Harman Accentra Insert Ignitor stuck on

[bookpile]

I've been trying to figure out why my insert is drawing so much power for some time now. I think I finally figured it out.
When I started the stove I sat there and watched for the ignitor light to go out, when it did there was no change in wattage draw on the kill a watt meter.

After the stove was running for a few hours, I opened up the ignitor cover and could see it was still glowing cherry red. So it seems like the ignitor is stuck on. I'm waiting for it to cool down enough so I can pull the wires and double check.

Has anyone heard of this before? Does this mean I need a new circuit board or could it be anything else?

Thanks

 

[bookpile]

That did it, I unplugged the ignitor and it dropped from 480w to 210w.

So is there anything else I check besides the circuit board?

 

[MSmith66]

sounds like it is time for a new board

 

[CJ-SR4ever]

Your ignitor staying in doesnt exactly mean your control board is bad. Sounds more like an ESP issue to me. Have you cleaned the ESP in the off season?

 

[PJPellet]

Your ignitor staying in doesnt exactly mean your control board is bad. Sounds more like an ESP issue to me. Have you cleaned the ESP in the off season?

Good advice, check the esp first. A lot less expensive. Keep us posted.

 

[bookpile]

Should also note that the ignitor is on even when the switch is in the manual position and the ignitor light is off. Would that be more indicative of the board being bad vs the probe?

I did remove the access panel and wipe it off with a wet paper towel yesterday. I didn't actually remove it by pulling the screw out. I can try that today. Is there any other way to test the probe?

If the ESP probe was bad wouldn't the combustion fan not shut off once the stove was cool enough?

 

[dingees]

is is your control board. something is stuck and will not shut the ignitor off, as the esp gets to its design temp to turn off the ignitor. you will also notice that if u were to shut the stove off, the combustion motor will run indefinitly because the ignitor will keep enough heat going out the exhaust to keep the esp temp above the designed shut down temperature. It go off if u open the door as now there is more cool air going thru the exhaust and cooling down the esp.

 

[bookpile]

is is your control board. something is stuck and will not shut the ignitor off, as the esp gets to its design temp to turn off the ignitor. you will also notice that if u were to shut the stove off, the combustion motor will run indefinitly because the ignitor will keep enough heat going out the exhaust to keep the esp temp above the designed shut down temperature. It go off if u open the door as now there is more cool air going thru the exhaust and cooling down the esp.

Actually that makes perfect sense. My stove seems to run forever in cool down mode sometimes, but as soon as I crack the door a little bit it will shut off right away. I never really made that connection. So I know there are some replaceable parts on the board like the potentiometers, anyone know if something is replaceable for the ignitor control?

 

[Lousyweather]

its the circuitboard, not likely the ESP......if the ESP fails to detect ignition in, I think its 36 minutes, the stove will go into shutdown mode, and will likely go off, with the status light blinking a 5 blink error. Usually, an ignitor stuck on will be the CB.......

 

[lbcynya]

This is an interesting topic. People who have repreated igniter failures could be experiencing this problem and not know it. I don't think the diagnostic tool will catch this unless its not connected to the igniter status light.. Hmmmm... A better indicator would be igniter wattage or an overall stove wattage to see if the igniter load drops off when it should. Something to add to the preventative maintenance list...

 

[Lousyweather]

This is an interesting topic. People who have repreated igniter failures could be experiencing this problem and not know it. I don't think the diagnostic tool will catch this unless its not connected to the igniter status light.. Hmmmm... A better indicator would be igniter wattage or an overall stove wattage to see if the igniter load drops off when it should. Something to add to the preventative maintenance list...

you are EXACTLY right....would be interesting to just test the wattage on, say, TEST mode......of course, in regular operation, depending on the stove settings, everyone would have different settings, given that the distribution fan is of variable speed, and the combustion fan voltage can be varied by several volts depending upon the potentiometer setting on the board, and if it's been monkeyed with or not (its only a few volts).....

 

[bookpile]

That is exactly how I have gotten to this point. I thought my winter electric bill was ridiculous so I started checking around with the power meter. I had started another thread about it:

https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/73353/

Some people said there was no way it could be drawing that much, my meter must be wrong etc, etc. Well before it was drawing 480w, now since I have the ignitor unplugged it's drawing 165-220 depending on how high the fans are running. That seems about right since the ignitor is 306w.

I tried replacing the combustion fan yesterday but it turned out that was a waste of money. I had compiled a lot of data with various components unplugged to find the wattages. What tripped me up was apparently the ignitor was not coming on when the combustion fan was unplugged. In retrospect that is probably a safety feature.

I had thought about the ignitor before but since the light was going off and it drew the same when the stove was in manual mode I didn't think that was the issue. But yesterday after installing the new fan I watched the ignitor light go off and I saw that the wattage did not change at all. I hope someone else can use my numbers one day if they're having problems too.

 

[603BOB]

Purely a guess - since I don't have your board on the bench, but could be either the Triac that turns the ignitor on and off or the optical isolator chip that controls the triac. Both are easily replaceable by a competent electronic tech.

Both parts are under $3 and very easy to replace.

 

[bookpile]

Thanks for all the help everyone. New board fixed the problem.

 

[Dougsey]

If you have your stove plugged into a UPS with a load gauge, it is very easy to see when the igniter is on.