wood pellet question

[TomPajak]

im new to this wood pellet scene so go easy..lol...
does anyone make a beeper to tell you when your pellets are low?
if so where can i get one?

thank you for any help

 

[restorer]

Welcome to the hearth. On a serious note, DUCK. This may get a little rough, but it will help. I think you are in another time. Be gentle ladies and gentlemen, remember he said he was new.

 

[stoveguy2esw]

if there is one out there , i do not know who has it

 

[begreen]

That's not a bad idea, actually, though I haven't seen one.

 

[Highbeam]

From what I understand the burn rate is slow enough that you can just check the levels when you get around to it until you get a feel for consumption. There is no penalty for topping the hopper up early but letting it run out can add a little work to the job plus let your room cool off.

 

[bacsales]

I haven't seen one yet. Usually you will get in a rhythm of adding pellets once per day.

 

[Metal]

What you need to do when you load the hopper is put a "lady finger" firecracker about two inches from the top. It will let you know when it is time to reload the hopper.

 

[Shane]

A cold wife makes for a great alarm.

 

[HarryBack]

you could put a proximity sensor in the bin, actually, the PF100 has one...it lights a little LED telling you its low, but Im guessing some of the more electrical savvy guys here could suggest it can actuate analarm as well.

 

[GVA]

You know the first thing I thought of was the Pellet furnace. But that is on a different floor than the t-stat (i hope)....
Maybe just adding pellets once to twice a day would suffice.

But maybe someday when my warranty runs out I'd hook up a sonar type sensor to the top of the hopper to sense the depth of the pellets. Prox switches....... Hmmm it has to be a capacitive type switch on those PF100's Harry just wonderin' do they have any problems not working right when there are fines stuck to the face of them, as this is the biggest problem with cap type proxes which is why I would go the sonar route.
But that's another project for another time though after I get that pellet mill and auto feed system built and running in my basement ;-P

 

[Bob512]

Cory, we get to re-invent the wheel again! :coolsmile:

 

[HarryBack]

You know the first thing I thought of was the Pellet furnace. But that is on a different floor than the t-stat (i hope)....
Maybe just adding pellets once to twice a day would suffice.

But maybe someday when my warranty runs out I'd hook up a sonar type sensor to the top of the hopper to sense the depth of the pellets. Prox switches....... Hmmm it has to be a capacitive type switch on those PF100's Harry just wonderin' do they have any problems not working right when there are fines stuck to the face of them, as this is the biggest problem with cap type proxes which is why I would go the sonar route.
But that's another project for another time though after I get that pellet mill and auto feed system built and running in my basement ;-P

They do seem somewhat reliable, but certainly not 100%. They tend to sit on a sloped surface, so little fines or pellets can actually get deposited on them.

 

[Gooserider]

Not a pellethead, so I don't really care, but I'd consider a photo-electric approach. Put a mirror on one side of the hopper near the bottom. (a shiny plastic stickon would probably do) up near the top put a focused LED (possibly an LED laser?) pointing at the mirror and a photo-diode that would pickup the reflection from the mirror. Hook the diode up to an alarm circuit.

If the hopper is full, the mirror is covered, no reflection back to the diode, and all is quiet. When the level drops, the mirror gets uncovered, the diode sees the reflection and sets off the alarm....

Should be easy enough...

 

[EatenByLimestone]

LOL!

You guys kill me!

Can you set it up so it automatically charts usage on my computer?

Matt

 

[Gooserider]

Perhaps... The idea that occurs to me would be to put a sensor across the ouput of the feed auger so that each pellet would generate a pulse as it went by. Send the pulse stream to the computer and have the PC count the pulses - you could then have a display of how many pellets you'd burned. Then presumably you could count the pellets in a unit measure and get a calculated display of how many units you'd burned of whatever sort - bags, pounds, tablespoons, whatever....

For real geek factor, you could set it up to subtract the amount burned from your supply and have the PC call your pellet source and order more when you ran low...

However we don't have robots to feed the stove for you just yet.

Gooserider

 

[Andre B.]

(broken link removed)

Just read the abstract.

 

[Gooserider]

http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=16963384

Just read the abstract.

Might work, but not sure it's applicable... they are talking about a pnuematic conveyor, where the pellet stove is using a mechanical auger. Also I'm not sure if "particle size" is a big issue, since pellets are supposed to be pretty uniform. It might be bordering on overkill

Gooserider

 

[Andre B.]

http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=16963384

Just read the abstract.

Might work, but not sure it's applicable... they are talking about a pnuematic conveyor, where the pellet stove is using a mechanical auger. Also I'm not sure if "particle size" is a big issue, since pellets are supposed to be pretty uniform. It might be bordering on overkill

Gooserider

A little reprogramming and it should be possible to get it to ignore the auger.
Particle size would be a measure of the quality of the pellets, so the stove could be programmed to make complaining noises when you get the cheap brand.

Anything more then a micro switch is more then needed. Possibly the hopper could be mounted on springs and the micro switch set so that when there is less then 5 or 10 lbs in the hopper it activates.