Range of temperatures on the convention blower

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

Hello members
I'm new to this side of the world... I've been burning firewood for a few years now. I've been a member of hearth.com for a while and I get most of my information here.. I have a few questions I'm looking to supplement heat down in my basement with a pellet stove..
basement is a cinder block 900 square foot unfinished with 7 1/2 ceiling..

What kind of temperatures are you guys seeing out of the convention blower?
is there some sort of safety switch on the pellet stove that controls the temp?
With my wood stove the hotter I get the temperature the hotter the convention air gets..
Can this be done with the pellet stove?

Don2222 · Mar 12, 2014

Hello

The pellet stove convection blowers have a thermal overheating circuit that typically open at 120 Degs to protect the motor from burning up. When the convection blower's circuiit trips or the blower dies and the temps soar inside the pellet stove, the Hi Limit safety thermo switch opens up at anywhere from 200 Degs F to 300 Degs F depending upon the stove Make which cuts the power to the auger motor so the stove will stop feeding pellets and shut down to prevent a fire.

Typical temps coming out of the heat exchanger in the front of the pellet stove range from 100 Degs F to 400 Degs F.

Remember the typical temperature of the air coming out of the heat register in your average forced hot air furnace is 225 Degs F.

Hope this info helps.

stovelark · Mar 12, 2014

In answer to your questions, Don gave the range of normal temps discharge from the convex blowers. The "safety switch" you asked about is the heat output level of the stove- obviously on a higher heat level most stoves put out a little warmer air, unless the convex blower strips it away in a linear heat level to heat output temp, but most stoves higher heat levels, hotter air discharge. You would also find that pellet quality (just like your wood quality and dryness) determines heat temp outputs too. Hope this helps.

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

Don2222 said:
Hello

The pellet stove convection blowers have a thermal overheating circuit that typically open at 120 Degs to protect the motor from burning up. When the convection blower's circuiit trips or the blower dies and the temps soar inside the pellet stove, the Hi Limit safety thermo switch opens up at anywhere from 200 Degs F to 300 Degs F depending upon the stove Make which cuts the power to the auger motor so the stove will stop feeding pellets and shut down to prevent a fire.

Typical temps coming out of the heat exchanger in the front of the pellet stove range from 100 Degs F to 400 Degs F.

Remember the typical temperature of the air coming out of the heat register in your average forced hot air furnace is 225 Degs F.

Hope this info helps.

thank you for the great information on the convection blower.(Ishould use spell check)
I am NOT looking for a very expensive stove to heat the basement with supplemental heat. but I would like a stove that I can have more hands-on where I can get those heat exchangers up to 3 to 400 degrees when I want is there a stove that you would recommend...
should I be looking at a 30,000 BTU or 50,000 BTU

wsar10 · Mar 12, 2014

I have a Breckwell Big-E IIRC it is 48k BTU, on level 4 (it has 1-5) I have measured 470 ::F

with fan on hi and burning Hamer hot ones, it averages 450-460 on 4.

Lake Girl · Mar 12, 2014

stovelark is correct on pellet quality but it is different than cord wood. Your best heat for pellets comes from softwoods rather than hardwoods... Not all stoves are created equal and some auger/feed systems have trouble with the softwoods. Mine loves them!

tjnamtiw · Mar 12, 2014

OK, you have, obviously, the wood stove mentality of just keep throwing more wood in to get more and more heat out.

This is NOT how a pellet stove works or is to be used, PERIOD! If you just keep dumping more and more fuel into the stove, it will shut down on safeties - hopefully. If not, you will hear the sirens of the local fire company! You pick a stove with the btu output you want and THEN you set it up for the RECOMMENDED flame height to obtain those btu's.

Don't mean to sound picky but you are going about it all wrong and are headed for either disaster or being a frequent poster here of why you can't get your basement hot. Then, putting any pellet heater in an unfinished basement with cement block walls will be a waste of pellets and money since you'll spend it all trying to heat those uninsulated walls and floor. My suggestion > forget about it unless you want a semi-warm room.

Of course, as I say to ANYONE from Pennsylvania, 'why would you want a pellet stove that only puts out maybe 35,000 btu's when you can get a coal stoker for about the same price and get three times the btu's for the same amount of money as you would be spending on pellets?" It makes absolutely no sense to me.

Harvey Schneider · Mar 12, 2014

Perhaps my application will help you get a feeling for what it takes to heat a basement with a pellet stove.
I use a small (25PDVC) pellet stove to heat my 1200 sqft, bare walled, 7.5 ft high basement. It takes a while to raise the temperature, but it will take the basement from it's natural 52 ::F

up to 72

in two to three hours. That is with it burning on max (9,9) and with a box fan helping to circulate the air.
I use a thermostat to control the stove in order to prevent undesirably high temperatures, I usually start it up and come back down in an hour when the temperature is in the mid to high 60's.
It typically costs me about 1/2 to 3/4 of a bag of pellets to heat my basement workshop for the day. Based on those numbers I am over firing the stove a little, but it comes to about 30KBTU/hr.
When I turn off the stove at the end of the day, the temperature plummets. Clearly I am not significantly heating those concrete walls and floor, just the air.
If I had it to do over, I would have gone with a slightly larger stove.

wsar10 · Mar 12, 2014

tjnamtiw said:
OK, you have, obviously, the wood stove mentality of just keep throwing more wood in to get more and more heat out. This is NOT how a pellet stove works or is to be used, PERIOD! If you just keep dumping more and more fuel into the stove, it will shut down on safeties - hopefully. If not, you will hear the sirens of the local fire company! You pick a stove with the btu output you want and THEN you set it up for the RECOMMENDED flame height to obtain those btu's.

Don't mean to sound picky but you are going about it all wrong and are headed for either disaster or being a frequent poster here of why you can't get your basement hot. Then, putting any pellet heater in an unfinished basement with cement block walls will be a waste of pellets and money since you'll spend it all trying to heat those uninsulated walls and floor. My suggestion > forget about it unless you want a semi-warm room.

Of course, as I say to ANYONE from Pennsylvania, 'why would you want a pellet stove that only puts out maybe 35,000 btu's when you can get a coal stoker for about the same price and get three times the btu's for the same amount of money as you would be spending on pellets?" It makes absolutely no sense to me.

Chimney cost, placement options, COAL dust vs pellet dust, higher potential for gases, storage.

Lake Girl · Mar 12, 2014

Insulation would probably be a good first investment especially if you are planning to spend any amount of time down there. Spray foam seems to be the best way to go for foundation walls - just get a reliable company since it is a two part process and have heard of incomplete curing (bad smells) due to improper mixing. (CBC - Go Public report I think).

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

Pennsylvania is a very big state coal is not everywhere in Pennsylvania maybe up north and out West. some townships and counties won't allow you to burn coal..what I'm really looking to do is take the chill out for periods of time during the day

tjnamtiw said:
OK, you have, obviously, the wood stove mentality of just keep throwing more wood in to get more and more heat out. This is NOT how a pellet stove works or is to be used, PERIOD! If you just keep dumping more and more fuel into the stove, it will shut down on safeties - hopefully. If not, you will hear the sirens of the local fire company! You pick a stove with the btu output you want and THEN you set it up for the RECOMMENDED flame height to obtain those btu's.

Don't mean to sound picky but you are going about it all wrong and are headed for either disaster or being a frequent poster here of why you can't get your basement hot. Then, putting any pellet heater in an unfinished basement with cement block walls will be a waste of pellets and money since you'll spend it all trying to heat those uninsulated walls and floor. My suggestion > forget about it unless you want a semi-warm room.

Of course, as I say to ANYONE from Pennsylvania, 'why would you want a pellet stove that only puts out maybe 35,000 btu's when you can get a coal stoker for about the same price and get three times the btu's for the same amount of money as you would be spending on pellets?" It makes absolutely no sense to me.

Harvey Schneider said:
Perhaps my application will help you get a feeling for what it takes to heat a basement with a pellet stove.
I use a small (25PDVC) pellet stove to heat my 1200 sqft, bare walled, 7.5 ft high basement. It takes a while to raise the temperature, but it will take the basement from it's natural 52 up to 72 in two to three hours. That is with it burning on max (9,9) and with a box fan helping to circulate the air.
I use a thermostat to control the stove in order to prevent undesirably high temperatures, I usually start it up and come back down in an hour when the temperature is in the mid to high 60's.
It typically costs me about 1/2 to 3/4 of a bag of pellets to heat my basement workshop for the day. Based on those numbers I am over firing the stove a little, but it comes to about 30KBTU/hr.
When I turn off the stove at the end of the day, the temperature plummets. Clearly I am not significantly heating those concrete walls and floor, just the air.
If I had it to do over, I would have gone with a slightly larger stove.

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

I understand I'm not gonna be able to hold the heating in a uninsulated basement .by the way I love your post this is exactly what I'm trying to do I want to take the chill out of the basement when needed..would going with the 50,000 BTU stove be better than the 34,000 btu..or would I be still be eating the same amount of pellets.

Harvey Schneider said:
Perhaps my application will help you get a feeling for what it takes to heat a basement with a pellet stove.
I use a small (25PDVC) pellet stove to heat my 1200 sqft, bare walled, 7.5 ft high basement. It takes a while to raise the temperature, but it will take the basement from it's natural 52 up to 72 in two to three hours. That is with it burning on max (9,9) and with a box fan helping to circulate the air.
I use a thermostat to control the stove in order to prevent undesirably high temperatures, I usually start it up and come back down in an hour when the temperature is in the mid to high 60's.
It typically costs me about 1/2 to 3/4 of a bag of pellets to heat my basement workshop for the day. Based on those numbers I am over firing the stove a little, but it comes to about 30KBTU/hr.
When I turn off the stove at the end of the day, the temperature plummets. Clearly I am not significantly heating those concrete walls and floor, just the air.
If I had it to do over, I would have gone with a slightly larger stove.

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

The basement only for the in-laws I won't be down there much at all.. only kidding.we created a small rec room slash play room for the kids and just want a periodically take the chill out of the air when needed

Lake Girl said:
Insulation would probably be a good first investment especially if you are planning to spend any amount of tiome down there. Spray foam seems to be the best way to go for foundation walls - just get a reliable company since it is a two part process and have heard of incomplete curing (bad smells) due to improper mixing. (CBC - Go Public report I think).

wsar10 · Mar 12, 2014

Burd said:
I understand I'm not gonna be able to hold the heating in a uninsulated basement .by the way I love your post this is exactly what I'm trying to do I want to take the chill out of the basement when needed..would going with the 50,000 BTU stove be better than the 34,000 btu..or would I be still be eating the same amount of pellets.

Even if it eats the same amount of pellets (pellets produce BTU's not stove's) It's always better to go bigger and than back it down in setting, just seems better for ANY equipment to not have it running balls to the wall !!

IIRC a pound of pellets produces 8k BTU, so to achieve 8,000 BTU you burn a pound of pellets no matter what size the stove is.

chken · Mar 12, 2014

Burd said:
Hello members
I'm new to this side of the world... I've been burning firewood for a few years now. I've been a member of hearth.com for a while and I get most of my information here.. I have a few questions I'm looking to supplement heat down in my basement with a pellet stove..
basement is a cinder block 900 square foot unfinished with 7 1/2 ceiling..

What kind of temperatures are you guys seeing out of the convention blower?
is there some sort of safety switch on the pellet stove that controls the temp?
With my wood stove the hotter I get the temperature the hotter the convention air gets..
Can this be done with the pellet stove?

Well, that's not a very large space even if it's in the basement, which means heating the concrete mass. When you say 30 or 50, I'm assuming you mean 30k to 40k, vs 40k to 50k btu stoves. You should be able to heat that space with a 30k to 40k stove. Those typically are closer to 40k.

As for safeties, I think all pellet stoves have a shutdown if exhaust vent temps get too high. I think mine is 375degrees.

Harvey Schneider · Mar 12, 2014

Burd said:
I understand I'm not gonna be able to hold the heating in a uninsulated basement .by the way I love your post this is exactly what I'm trying to do I want to take the chill out of the basement when needed..would going with the 50,000 BTU stove be better than the 34,000 btu..or would I be still be eating the same amount of pellets.

You've got to burn pellets to make heat. That should be the first law of pellet stove operation. The answer to you question is really one of efficiency. That has a little to do with the size of the stove and more to do with the design.
The advantage of the larger stove is that it can bring the space up to temperature faster than the small stove. It's just an issue of how many BTU/hr the stove can deliver.
There is another variable to consider. Some stoves work on a high/low burn principle. That is, they burn at high flame when the thermostat calls for heat and at low flame when the heat requirements are met. Other stoves work on an on/off principle. The ignite and run when heat is called for and they shut down entirely when the thermostat is satisfied. If a stove is overly large for the space and runs high/low, it may tend to overheat the space resulting in a loss of efficiency (wasted pellets). In a space that has substantial heat losses high/low will probably be fine. An on/off stove will work in almost any setting, but may have the added cost of shorter igniter life. My PDVC runs high/low and is just fine in the basement, but it is as I said a little undersized and the heat losses from the basement are substantial. I think you could get by just fine with either, but I thought that you should be aware of the difference.

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

this is great information I have the opportunity to buy the Quadra Fire Santa Fe but I believe the 34th BTU is too small. I like the option of the thermostat and the on and off insead of the high low option. I also don't want to spend the Quadra Fire kind of money for the for basement.
I sure don't want to undersize myself Nor do I want to spend a crapload of money. I

Harvey Schneider said:
You've got to burn pellets to make heat. That should be the first law of pellet stove operation. The answer to you question is really one of efficiency. That has a little to do with the size of the stove and more to do with the design.
The advantage of the larger stove is that it can bring the space up to temperature faster than the small stove. It's just an issue of how many BTU/hr the stove can deliver.
There is another variable to consider. Some stoves work on a high/low burn principle. That is, they burn at high flame when the thermostat calls for heat and at low flame when the heat requirements are met. Other stoves work on an on/off principle. The ignite and run when heat is called for and they shut down entirely when the thermostat is satisfied. If a stove is overly large for the space and runs high/low, it may tend to overheat the space resulting in a loss of efficiency (wasted pellets). In a space that has substantial heat losses high/low will probably be fine. An on/off stove will work in almost any setting, but may have the added cost of shorter igniter life. My PDVC runs high/low and is just fine in the basement, but it is as I said a little undersized and the heat losses from the basement are substantial. I think you could get by just fine with either, but I thought that you should be aware of the difference.

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

Thank for the great info

wsar10 · Mar 12, 2014

Burd said:
this is great information I have the opportunity to buy the Quadra Fire Santa Fe but I believe the 34th BTU is too small. I like the option of the thermostat and the on and off insead of the high low option. I also don't want to spend the Quadra Fire kind of money for the for basement.
I sure don't want to undersize myself Nor do I want to spend a crapload of money. I

If you have cinder block walls.....After you have them upto temp and storing heat, the room will be VERY easy to heat.

tjnamtiw · Mar 12, 2014

wsar10 said:
Chimney cost, placement options, COAL dust vs pellet dust, higher potential for gases, storage.

Chimney cost > wrong > the new stoves can have power vents external or internal. Coal dust > wrong > it's wet in the bags or when picked up/delivered. Gases? CO is CO. MODERN stoves present no more hazard than pellet stoves. Storage is actually easier for coal since it doesn't have to be stored inside.

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

I was just online looking into some of the small coal stoves pretty cool with power vents? I'm not sure if this is right for my application as most of them seem to be radiant heat instead of convection heat. do you know of a model I can look into that works like a pellet stove?stove

tjnamtiw said:
Chimney cost > wrong > the new stoves can have power vents external or internal. Coal dust > wrong > it's wet in the bags or when picked up/delivered. Gases? CO is CO. MODERN stoves present no more hazard than pellet stoves. Storage is actually easier for coal since it doesn't have to be stored inside.

wsar10 · Mar 12, 2014

tjnamtiw said:
Chimney cost > wrong > the new stoves can have power vents external or internal. Coal dust > wrong > it's wet in the bags or when picked up/delivered. Gases? CO is CO. MODERN stoves present no more hazard than pellet stoves. Storage is actually easier for coal since it doesn't have to be stored inside.

Power vents are what ? $400 PLUS the piping

.......And I think your wrong about dust (maybe not in every situation), friends of ours have a two year old stove and when they dump a bag the dust that comes off of that (around the stove, you cant really see it in the air) is a filthy black thin film vs the pellets that is fine saw dust,difference between the baseboards around his stove and those around the pellet stove is the staining over time. When they had there stove installed they had to run a chimney all the way to the roof at a cost of over $1000....... And your really gonna debate about the emissions differences between coal and pellets ;ex

As far as storage if its not in bags you gotta build a bin or have pile of filth on your property someplace, if its bags than ya got saturation of damp coal dust plus there IIRC 50 lbs, for mr that extra ten pounds with back issue's adds up.

Look I'm not against using coal, if it was applicable for us WE WOULD BURN COAL ! In fact when my oil boiler becomes a problem we are gonna replace it with a coal fired unit, I'm just relating my minimal personal experience with modern coal stoves.

Burd · Mar 12, 2014

Wow talk about a coal highjack. where's the administrators when you need them...
Trying to be funny..Coal seems to be the way to go if your interested in burning a radiant stove.I am NOT looking for a radiant stove for the basement I'm looking for a convection stove that would be safer in my situation

wsar10 · Mar 12, 2014

Burd said:
Wow talk about a coal highjack. where's the administrators when you need them...
Trying to be funny..Coal seems to be the way to go if your interested in burning a radiant stove.I am NOT looking for a radiant stove for the basement I'm looking for a convection stove that would be safer in my situation

Is your basement an open floor plan ?
If so you In my opinion you could go smaller to save some startup cost's, Like I said after you bring the materials upto temp that room will not be hard to heat Cinder block will hold temp for a LONG time especially if below grade , after that you could heat the room with a candle !! I would still go bigger, you could always vent the ceiling of the basement to the first floor to subsidize your heat upstairs.
My basement has stone walls (100yo home) and it never drops below 45 even if its 0 outside, its roughly 15 ft down and @ 20ft the ground stays around 50 ::F

at all times (hence geo-thermal), If I was to put my pellet stove down there I would only ever need to run it on 1 to keep the area at a decent temp. My crawl space on the other hand is always my concern.....

Harvey Schneider · Mar 12, 2014

wsar10 said:
you could always vent the ceiling of the basement to the first floor

An open vent between floors is not legal in most places. There are special fire stop vents that can be used, but building/fire inspectors don't like the practice.

Range of temperatures on the convention blower

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