Lifespan of Pellet Stoves in Greenhouses

[frei7547]

Hello,
Does anyone have experience with or seeing pellet stoves that operate in high humidity areas such as a greenhouse? I have an old St Croix Prescott EXL that has heated a greenhouse for a couple of years and I'm wondering if corrosion and rusting is something that people have dealt with or how much it may shorten the lifespan of a unit. Currently, I'm thinking about upgrading the faulty control board. Mainly with my older unit I'm worried about replacing parts that are already discontinued and may get hard to find in the future
Thanks

 

[heat seeker]

I have no direct experience in a greenhouse, but I would think that while the stove is running, its heat would prevent moisture damage, especially if the control was in a heated and dry atmosphere. During the summer, however, with the stove off, I would expect moisture to wreak havoc on the stove and the electronics. There is a lot of bare metal in the stove, and electronics just don't like damp environments.

 

[Overfireinthehole]

Your best option if you really want to heat your greenhouse with a pellet stove is to remove the unit during warm months and clean it thoroughly before putting it in storage. Try not to let it sit with pellets in it not being used for more than a week. I’d touch up any rust spots with high heat paint before they get out of control. They definitely can turn into rust buckets really fast in a high humidity area like that. I have a few customers that use heatilator pellet stoves for their greenhouses and they are all covered in rust and constantly having clogged augers when they first go to use them after the pellets have sat for a while in the hopper. That being said, we have one in the greenhouse at the store that we’ve been using for about 8 years so it really just comes down to maintaining your stove. The worst application I’ve ever seen for a pellet stove is a customer I have who uses two pellet stoves to heat his pool room. He’s currently on his second set of stoves after rusting our two Breckwell Big Es after about 4 years. He switched to Quad CB 1200s this year so we will see if they do any better.