Has this ever happen to anyone??

[Robzheat]

I was watching tv last night when all of a sudden, my pellet stove just stopped. I was a little nervous about smoke coming into the house, but about five seconds later it started up again. I know I didn't lose power. This actually happened a least two times before, and each time i cant get the the control panel fast enough before it turns back on to see if the power lights on the panel are on.

Any ideas?????

 

[petejung]

You mean the blower just all of the sudden shuts off and comes back on? Did you hear any noises or anything right before it happened, or notice anything out of the ordinary? I wonder if there's a loose wire in there someplace?

 

[pegdot]

Do you have it on a surge protector? My first guess would be some type of power flux. For some reason we get drops here that cause the lights to dim briefly in the entire house. The power company has had loads of complaints and they say they are working on it but it's still happening. I never paid it much attention until I got my first computer. It doesn't effect any other appliance in the house, the TV blinks off but comes right back on, but it's enough to shut my computer down completely. We haven't had this happen since we installed our stove but I suspect it will do what you are discribing when it does happen again.

 

[Robzheat]

None of the lights or the tv dimmed. Yes, the combustion and distribution motor went off.

 

[eernest4]

I'm not sure what to tell you, It could be a loose wire/ bad connection/ high resistance connection/ inside the stove or equally,it could be a component in the control computer or a bad connector inside the control computer.

If the stove is plugged into a surge protector, as mine is, try replacing the surge protector as a first and cheapest & easiest step.

If the stove is still under warrantee, contact the factory service and tell them about it so as to get the complaint on file before the warantee expires.

They may not be able to find the bad connection until it happens again, especially if it is an intermittant control computer electronic component.
>
BIT OF A RAMBLE ON BELOW , but should be interesting to the mechanically orented.


Sometimes, you can find a bad wire connection by pulling on the wires gently & if you are lucky, the burnt one will come apart in your hand, but I once had on that nearly drove me nuts, as the wire inside was bad but the insulation outside held it together and it seemed ok.

I finally found it on a desperation third check of all the wires concerned.

It was one of the power wires to a 3 speed whirlpool washer motor, so that the washer would not work on normal cycle, but worked fine on gentle & permanent press cycles
because those cycles used the low & medium speed motor windings being supplied by other good wires.

i cut the end of the wire off & soldered a new terminal on to it & plugged it back into the motor and it was fine.

A government bureaucrat probably wouldn't be interested in that.
An overpaid government bureaucrat certainly wouldn't be interested in that!

 

[eernest4]

None of the lights or the tv dimmed. Yes, the combustion and distribution motor went off.

The conbustion & distribution motor went off. Then the problem is somewheres in the power feed circuit to the combustion & distribution motors.

By the way, I have never heard of a distribution motor. What function does it serve?

My stove has 3 motors
1. a combustion blower for the fire.
2. a room air circulator blower motor
3. an auger drive motor

I am guessing that you meant #2 by a distribution motor.

WAIT, I HAVE BOTH HEARD & heard of DISTRIBUTION MOTORS, late at night after every snow storm.

I think sanding trucks have distribution motors.
It is a 8, 10, 12 or 14hp gasoline engine that has a big 2 ft or 3 ft diameter distribution wheel on it.
The sand falls off of a conveigher belt onto the distribution wheel that the distribution motor spins & centrifigual force flings the sand in a 12 foot circle to distribute the sand over the parking lot or road.
Distribution motors usually run at 3,600 rpm and have no mufflers or brunt out mufflers on them & are remarkably
noisy and annoying, especially between 3am & 6 am.
BBBRRRRAAAAATTT,BBRRAATT,BBRAAT
I hate distribution motors.

 

[drizler]

Are you sure it really stopped? Mine when running on low often overruns the set switch and it simply stops blowing hot air until the heat inside builds up enough to kick in again. For it to really stop you would need the auger to stop turning as well. My advice for its ten cents worth is to just keep an eye on it and not go digging in there like a surgeon. Another thing that can affect how they run is the safety switches on things like the the bin lid. They get jammed with pieces of pellets or corn and sometimes aren't fully seated. Mine had a switch that was built like a brick craphouse but had a wandering short in it. I used to have the fire go out all the time until I simply cut the safety out of the system then wired it to a switch which is much more handy. Whenever I go looking for anything like that, especially on cars and appliances the first thing I check is the damned safety switches. They are the problem as much as 80% of the time. Every place you have one of those things is another cut out waiting for a place to happen so keep an eye on those things first and formost. Age of the machine seems no consequence and in my experience newer stuff seems to be the culpret the most often. Look for built up stuff and broken pieces of fuel in those places where the lids and doors shut and hope to heck it isn't an intermittent short or cold solder joint in the circuit board as they are a beast unable to be checked by mortal man. Not very likely though.