Programmable Thermostat on Avalon Cypress

[dabramov]

Hi,

We're going to be purchasing a free standing DV gas stove to heat a large extension (with lots of windows...) to our house. The room doubles as a both living room and a casual dining area.

Our leading contended is the Avalon Cypress GreenSmart. 40K BTU, looks nice. We want to have the thermostat on the timer - have the room come up to living temperature in the AM, and drop back down to something colder overnight. However, there doesn't appear to be a programmable thermostat option from the manufacturer.

Does anyone have any knowledge if the Skytech 3301P would work with this system? If so are there any downsides to go with a 3rd party controller?

http://www.avalonfirestyles.com/product-detail.aspx?model=405

Also, our requirements are a modern look and high output (>30K), plus the programmable thermostat. I'd be open to suggestions if there are good alternatives!

Thanks in advance,
Dan

 

[DAKSY]

I don't see why a Skytech remote (any of them) won't work with this unit. If you can hook up a thermostat,
you can hook up a remote, as long as you are using a millivolt remote.
Compatibility can be confirmed if you call Skytech...888-672-8929

 

[dabramov]

Thanks for the reply. Alas, both Skytech and Travis Industries (Avalon) were rather non-committal when I contacted them. No one wants to take "responsibility" if it doesn't work.

This stove is IPI, not millivolt. I'm totally new to this type of equipment - are these interfaces all standardized?

Who else makes universal fireplace remotes except for Skytech?

 

[DAKSY]

Not sure who else makes remotes, but IPI units don't seem to care if you use one.
I've had a Skytech 3301 on my H&G 6000TRX-I since it was installed in 04, with no issues.

 

[danimal1968]

Valor has the Madrona Contemporary stove, which superficially looks like the Cypress, and the ValorStat remote has a programmable time function that will do exactly what you want. Problem is the stove is rated for max input of 26k BTU/hr.

It's not quite as modern-looking (though certainly not old fashioned), but the Regency U39 does have the "Fire Genie" remote and/or wall thermostat that look like they are programmable to come on/off at a certain time, and its a 38k BTU/hr stove.

Just FYI, neither the Cypress nor the U39 are truly going to hit 30K BTU output if you go by the Enerchoice P4 ratings. They're both in the 70 percent range so you're going to get about 28K BTU (40K input * .7 efficiency) out of them. I know Avalon claims 84 percent or something like that but that's probably in their own tests.

 

[dabramov]

Good info. I like the having a standard rating to compare against.

Thanks for the suggestions. We just didn't like the look look of the U39. The Madrona is nice, but we're worried about the output. Actually, in slightly smaller stoves there are a couple of nice sleek options.

They don't post it on their website but I found the list of ratings for freestanding gas stoves (http://www.enerchoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/May-7-Freestanding-NG.pdf) and they did OK compared to others (70.4) but like you said, around 28K BTU output.