Summers Heat/Englander 25-PDVC on a thermostat?

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Clincker

New Member
Hearth Supporter
Feb 10, 2009
21
Northern MN
Several weeks of burning the new Summers Heat stove and have it hooked up to a thermostat. Basement install, about 900 square feet on each level, and settings on stove are feed rate 4 blower 5. Am I correct in thinking that once thermostat temperature is hit, the stove cycles down to lowest setting of feed rate 1 and blower remains at 5? Have had temps from -24 below to 36 above outside in the last 2 weeks. The thermostat works marginally. Seems to burn around a bag per day either way, give or take a few hours. Thermostat in basement set at 72. It seems like once the stove cycles down, it still throws too much heat. As with basement installs, getting it to heat the whole house evenly is problematic. It is almost 10 warmer in basement than in main level living area. This is fine with me as the old boiler system struggled to keep it 65 plus cold floors, but all this heat is an adjustment. I think the problem might be that I don't have a low burn setting dialed in and it continues to heat instead of just stay running. I am aware that on level 1 and 2 there are some adjustment in feed rate and burn air, but lowering the feed rate just makes the fire go down to coals until new pellets are fed - smolder and smoke - and eventually fire, repeat. Adjusting low burn air does not seem to do anything. Any suggestions?
 
you're on the right track. You need to fiddle with the LFF and LBA so that you get the ideal "low burn" And you need to do this everytime you switch brands too. Sometimes even different tons within the same brand too. size of pellet and species of wood are the biggest factors. My Low burn does the same as yours - throws a pellet or 2 into the coals every so often enough so the colas never go out. then, when the 'stat calls for heat, the coal bed is ready to ignite and burn the increased feed rate. LBA helps achieve a cleaner low burn. I have found the higher it is, the faster the pellets ignite, which equals less smoldering time. You can further tune the Low feed rate by adjusting the restrictor plate at the bottom of the hopper. There is no exact science to it, you basically have to do some trial and error. Wait about a 1/2 hour in between button adjustments to see results.
 
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