Faulty Internal Heat Sensor?

[kjhorn]

Hi All,

I'm new... so I'm open to this being operator error.

I have an Englander 25-PDV. It's great! Except, after 6-7 hours of running...and every single night... the upper auger stops feeding pellets. I've called England (great tech crew!) and we decided that it had to be the vacuum switch. They're in the process of sending me a new one, but at the moment, the switch is by-passed.

When I woke up this morning, the fire was off...but there were 10 or so unburned, untouched, pellets in the burn pot. I restarted the unit (had to jiggle the auger motor a bit...but pellets flowed great after that). One more time through out the day it died, but I just quickly jiggle the upper auger motor, and it worked great again. I figured a pellet or two got stuck.

To my exasperation, the upper auger stopping occurred again tonight. It's been running all day, with a few issues, but mostly running. I waited it out...and as soon as the machine was cold, it started again. My room is not all that warm, I'm running the stove on settings 4 and 6, so the fan should be pulling most of the hot air out from the unit.

I've only had the unit for 3 weeks...but did clean it out completely this weekend in hopes of finding a stuck pellet or some such thing.

Any thoughts? Maybe it's just pellets continually getting stuck and then they happen to work their way out when the unit gets cold?

Oh, so far--I've realigned augers (but am willing to say I maybe did it wrong?); switched the auger motors; tried 6 different types of pellets. The stopping is much less frequent now... it use to only run 20 minutes or so in the beginning. I'm on the road to finding whatever will fix it!

I'm a tinkerer....so none of this is at all phasing me yet. (It stopping during a negative degree night...and I'll have some choice words)

Thank you for your help!

 

[imacman]

First of all, welcome to the forum.

Questions:

If it seems more & more like something is making the auger stop, why do you still have Englander sending you a vacuum switch? You bypassed it and the problem persists.

Have you made sure that whatever holds the auger to the motor (set screws?) are tight? When it stops, does the motor stall (stop), or is the motor still turning & the auger is slipping?

Also, what year was this stove made?

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

It is more than likely a shot auger motor or bad power connection to it.

Seems like it wasn't the vacuum switch after all.

 

[kjhorn]

If I understand your first question, the belief is the vacuum switch needs to be switched out. Until I receive the new one, this one is by-passed. If you're asking why I'm still accepting the replacement when the stove still isn't working, it's because the stove didn't stop working until their hours are closed. Am I going to call tomorrow? No, I'm back on the road for the next 3 weeks.

Depends. In the beginning, the motor completely stopped--no movement. After the vacuum switch by-pass, this afternoon the motor kept attempting to run. This evening, it stalled.

Yes, I've definitely checked everything holding anything in place. I have a bad wrist and it's difficult for me to tighten things. So, I always check three or four times to make certain that I have anything as far as it will go.

 

[kjhorn]

Smokey, we already switched out the auger motors. No change whatsoever.

I checked all of the voltage...and that checked out as well.

It definitely got MUCH better after the vacuum switch was by-passed....so I'll give them that. Before that move...I couldn't run the stove for an hour straight.

Thanks to everyone for their help!

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

There have been more than a few augers go bad. It is usually the lower one that goes first, but if you or anyone else (I don't know if this is a new or new to you stove aka used ) have been switching them it will be hard to tell.

As imacman has already said if the coupling is loose they won't work right and I see you are playing with the alignment, and then there is bridging.

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

What is showing for an error code if any?

 

[kjhorn]

No error code.

It's a brand new stove--built in July 2011. We didn't switch any augers around...but did realign them. It going bad is a complete possibility. It would have been right "out of the box". I didn't even think of it because of that.

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

I meant auger motors not the augers.

One of the other things that has happened is that pellets don't make the turn into the drop from the top to bottom auger, was the top auger loaded up?

 

[kjhorn]

It happens at varying load levels. When I could get it to run for 20 minutes or so, I'd only put in a pound or two, but it was no different if it was full.

Now, though, it usually will make it 6 hours or so before "stalling" (for a lack of a better term). I did clean out the burn pot, and usually do every time it stalls. Needless to say, until recently it hasn't had the opportunity to really build-up any amount of ash.

I'm open to pellets not making the turn to the lower auger. Any way of fixing or helping that?

Thank you to all again.

 

[DexterDay]

High temp. Overlimit switch. My old Englander (16 yrs old) will do this. It will shut itself down if it gets to Hot. Only happened twice. Too high of heat setting and too low blower setting. Shuts top auger down.

Might not be it. But possible. My high temp (only safety switch) is on the backside of stove. I just run convection blower on high. No matter the heat setting.

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

It happens at varying load levels. When I could get it to run for 20 minutes or so, I'd only put in a pound or two, but it was no different if it was full.

Now, though, it usually will make it 6 hours or so before "stalling" (for a lack of a better term). I did clean out the burn pot, and usually do every time it stalls. Needless to say, until recently it hasn't had the opportunity to really build-up any amount of ash.

I'm open to pellets not making the turn to the lower auger. Any way of fixing or helping that?

Thank you to all again.

By loaded up I was talking about the full auger length.

It required a bit of metal work, now what should I use to search for that thread. Found it: https://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/forums/viewthread/52208/

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

High temp. Overlimit switch. My old Englander (16 yrs old) will do this. It will shut itself down if it gets to Hot. Only happened twice. Too high of heat setting and too low blower setting. Shuts top auger down.

Might not be it. But possible. My high temp (only safety switch) is on the backside of stove. I just run convection blower on high. No matter the heat setting.

It should toss an E-3 if the high temp limit is detected.