My Install - St. Croix Revolution

[John Wallington]

I have an 1800 s.f. ranch and the Revolution, when running correctly, heats my entire house. I recently had 2" of rigid insulation put on the exterior, all new windows and doors and new vinyl siding and it cut my pellet use from around 7 tons to around 3 tons. It is installed in the basement and tied into the duct work for the entire house. I am running 2 thermostats, Pellet on 72, and Propane on 64. The propane never runs. I am currently on Program 2, Heat Setting 3 and it is maintaining 74 in the house, even with the thermostat setting. I need to turn it down a bit but we are still getting 40's during the day and 20's at night.

I have the supply and return for the pellet furnace run into the cold air side of the propane furnace with a damper in between. The damper is closed about 60% when running the pellet furnace due to the CFM Differences between the 2 fans. The pellet stove is approx 1000 cfm and the propane is approx 1400 cfm. So 1000 CFM runs through the 12" diameter pipe and the additional 400 cfm is allowed to pass by and just cycles. The second picture is the relay's I have set up so when the pellet fan comes on it turns the fan on in propane furnace...

Future improvements:
Motorized damper so when the pellet furnace goes off and the propane furnace comes on it opens the damper in the return and bypasses the pellet furnace completely.
Another set of relays so I can turn on the humidifier with the pellet furnace controls.

 

[DonD]

Nice looking furnace install! I hope to do something similar some day. Either a St. Croix Revolution or a Fahrenheit Endurance. Any particular reason you chose one over the other?

 

[John Wallington]

I chose the Revolution because it was the one I saw that did what I wanted when I installed it...also I got a decent price on it, even though it was the first year it came out and the government gave me a 1500 dollar tax credit that year...which figured out to a tax refund that paid for more than half the cost of the stove.

I didnt know anything about the Endurance, but the Revolution was a self starter, worked on a thermostat, was a furnace rather than stove, gave me the BTU's i needed, and until I had the problem with my auger, it was very reliable and ran like a champ. Now that I have it run through the propane furnace/fan, I have enough head pressure on my duct system to move the heat to the far end of the house as well. The one day I got it to run so far this season it heated the house like a champ on setting 2 - 2, which is beautiful...and with the TSTAT option it maintains the temperature as well. The only downside I have, is that i put a cheap programmable thermostat on it and between the 2 stats (propane/pellet) there is a 4 degree difference...and they are on the wall directly next to each other..

 

[DexterDay]

Very nice. I like how you installed the relays to kick on lp blower...

As for the Endurance. It is an Auto ignite/ runs on a stat/ self cleaner (kinda like the Revolution, but slightly different)/ and its a 50,000 BTU furnace w/ 800 CFM distribution blower. . Looks similar to the 050-SCF and Revolution.

Here is a Pic of mine. Cold air is Not hooked up. But I have a Woodstove in the basement and can get it to 90° in short order. So the furnace sucks this Hot air and distributes it upstairs. It works well for me. Almost 2,200 upstairs and 800 uninsulated downstairs.

 

[John Wallington]

Yeah, I probably voided my warranty, because the book says distinctly not to do that, but they are also thinking of the pellet furnace as 'supplemental' heat and my pellet furnace is far from supplemental anything when it is running right, it can go up to 65k BTUs on program 4, heat setting 5. The other nice thing about the Revolution, which i am not sure about yours, is the ability to burn anything. Wheat, Cherry Pits, Corn, Rye, Wood Pellets...with nothing more than changing the fuel...

When i first hooked it up, i hooked it up exactly according to the book, the supply was run into the supply, both furnaces had backdraft dampers, and it worked...as long as I was drawing my return directly from my basement. The second I hooked the return up to the house returns, there was too much head pressure to get adequate air flow that way...i had it hooked up that way. so i moved them around and ran them in series, rather than parallel. and used the blower on the propane fan....now I just set my pellet furnace at 70 and put the propane at 62. If the pellet goes out, the propane kicks on and keeps the house at 62. So if i forget to put pellets in, I am covered...the house will never freeze.

Everyone I talked to told me to get a supplemental fan...but there are 2 types of those...the round ones that go in the ends of the ducts and those dont do much and i would need one for every single run and there are about 20 runs in my house. Or the ones that go in the main trunk, but i only found those at around 300 cfm. which wasnt enough to do what i needed and they run like 3-400 dollars....and i figured i could do it cheaper. The relays, i bought solid state, rather than old fashion single throw mechanical ones, ran about 30 dollars each. So i got around 60-70 bucks in the relays...and it works like a champ...

 

[DexterDay]

Yeah. Endurance has a self cleaning pot and Burns a multitude of fuels.

I haven't burned LP in 5 yrs. Eo Supplemental isn't an Option. I have a Newer Trane LP furnace. But choose not to use it.

The 50,000 BTU and 800 CFM is plenty for my application. I don't even use the Endurance until its under 30° outside. As the Furnace is Too Much on Low. I only have it set to level 3 (out of 5). But it doesn't hardly hit 3 (stat calls for heat) unless its below that. So I use the freestanding Quad upstairs on days above 30° and the Furnace below that (Never use them together/Way to Hot ).

I do however use the woodstove on most days (work and kids schedule). I do not have the return air hooked up, but like I said above, my situation is unique with the wood burner near the furnace.

Thanks for the Pics.