Quadrafire Secondary Air Manifold Crack

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Well... they credit us the full purchase price we paid for it, plus labor, for each one. They would be stupid not to look into the problem and fix it. I could call one of the R&D engineers I know on monday if the matter concers you that much.
 
TMonter said:
I was cleaning out the stove today and found this crack. It's not in a critical spot, but I was just wondering what people thought I should do. I Was just thinking of waiting till this spring and cleaning the stove out and having the crack welded up. It looks like a fatigue crack from thermal cycling, possibly caused by an uneven weld on the secondary air manifold.

I figured I'd direct this question at MSG and some of the other quad people here.
Click to expand...

looking at the crack it is all the way into the secondary outlet hole it is headed to ,the crack will likley not extend past that hole (kinda like a stop hole) but it may very well widen. question; does quad weld the manifold all the way out? meaning do they weld that part all the way around or just intermittant stitches? looking at it from a builders standpoint i would think that with a stress point like that they should have the header welded at leats 3 inches or so up the vertical continuing about 3 inches or so around the corner horizintally. this would likely releave some of the stress at that corner, if no weld the whole bloody thing in. im not familiar with that stove and copuldnt see in the photo if this is the case but i think if it isnt done that way its a mistake looking at the way the "tee" of the manifold it laid out

just my 2 cents
 
The manifold itself is 100% seal welded with what looks to be a full penetration weld. From what I can tell the manifold itself is skip welded to the firebox. The crack started on the corner of the manifold at the weld when indicates a thermal expansion stress crack. I doubt they stress relieve the manifold after welding so I'm betting that's the culprit.

I sometimes burn white fir and while I've never seen the manifold glow, I have seen the back stainless air tube slightly glow in the center even when the fire is turned down in some cases.

My guess is it may just be a flaw in the weld or maybe a known issue with the stove. I do know they have radically changed the design on the free standings but I'm not sure about the inserts.
 
TMonter, is there any kind of an expansion joint in that air tube that runs from the back of the stove to the front? If not, it seems like a design issue. If the perforated tube (I assume this is the front "airwash" manifold) is welded to the outer shell of the stove, the "air delivery tube" will be much hotter than the shell and therefore expand considerably more, something's gonna give. I'd think that there should be either an expansion joint on the air delivery tube (the front to back one), or that the airwash manifold would be floated on clips allowing for the different expansion rates. It might also be OK just to have the manifold welded at the ends, this would allow the center to flex more readily, perhaps putting less stress at the joint.

I hope Quad takes care of you, they are made just over in Colville I believe. I had a Quad at my old place, never had any problems, sorry to hear that you are running into this.

Bri
 
TMonter, is there any kind of an expansion joint in that air tube that runs from the back of the stove to the front? If not, it seems like a design issue. If the perforated tube (I assume this is the front “airwash” manifold) is welded to the outer shell of the stove, the “air delivery tube” will be much hotter than the shell and therefore expand considerably more, something’s gonna give. I’d think that there should be either an expansion joint on the air delivery tube (the front to back one), or that the airwash manifold would be floated on clips allowing for the different expansion rates. It might also be OK just to have the manifold welded at the ends, this would allow the center to flex more readily, perhaps putting less stress at the joint.

I hope Quad takes care of you, they are made just over in Colville I believe. I had a Quad at my old place, never had any problems, sorry to hear that you are running into this.
Click to expand...

No worries, the stove performance hasn't been an issue. It's been running just fine, but it looks like Quad is going to step up to the plate and replace the stove. I just haven't gotten a date on when they'd have a new stove ready. I certainly hope they've fixed this design issue. Maybe I'll get one of the newer stoves that has the timing mechanism for the startup air.
 
Unless the dealer has old stock sitting around you should get a nice new ACC model which has the timer. The ACT version for the stoves is discontinued.

*I just looked at your pics, seems you have an insert. I don't think they updated those to the ACC versions.
 
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