Computer UPS for Pellet burner backup

[ChrisWNY]

I have a 5500W generator on hand that I can manually plug in through my garage and power my entire breaker in the event of a power outage, I can ready it within a few minutes. My concern is what happens if my pellet furnace is running and the power cuts out, I need something to run that stove for a few minutes (just the fan/blowers) while I ready my Generator, or begin a shut-down routine, in that case the flame usually is out within 10 minutes although the exhaust fan stays on for a longer time to ensure all exhaust has been vented. Pending that the UPS supplies enough power (the one I'm looking at supplies 810W, WAY more wattage than my pellet furnace draws even when running full blast), and can run the blowers for 15-20 minutes (we never run the pellet burner when we're not home), would there be any harm in going with a typical higher wattage/high VA 120V UPS designed to run electronics during a power failure?

http://www.amazon.com/CyberPower-CP...FI/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1294070940&sr=8-13

I've read through a few threads where others have described wiring up massive amounts of battery power, but I don't need a lot of Amp hours just to power down my furnace or switch to Generator power. At any rate, just wanted to find out if there were major issues running a typical PC UPS to power a Pellet burner for a few minutes. Thanks.

 

[Turbo-Quad]

fyi

https://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/forums/viewthread/67333/

 

[MButkus]

Any $100 UPS would do that... $200 and it'll run 1/2 hour or more. For a bits more time.

http://www.butkus.org/ups/ups.htm

 

[kofkorn]

Chris,

Spend just a few extra dollars and get the Cyberpower PFC version of the same UPS.

http://www.amazon.com/CyberPower-Ad...ef=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1294073601&sr=8-1-spell

It doesn't use the Stepped Sine waveform and will not fry your circuit board.

Read about it here:

http://www.cyberpowersystems.com/about-us/news/adaptive-sinewave-ups.html

The battery power should run you for a while as long as you are not going through an igniter startup.

Good Luck!

 

[ChrisWNY]

Thanks, kofkorn, exactly what I was looking for - the PFC UPS's are definitely preferable for sensitive electronics, I didn't realize the control boards in these pellet burners toasted so easily. Either way, I'll probably go for the unit you posted above. Thanks again.

 

[kofkorn]

I'm not certain that the one you originally posted would be a problem with your stove, but for my Englander, a clean sine wave is preferred. I've also had experience where fan motors don't seem to work as well with the stepped sine waves. They can start making odd humming and buzzing sounds.

The way I look at it, it's better to have spent a little extra now for a lot less later.

Best of luck with it. I haven't broken down to make the purchase yet myself, christmas was tough this year. But I'm going to get the 1000VA model to survive those power blips as soon as I am able.

 

[wingman1776]

I use a apc smart 1500 on my stove it is pure sine wave it also supplies surge protection and power conditioning for the stove. If you look around you can find them cheap i got mine off ebay for 50 bux.

 

[THE ROOSTER]

I thought about the very same thing to power my stove, but then I thought about what would happen if I was at work and the power went out... So instead of getting a tricked out gas powered golf cart with a lift kit and all I got a battery powered plain jane one and use that for my batteries when I'm not golfing...
two years ago it had to run my stove 10 hours until I got home and got the generator going...

 

[mascoma]

Chris,

Spend just a few extra dollars and get the Cyberpower PFC version of the same UPS.

http://www.amazon.com/CyberPower-Ad...ef=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1294073601&sr=8-1-spell

It doesn't use the Stepped Sine waveform and will not fry your circuit board.

Read about it here:

http://www.cyberpowersystems.com/about-us/news/adaptive-sinewave-ups.html

The battery power should run you for a while as long as you are not going through an igniter startup.

Good Luck!

Any idea how long this would run a stove without any igniter use???

 

[ChrisWNY]

Best thing to do is to hook up a power monitoring device to your stove, such as a Kill-A-Watt (they're $20), and monitor the power your stove is using during ignition. I'd guess a few hundred watts as the igniter requires a good deal of power to generate enough heat to ignite pellets. While your stove is operating, between the auger, fans (exhaust and blower fans), your furnace probably doesn't use much more than 50-100W, so the average 1500VA (900W or so) UPS should be able to operate most pellet stoves in normal running mode for at least an hour or so, because the UPS is only operating at a fraction of the load it is capable of handling. If you max out the load of a UPS, unless you have a LOT of battery capacity, the UPS won't last more than a few minutes.

 

[kofkorn]

Quick estimate is somewhere in the range of 30 min to 1 hr based on a 150W load. It really depends on a bunch of factors, namely how much your stove draws. Most low end UPS's won't give you much more than 10 minutes or so. But that should be enough for you to withstand those power blips and quick losses which account for the majority of your power failures.