Wiring issues

  • Active since 1995, Hearth.com is THE place on the internet for free information and advice about wood stoves, pellet stoves and other energy saving equipment.

    We strive to provide opinions, articles, discussions and history related to Hearth Products and in a more general sense, energy issues.

    We promote the EFFICIENT, RESPONSIBLE, CLEAN and SAFE use of all fuels, whether renewable or fossil.
Status
Not open for further replies.

Snowy Rivers

Minister of Fire
Feb 7, 2010
1,810
NW Oregon
My recent aquisition of an Advantage IIT required me to dig completely through its innards and what I found was disturbing.

The wiring in these things is generally not tied up or otherwise done in a neat a tidy fashion.

There were wires laying across sharp edges of sheet metal parts and generally in disarray.

Now I fully understand that this thing is not going to haul tail down a rough road and see things bouncing all over, but stuff needs to be neat and tidy when it comes to wiring.

I carefully wipped out the complete mechanical compartment with a damp rag after blowing out all the dirt, dust and collection of pellet pieces that had accumulated in there.

Next I sorted out the wires and got everything laying in a neat fashion and tied them in a bundle with small tie wraps.

Any place that the wires ran over any sharp steel parts I wrapped the wire in a piece of loom (split wrinked sutff that you can get at the parts house)


Once this was done I made sure that no wires could come into contact with any HOT surfaces such as the exhaust fan housing.


Great thing to do now that the stove is out in the open where I can crawl around the thing easily.


Most new stoves these days are fairly good , BUTTTTTTT used ones are or can be a real BAG of worms, depending on who has been fooling around inside.

When buying a used stove you can also uncover HASH like a low temp switch that has been "Jumpered " (Switch quit so someone connected the leads to get the stove running)

A scarry one is to find a high temp snap switch that has been "Jumpered" around

From personal experience I can tell you that most fan motors don't get lubed as the manual recommends.

Depending on where and how the stove is installed, many times getting to these things is a real PITA.

Another spot to check is the small spade connectors that "USUALLY" have a plasitc shield over the connector.

Some times replacement parts (aftermarket) may not have the same connectors or none at all and the previous owner or a sloppy repair person has just crimped on what they had handy.



I have seen connectors on fan motors that had nothing on them to prevent a short.

This sort of stuff can be serious and at the least cause a fuse to blow if a wire vibrates around and comes into contact with metal.

The process of moving a used stove can cause loose wires to get jiggled around and into places that they otherwise would not have if the stove had not been moved.


Its a great idea when buying a used stove to take careful tour through the mechanical compartment once you get it home and before you drag it into the house.

Far easier to do all the cleaning and other dirty work outside and then do a test run before you install the thing.

Any wiring issues and or other items that need attention can be dealt with easily.

These things may seem trivial, but on a cold dark nasty night when the stove stops working due to a shorted wire or other issue, the small amount of time to have done some Preventive mainteance will be nothing compared to having to do it when you need the stove.


Just some thoughts.


Snowy
 
All good thoughts. I have a mess of stoves in the shop and recently took to task cleaning all of the wiring up. I was surprised to see how many wires I found on 6 stoves that had bare metal showing somewhere. Almost every stove had something that could go wrong electronically. I found 2l low limit switches where the plastic was so brittle that removing them caused them to break. Fun stuff.
 
Thanks Snowy.

Good thoughts !!
 
Yeah Snowy... I'm itching to tear into the Whitfield that I picked up on Sunday. But not going to till I get some other projects out of the way first.

I'll be doing the whole "goin over" on it.

It's an Insert, so I have had a pretty good look "under the hood" but I'll take her all the way down while she's still out of the house.

This one is 5 years newer than the previous one I looked at and this owner accepted my price offer.

I am amazed how nice this stove is at 15 years old! Under the hood, very little dust, no dirt, rust or hot spot marks and such!

Seen signs of motors having been oiled as some light dust had collected around ports where oil had creped.

IMO very low mileage unit.

Someone made a note in manual of a snap switch being replaced. And described it as the Low Limit (N/O) but wrote the part number for the High Limit (N/C)
and the room blower blows constant. ;( Bass Ackwards!!!
 
one think you want to think about when you are cleaning up the wires is to make sure you leave the connectors for the blower and auger motor free or easy to get to so you can disconnect them with ease when you are pulling the blowers every year to clean. with out haveing to remove the back cover and cut zip ties.
 
Good idea to leave a little slack.

Most of the motors have short wires on them with the connector already crimped in place.


Many stoves dont get a snot run out of them like some of us :) do

My stoves stay hot 24-7 from late October to April

The Prodigy has been HOT since I installed it back in December.

I run it long enough to get the coals gone then clean it. The cast iron door will still be quite warm when I clean the thing.

Total down time, maybe 30 minutes, MAYBE

Snowy
 
Status
Not open for further replies.