new to stoves with problems.

[jeremygrimm]

I would like to thank mike for calling me at home and confirming my fear that this board was trashed. Stand up guy and stand up customer support. I am super happy to have this brand of unit and would recommend it to anyone simply because it appears the customer support is superb. So now I'm going to buy the pucb04 and have the diagnostics set to the pucb98. I'm learning tons about this unit everyday and I'm going to have this thing running great.


I'm debating installing a thermostat for this unit. My question is I see no pilot light and my brother in law said he always started it with a gel state on the pellets and let it burn for a while. If I purchase a thermostat will I have to worry about the fire going out if it gets warm and shuts the burner down? Or does it keep the fire going on low until it needs high heat again.

I seen in the user manual that I need to put heat setting and blower both to 9 while tstat is connected but it doesnt really tell me what happens and since i dobt have auto start im wondering if it will work. Sorry if I'm getting annoying. I'm just trying to wrap my head around everything.

 

[SidecarFlip]

Solid fueled stoves (appliances) have no 'pilot light'.........

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

T-stat operation is a function of the control board as is auto light., you have to have an igniter and the correct control board for automatic ignition some stoves allow manual light and thermostatic control in hi/low mode your manuals should tell you how the unit will work and if a thermostat can be used.

 

[SidecarFlip]

T-stat operation is a function of the control board as is auto light., you have to have an igniter and the correct control board for automatic ignition some stoves allow manual light and thermostatic control in hi/low mode your manuals should tell you how the unit will work and if a thermostat can be used.

If you read the first post SB, it's manual (gelled firestarter start).....

"My brother in law gave me an older unit. It is an englander model # 25-pvd/55-shp22. The serial number is whi-012803 and the manufacturing date says 07101? "

So, the t'stat will modulate the HR setting from idle to the highest setting user inputted to the control board. with the board controlling the ramp time between ranges and that of course is not user adjustable.

 

[jeremygrimm]

So the board should control feed and keep the fire "alive" while the thermostat switch is open. I will just need to start the fire manually. I shouldn't need to restart the fire if the thermostat takes an hour to go to switch closed?

In any of your experiences has a thermostat helped or hindered fuel consumption?

 

[jeremygrimm]

Solid fueled stoves (appliances) have no 'pilot light'.........

Correct. I used the wrong term. Auto light is what I meant. Not pilot light. I'm still new to this. Learning terms is still something I'm working on.

 

[SidecarFlip]

The appliance (stove) will ramp down to the lowest setting when the T'stat is open. That setting is in the memory chip on the board and cannot be altered. It's enough to keep the burn going and the firebox hot enough to most likely keep the RA fan energized. When the T'stat calls for heat it closes the circuit and the control board begions to ramp up in HR settings to the highest setting you have selected.

I've always ran my stoves on a remote t'stat, for over as long as I can remember. You need to consult your manual as to which terminals you attach the t'stat leads to and/or which jumpers you need to remove to allow the t'stat to control the stove. Most, but not all stoves, use a millivolt t'state so you need to consult your manual for which type.

Running a remote t'stat evens out the heat. You can set it for say 68 and it will maintain 68 within a couple degrees. Fuel usage depens on many factors such as insulation or drafts or ambient outside temperature so usage can't be estimated but the heat level is much more stable and you don't have to fiddle with the settings. I basically set my stove to run balls to the wall (wide open-HR9, hard as it will go) and let the t'stat throttle the stove according to heat demand, just like a central furnace. My only issue is, unlike a central furnace, I have to fill the stove with fuel.......

Always and I mean ALWAYS UNPLUG THE STOVE AND DISCONNECT THE THERMOSTAT LEADS DURING THE WARM MONTHS WHEN YOU AREN'T USING THE STOVE BECAUSE INDUCTED CURRENT FROM ELECTRICAL STORMS CAN FRY THE BOARD if, it's plugged in or the t'stat is physically connected to the board.

I run a line conditioner (surge suppressor) on my stove in the winter as a precaution. Boards are expensive.

 

[jintoreedwine]

So the board should control feed and keep the fire "alive" while the thermostat switch is open. I will just need to start the fire manually. I shouldn't need to restart the fire if the thermostat takes an hour to go to switch closed?

In any of your experiences has a thermostat helped or hindered fuel consumption?

Just to clarify, the board on these stoves are not fully automatic in terms of adjusting the fuel/air to keep the fire "alive" as some other stoves will (this is not bad, but you do need to be away of it.) These boards have per-determined fuel/air mixtures (IE: feed rates/combustion blower speeds) for each setting of the heat range (1-9). I don't know if all model years of this stove have this or not, but on the control board you will probably see three buttons on the bottom lined up horizontally and they say something like "Low Fuel Feed" (LFF), "Low Burn Air" (LBA) and "Air On Temp" (AOT). You never use AOT, but LFF and LBA can be adjusted for a particular brand of pellets if it is not burning correctly.

These are not settings you will have to constantly be playing with by any means (since November I made 1 or 2 adjustments and I was mostly being OCD), it just gives you the option to tweak the burn settings to make sure a particular brand of pellets burn properly. There's plenty of posts on the forum that discuss setting them, or alternatively, if you call ESW support they will be more than happy to help you select the proper values if you are having issues . Again, you may not even have to touch these settings, just wanted to make sure you understood that if problems arise you aren't without recourse! In all likelihood, your pellets will burn just fine with the default settings, but if you are like others on this forum (myself included) it will be hard to resist playing with the settings to try and get the best burn possible for whatever brand of pellets you burn :D.

 

[stoveguy2esw]

with the unit you have adding a thermostat is possible, it will not turn the stove on and off (as it does not have an auto igniter) rather it will turn the stove up and down based on t-stat input. so the stove will not go out if the t-stat circuit is open, it would just continue to run on its lowest feed arte until the t-stat called for heat again

 

[jeremygrimm]

Thanks a lot mike.

 

[SidecarFlip]

with the unit you have adding a thermostat is possible, it will not turn the stove on and off (as it does not have an auto igniter) rather it will turn the stove up and down based on t-stat input. so the stove will not go out if the t-stat circuit is open, it would just continue to run on its lowest feed arte until the t-stat called for heat again

I could have sworn thats what I stated in my post #32, but then, I could be dreaming.........

 

[jeremygrimm]

It was.. but mike is an englander tech support guru that has personally called me at my house. I apologize for not giving you recognition on your post. Thanks.

 

[SidecarFlip]

It was.. but mike is an englander tech support guru that has personally called me at my house. I apologize for not giving you recognition on your post. Thanks.

You don't have to. I know what I'm talking about. If I don't know, I don't reply. This ain't my first rodeo.

 

[husky345 vermont resolute]

Yes I run my furnace fan to mix the air up and get heat upstairs to the opposite end of the house. Works great. U might want to consider installing some return grills close to the stove to suck up some of that heat

 

[Big papa]

You don't have to. I know what I'm talking about. If I don't know, I don't reply. This ain't my first rodeo.

Lol

 

[SidecarFlip]

Yes I run my furnace fan to mix the air up and get heat upstairs to the opposite end of the house. Works great. U might want to consider installing some return grills close to the stove to suck up some of that heat

Thats a good idea, something that I do as well, but I use a LUX CAG t'sat with a 'clean air cycle' that runs the central furnace blower 5 minutes, in every 15 minute segment instead of constantly. Keeps the whole house at a fairly even temperature and my main cold air return is right next to stove, very handy spot. The LUX isn't made anymore sadly, but there are other intermittent fan run devices on the market. Don't know why LUX discontunued theirs......A great idea actually.

An added benefit is the central air furnace filter traps a large portion of the dust associated with a pellet/corn stove. I get quite a bit of 'collected crap'. in the filter, which I change monthly.

 

[jeremygrimm]

Thanks for the input. The actual furnace is about 30 feet from the stove, but I have about 6 return air runs going into the room that the stove is in. The return air all goes upstairs but I'm going to cut holes in that silver cardboard stuff to bring return air downstairs instead of upstairs. My new thing is trying to find a nice looking way to mount a grill to a drop ceiling tile that looks nice.

 

[jeremygrimm]

Hello all. It's been a while. I'm making some good progress in may badement. I have all walls insulated and looking great. I got the new control for my pellet stove and have it hooked up (Correctly I hope). And I haven't fired it up, but I plugged it in, turn it on and it runs for about 15 seconds and then I get an e2 error on the control. I'm assuming something is wrong? Please provide an answer. I hate to fire it up and smoke out the house.

 

[jeremygrimm]

I take that back. I plug it in. It runs for like 10 to 20 seconds. The goes to e2. Then goes for about another 5 seconds and goes to e1.

 

[jeremygrimm]

Ok. I got it to run. It was vac sensor needed jumpered. Now.. it runs and after a couple minutes I see a 5 u code pop up. I don't believe the blower is running cause I filled my house with smoke. And I know the blower isn't running either.. now I'm so confused. I know all motors work. I checked them all. Please helpbme.

 

[jeremygrimm]

Well new updates. I changed the setting to d and it runs. Everything works the way it's suppose to. The only problem is after about 10 minutes the exhaust blower shuts off and the flames starts dying and I'm getting smoke in the house. I'm guessing it's another setting. Please help. Maybe it shouldn't be on d?

 

[stoveguy2esw]

missed a wire terminal, should be fine now