and late winter make your own charcoal from the wood you burn. Burn a bag or two to keep as hot a fire as you can against your turb tubes. Charcoal is basically low moisture (10%?? or so). True charcoal will make a blue flame which is very hot. I know the reason we like outdoor boilers is the mess stays outside. Less than desirable moisture wood can be brought into the house and dried while exposed forced air either by a ducted run or baseboard and a small fan.It might take two weeks but dry winter air and heat in the house will dry the wood a few points and add moisture to the house air for a couple of days. I ended up burning an extra two cords because of the long winter carry over into spring too. I usually only burn around 5-5.5 cord per winter. I get hot water and heat in the winter but stumbled on the 140-180f swing because of the the longer cold spell or teasing almost warm trend. I do think stretching the amount of stored heat in the water will help me this coming winter too. My boiler is supposed to shut right down when the call for heat is satisfied but my draft gate doesn't shut all the way off so I get a small coal pocket that stays lit so having a likelihood of a cold boiler remains on the fringe as long as I reset the boiler to auto control when I go some where or when I go to bed. I switched to a gasifier boiler that does not use turbulators and produces less ash when the wood is dry. Please wear a mask to stop heavy ash particles when you are using a brush. Wood ash has calcium carbonate which is the same as cement and is not good to breathe. Try stretching your technique in early fall and late winter/early spring and you can save a cord or two or more.

I give the turbulators a few swings every time I add wood. You don't have to swing too far. Only a few inches is necessary because if you go too far, the turbulator can get stuck or stiff. Adjusting your draft is critical to get a clean burn. The manual says 50% for primary and about 40% on secondary. If you adjust too much primary air, it won't burn properly. My fan blades had warped a bit from the heat cycles so I loosened the allen screws and moved it away from the fan motor and now it works really good and doesn't rub on the retaining housing any more.

Make sure at Christmas you put the unedited portion of you working on this boiler on a loop on your television for your family to see that you do indeed do some work.

I used to use moth balls placed in the bottom of creosoted brick flue shiny black and then lighting them with a propane torch. The creosote would burn at a very high temperature leaving only dry clean brick. This might work to eliminate this problem.

weld a stiffening rod down the middle of each turbulator so they cant spring...

Thanks for the video. The amount of cleaning necessary on those gasification furnaces really scares me. I like you previously am used to throwing wood in every 12 hours and forgetting about any problems. My cleaning amounts to just removing ashes once per week, that's it period. Sure dry wood will help but will you always have dry wood? Thanks again for showing it like it really happens and sharing your solution to a problem all will likely face.

Great video Greg, thanks for the detailed explanation of cleaning the turbulators. You are right there is not much info on this. I do like the easier access to them. I wonder if the reason for this is Heat Master and the other gasification models do not have this problem. This was alot of work especially being that hot out, thanks for sharing your experience. Is this the same design as the Portage and Maine EGR Optimizer?

Hi Greg - it would be great to see a video of you getting the stove going for the season. All the set up and the first firing. Thanks.

What size is that flue brush? Was doing the cardboard thing this morning but haven’t tried to put turbulatora back in yet. Thanks!

Hi I live in South Manitoba as well. We moved to Manitoba last year. So the house came with a Headmaster G 4000 is only been used for one season the previous owner used apparently green wood cause the is creosote all over. My problem now is after some cleaning is that I can NOT get the 3 turbulators lose! So will your trick work for my G 4000 and how much diesel dit you put in each turbulators? Thank in advance. Henk

Hi Greg great video I'm a new subscriber when you were checking the bottom of that number 7 turbulator if you look back at your video it looks like it was trying to move slightly when the handle was being moved back and forth. when you screwed that number seven turbulator out did you see if it was bent or not,it looked to me that a couple of the coils were closer together than the others were. One of those looked as if the last 10 inches was bent slightly.When you reassembled and put the fifth turbulator in you could see where it was bent, and you pulled it back out and put a different one in. I'm wondering if that was the one that came out of number seven tube in the beginning? I guess the point I'm wondering about either that turbulators bent or the tube is messed up, when you cleaned those tubes the amount of red rust and flakes that came out of that number seven was a lot greater than the others, to me it hasn't been working like it should since it was new.It can be jamed but the lever will move relatively easy due to the fact that they are a spring design.( part of the turblator is moveing, the stuck part will not ) Did you look in the lower opening afterwards to see if they were all moveing evenly? I know it was a hot miserable day and trying to get it done and over with is understandable. just an observation, more than one pair of eyes are sometimes helpful sometimes they're hindrance I'm just curious and trying to help. Guess it will be part of a summer of 2023 inspection now!! Stay warm, it was -8 degrees here in virginia on 12/24/22 Take Care, H.

That unit sure doesn't follow the kiss system ... I for one, am not interested in owning one at all. Thanks for posting.