How does your thermostat connect?

You're definitely not abusing the forum by asking questions - that what it's here for! Someone with electrical knowledge should be along shortly to help

Old school heat only are two wire red/white. So the tstat has no constant power to it.

+1 on what drew said. You could do without a thermostat if you were willing to twist the two wires (red and white) together every time you wanted the furnace to run. For the more complicated t stats (like my Honeywell with wifi) the red supply is switched and returns on the white. Then the black is another hot that is used to power the t stat, again using white as the neutral.

mk48 said:

I'm looking at a used Quadra Fire 1000i, which requires a 24v thermostat to operate. No problem. But when reading the manual, I noticed that the instructions very clearly say that the white and red thermostat wires should be connected to the stove. However, as I understand it, the white wire is normally the switched power from the thermostat, the red wire is power from the thermostat transformer to the thermostat, and the black is neutral from the thermostat transformer. This means that a simple heating system would be connected to the WHITE and BLACK wires, as opposed to the WHITE and RED. Am I going crazy? Or is this maybe a simpler system than I'm used to, where you don't need a transformer and the thermostat just interrupts/allows current that the stove is already providing.

Thanks for the help, I really hope I'm not abusing the forum by asking all these newbie questions.

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What's your deal with the questions? This forum is ONLY for OAK and cheap pellet/expensive pellet questions. 24V tstats are a simple switch and either allow or disallow current passthrough like you guessed at the end of your question. There are only two wires for this system and as with many 24V components +/- doesn't really matter. Granted, there are exceptions, but for the vast majority of 24V switches as long as both wires are connected you don't have much to worry about. The stat does not generally have it's own power source unless it is programmable and at that point it is just a battery to store the program and time. Hope it all works out for you.

Oh yeah "what are you burning when it gets cold?" and "why don't you have a OAK?"...one more..."is your generator pure sine wave with a ups backup and a $300 surge suppressor? If not you suck." These are the usual conversations on here but only because there aren't that many real questions this year. Enjoy that tstat...good investment.

Yeah I learned the 2 wire, 3 wire, 5 wire thing the hard way trying to hookup a wifi tstat to my 2 wire hot air furnace. Not so much fun trust me.

So I should post my surge in my sig line with my stove right?

Drew65 said:

Yeah I learned the 2 wire, 3 wire, 5 wire thing the hard way trying to hookup a wifi tstat to my 2 wire hot air furnace. Not so much fun trust me.

So I should post my surge in my sig line with my stove right?

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Yes. This is imperative. It's actually more important than what stove you have. Also, don't go getting a regular thermostat and trying to just hook it up. You need to get one that senses what type of mood you are in and adjusts automatically, will call you at work if the stove needs cleaning, is accessible from anywhere at any time via thought waves, and costs at least as much as the stove. Anything else just won't do.

Sorry for the sarcasm, it's just gotten a little ridiculous/condescending/contentious around here lately and I just don't get it. People used to give pros/cons to choices now a lot of people just plain talk chit if you don't do exactly what they do/suggest. Some guys act like the stove is a space ship and they are the only one who understands it. I work on million dollar machinery and it is apparently less sensitive and less complicated than some of these stoves if you believe everything you read. I have the free Lux stat that came with my stove and it works like a champ. No timer/program. I turn it down a little when I leave and up a little when I get home. Works like a champ. I also...try not to faint...don't have an OAK and this year I'm burning ashy pellets. This is because this year I'm broke as hell with other more important things going on. My "junk heat" seems to be keeping the family from freezing to death and the pipes are still not frozen even though I haven't installed a thermoguard. Believe me, I would love to be burning turmans with a programmable stat, an OAK and a thermoguard downstairs with an automatic backup pure sine wave generator but I just can't get it done right now. I run with a basic stat, a Chinese generator, a decent surge suppressor and the pellets I can afford and you know what? It works. There is better, but basic works too. Just saying. Be prepared for the "facts"(opinions) from some, not all, if you're not shelling out the big bucks for the best of the best everything. Find the middle and the truth is usually there somewhere.

Not trying to derail your thread, just felt it necessary to explain my negativity this morning.

Happy burning!

as far as the white and red, it doesn't matter. it is just a switch, it doesn't know polarity. the black wire is a common I would think. wht stat are you running?