Turns out I'm not an idiot

[trb157]

So I finally broke down and got the Harman guy out to our house to check my DVC-500. It had the big bad 2 light blink for a while as well as not really running right all this year. I cleaned and recleaned, recaulked, recleaned, checked gaskets, cleaned some more. All the while, my stove kept the living room and area above 80 no matter what you had the settings on. So he finds a bad cicuit board, and a bad blower motor because of the bad board. He said this is the worst one he's seen for only being a year old. Not our fault, he said a few others he'd checked from that year have had the same issues. So it's good and bad news. Good news is that it's still way under warranty, bad news is that I now have to run oil heat until it's fixed!

 

[HarryBack]

huh....interesting....Howd he check the curcuitboard to determine its "bad"? And the circuitboard fried the blower too? Well, at least the DVC boards are pretty common, and the blower should be stock....heck, I even have a board in stock for the DVC's we've sold. And Im happy that its at least covered under warrantee.....to to me it sounds more like a probe issue.

 

[trb157]

I wasn't there when he came. My wife was. So I am not sure exactly why the board is bad or what happened to the blower. The weird thing is that all the fans and motors run just fine on the test cycle. Maybe it is a sensor that he was talking about on the blower, something that makes the blower run when it is supposed to? Got me. He kept asking my wife if it was only a year old, over and over. Got me worried.

 

[wg_bent]

huh....interesting....Howd he check the curcuitboard to determine its "bad"? And the circuitboard fried the blower too? Well, at least the DVC boards are pretty common, and the blower should be stock....heck, I even have a board in stock for the DVC's we've sold. And Im happy that its at least covered under warrantee.....to to me it sounds more like a probe issue.

So a basic question for you Harry...and other dealers, how reliable overall are pellet stoves?

 

[HarryBack]

I wasn't there when he came. My wife was. So I am not sure exactly why the board is bad or what happened to the blower. The weird thing is that all the fans and motors run just fine on the test cycle. Maybe it is a sensor that he was talking about on the blower, something that makes the blower run when it is supposed to? Got me. He kept asking my wife if it was only a year old, over and over. Got me worried.

More and more, it sounds like the ESP probe, not the blower or the board. Only a year old means its still covered under warrantee, all labor and materials....Im guessing hes trying to ascertain whether or not its gonna be a moneymaker or not for him........? Youre ok, unless the stove hasnt been properly maintained. Pretty important with coal stoves, things rust much more readily, etc.
The blower has no sensor on it....so, if the blower runs well on a test cycle, Im 99% certain the blower is fine. The ESP probe does control when the blower starts tho....my answer would be replace the ESP probe, THEN the circuitboard, if the ESP change didnt make a difference. I dont know of a way to check the circuitboard in the field. They just get replaced....its not like you can change individual items on the circuitboard or anything. Thats why I asked about how did he check it.

 

[HarryBack]

huh....interesting....Howd he check the curcuitboard to determine its "bad"? And the circuitboard fried the blower too? Well, at least the DVC boards are pretty common, and the blower should be stock....heck, I even have a board in stock for the DVC's we've sold. And Im happy that its at least covered under warrantee.....to to me it sounds more like a probe issue.

So a basic question for you Harry...and other dealers, how reliable overall are pellet stoves?

Reliability would be dependent upon many factors, the primary ones being the quality of the unit and more importantly, the maintenance regimen of the client. The biggest problem is cleaning, and I think thats true with any unit. If you dont clean it well and properly, the stove will stop working...some sooner than others. Some folks think a good cleaning is taking the ashes out....definitely not so.

 

[trb157]

I would agree with the cleaning issue. It is perhaps magnified in coal stoves such as mine. They are much more delicate units than the stoves of our fathers. That is a good thing but requires much more cleaning. I cleaned mine at the end of last year as per the manual and I still feel like I should have done more and learned my lesson to keep an eye on the stove throughout the season both burning and resting. I worry about my stove constantly whether I did something right or wrong or whether it's clean or not.

 

[trb157]

So this is about chapter 5 in my 2nd season with my Harman DVC-500. The Harman guy(from another dealer) came out, which is a plus since my dealerthat I bought the stove is about useless. So at least I got someone out to fix my stove. He replaced the combustion motor and the draft motor and the computer board. This all happens while I am at work and my wife is home.

So I am all excited to go home to a good fire and a fixed stove. Indeed, the fire was going when I got home. I noticed the combustion blower was blowing on high with a reduced fire on the grates and the stove temp turned down as low as it can go. I was home for about 3 hours and the combustion fan never turned off or even cycled to low as it usually does. I kept asking my wife, "don't you think this is really loud?" So I was thinking something is wrong, the combustion fan or any fan should not run on full blast all the time. Then I thought, how am I going to shut this beast down if the combustion fan is always forcing air through it. It will never die down to a safe level for the stove to shut itself off. The stove has to die down to 95 degrees for it to shut off and if there is always coal burning at full blast it will keep feeding coal to ensure there isn't a back up of burning into the hopper. So I had to basically kill my fire by raking all the buring coal into the ash bin and making sure the bin didn't ignite!

Seeing as how my Harman never ran right from the get go(dealer admitted) is this how this stove is supposed to run with the combustion fan at full blast allt he time? I can''t see how that works, especially since my living room was at about 85 last night with the temp on the stove turned down as low as it can go. With that blower running all the time it is making a max fire with whatever coal is present to burn. So even if the feed adjusts so it burns a smaller fire the blower is blasting that coal to it's max.

At first, I thought I did something wrong or it was poor maintenance or something and I felt like an idiot. Now, I think I got a bum stove and possibly a bum installer or something.

Any advice on what could be wrong or what the deal is with this stove from the Harman guys here would be great. I am really tired of dealing with this stove and heating with oil. Oil is the reason I dropped 3 grand on this boat anchor! It was so loud last night in my living room I thought I was going to go insane.

 

[HarryBack]

suggestion: as I said earlier, did he replace the ESP probe? Im relatively certain its not the blowers...they GENERALLY either work of they dont. The ESP probe controls many functions in the stove....when it fails it USUALLY gives a "3 blink" error, but not always. Its an easy part to replace, and not terribly expensive. Frankly, Im quite shocked the dealer(s) replaced all that they did and didnt replace the probe, but thats easy to sit here and say, I am not looking at the unit. The ESP probe basically monitors exhaust temp, and causes the circuitboard to adjust fan speeds and feed from there........the probe looks like a silver needle about 3" long...held in place by one screw. Heck, maybe its just covered in flyash and not reading correctly, which would cause your fan to run fast. Anyways, thats my 3 cents.

 

[trb157]

That is the probe that is sticking out in the middle of the square exhaust pipe correct? I have vacuumed carefully around that but maybe I should clean it off better. Is there an easier way to get to it other than from behind the ash pan and htorugh the draft blower cover?

 

[HarryBack]

if its clean, Id just go ahead and replace it.

 

[trb157]

Is that something Harman has to do or can I do it? It's kind of a pain getting this guy to come out. Just wondering

 

[trb157]

Is that something Harman has to do or can I do it? It's kind of a pain getting this guy to come out and convince him that I want it done. Just wondering

 

[HarryBack]

well, as I said, Im surprised they didnt change the ESP probe out....yea, you can do this if you are fed up with the dealer...the part number is 3-20-00774 (Harman part #). A few other ideas as well.....fines tray, is it cleaned out? (I mean the fines tray, NOT the ash pan)......Have you tried running in room temp vs. stove temp mode?......and heres a good one for you.....make sure the dealer replaced the circuit board with the right one!...theres a 3/4"x3/4" chip on the board with a white label.....it should say COAL on it....Ive heard of some misguided folks trying to use a pellet curcuit board, they are VERY similar!

 

[trb157]

The fines trays are cleaned and ready, both of them. I will take a look at the probe tonight. Sorry for all the questions but the advice here is better than haggling with the dealer. How do I remove the probe? I am pretty familiar with the stove so I don't need a detailed description. I will check the board tonight too. Still waiting for it to cool down again here in PA, it's in the 60s today.

Thanks!