Wood pellet burner unit with sliding floor hopper

A wood pellet burner unit, comprising:

• a sliding floor hopper, comprising:
• an upper loading section having an opening therein that is configured to receive wood pellets;
• a staging section coupled to the upper loading section and configured to stage the wood pellets received from the upper loading section;
• and
• a sliding floor disposed atop a staging surface of the staging section and through a slit in the staging section, wherein the sliding floor is configured to oscillate between a forward position and a back position, wherein the sliding floor is configured to push the wood pellets from a back region of the staging section forward toward a front region of the staging section responsive to the sliding floor sliding to the forward position, and off of the staging surface of the staging section;
• a lower region of the wood pellet burner unit configured to receive the wood pellets from the staging section;
• an igniter configured to ignite the wood pellets in the lower region of the wood pellet burner unit a fire grate couple to the staging surface and configured to:
• receive the wood pellets from the staging section;
• and
• guide the wood pellets to the lower region of the wood pellet burner unit;
• wherein the sliding floor hopper further includes:
• a motor;
• a connecting shaft;
• a cam coupled to the motor and to the connecting shaft, and configured to transform rotarty motion of the motor into a substantially linear motion of the connecting shaft;
• a first connecting pin directly coupled to the sliding floor and directly coupled to the connecting shaft;
• and
• a second connecting pin directly coupled to the connecting shaft and directly coupled to the cam;
• wherein:
• the sliding floor is a single contiguous sliding floor disposed atop the staging surface of the staging section;
• the staging section includes a back wall;
• the slit in the staging section is a slit through the back wall of the staging section;
• the slit is horizontally oriented in the back wall of the staging section;
• the back wall of the staging section is an outer wall of the sliding floor hoppen;
• a width of the slit is approximately the same as a width of the single contiguous sliding floor;
• the single contiguous sliding floor is disposed through the slit through the back wall of the staging section;
• the connecting shaft, the first connecting pin, and the second connecting pin are configured to cause the single contiguous sliding floorto oscillate between the forward position and the back position through the slit in the outer wall of the sliding floor hopper;
• the single contiguous sliding floor includes a circular hole having a diameter that is approximately the same as a diameter of the first connecting pin;
• the first connecting pin is disposed through the circular hole of the single contiguous sliding floor;
• and
• the first connecting pin is configured to laterally oscillate with the single contiguous sliding floor in a linear motion to automatically and periodiwlly feed the wood pellets to a lower region of the wood pellet burner unit on a continuous basis.