New issue with Quadrafire Mt Vernon AE -- stuck in Autoclean???

[Bob Barciszewski]

Hi all,
Hope to find an answer to my issue here. New member and was told by my local dealer that this is "THE PLACE" for great help....just wish they were

Anyway, I'm a happy owner of a Mt Vernon AE...at least til now. Here's the story...
I inadvertently put a "damp" bag of pellets in the stove 3 nights ago before bedtime. I woke up at 6 am Friday morning to a house full of smoke!. I went to the basement and the convection fan was blowing, no flame, and smoldering smoke coming out of the pellet hopper. I scooped the rest of the pellets out of the bin to get down to the smoldering pellets (half a bucket). When I got to the auger, there was red embers all in the auger chute...when I got to it, it gave it enough air to ignite a small fire. I quickly sucked the buring pellets out with the ash vac. At this time, the convection blower kicked on high, still no fire or combustion blower going. The stove was empty, no fire, no pellets, all cleaned out. The convection blower ran for about 5-7 minutes on high then shut off... I thought all was going to be good now. The wall control then showed 2 errors, comb blower and conv blower. I couldn't make the wall control do anything so I figured the next thing to do was unplug and re-plug to clear the issues... Well, it cleared those errors but now, here's where I'm stuck.... The autoclean comes up on the wall control and the door open and hopper lid open icons alternate back and forth. The stove does NOTHING. It does not start an autoclean cycle, no combustion blower, nothing.... I tried the unplug/re-plug 3-4 more times and let it sit for quite a while. Same thing each time now. Cleaned and made sure the door and hopper sensors were intact and touching...nothing works. any suggestions? I've searched and searched the internet, tried my local dealer (no service techs), and have a call into the closest dealer with techs (70 miles away). I really don't want to pay for a tech to come out and look at it...but may have to. Any ideas you guys can give me to see if I can reset something or what could be the issue..

Thanks for the help,
Bob

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

Call your dealer.

You had a hopper fire which usually also means other things were also damaged.

That stove needs a good going over as well as a through cleaning.

 

[Bob Barciszewski]

Call your dealer.

You had a hopper fire which usually also means other things were also damaged.

That stove needs a good going over as well as a through cleaning.

I't clean...very clean..unfortunately, it just did a major clean a couple days before "the incident"...
....I'm to the point where I'm going to start checking all the sensors with a fluke...see if I can pin-point the issue...only real kicker is, I can check pretty much everything but the board...

Was hoping that someone may have had the same issue (non-error code malfunction) and could share the fix...

 

[smoke show]

Especially cause the hopper is plastic. Isn't it the dealers responsiblity to fix your stove under the warranty?

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

You are going to have to verify that your wiring harness didn't get damaged.

Tear down your auto cleaning burn pot and reassemble it after cleaning and applying antisieze compound. Verify that the motor and its linkage isn't fried or warped etc. and still works

Then you have to take stock of your hooper, all fasteners, verify your auger system etc....

In short you may need to replace most of the parts inside your stove.

 

[BIGISLANDHIKERS]

i have to ask, at what point did you realize that you put damp pellets in your stove?

 

[Bob Barciszewski]

i have to ask, at what point did you realize that you put damp pellets in your stove?

Well,
unfortunately it wasn't until that morning...never had that problem before. I store my pellets in the unfinished side of the basement. This was the bottom bag in a stack on the floor. I've burned over 20 tons of pellets in the last 6 years and never had a problem with it....guess I have to stack them on a pallets in the basement because apparently this bag absorbed too much moisture...or it was damp when I bought it and never dried out.

 

[BIGISLANDHIKERS]

if the stove is still under warranty im afraid feeding it wet pellets wont be covered.
how wet were the pellets? most of the wet pellets ive seen are all expanded soft and would gum up the auger.
did you put any water or use a fire extinguisher on the hopper fire?

 

[smoke show]

ooops I see the stove is not under warranty. Is there obvious damage?

 

[Burt]

As a newb in this game are there other things that cause a hopper fires?

 

[L Free Or Die]

Bob,

Did you ever resolve this issue? What did you end up having to do? My stove is currently stuck on Autoclean and showing that the front door and the hopper are open, but they are not. Any help would greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Colin

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

Bob,

Did you ever resolve this issue? What did you end up having to do? My stove is currently stuck on Autoclean and showing that the front door and the hopper are open, but they are not. Any help would greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Colin

What year is your AE and is the auto clean issue the only thing that you have going on, that is it wasn't a possible result of a hopper fire induced damage.

You added on to a 2 year old thread that was the only thread posted to by the OP on his first and last visit to the site..

 

[L Free Or Die]

I am not sure the year. The stove was there when I bought the house.

I know this thread is old but when I googled the issues I found this thread and I had a similar issue to Bob. It wasn't a hopper fire but the pellets seemed to gum up in the Auger and the pellets heated all the way up into the hopper. Fortunately I was home and was able to clean it etc before it got to a fire. Just had a lot of smoke.

I think it was from the pellets. I don't normally buy Pellets from Home Depot but did because I had a gift card and I regret ever since. I have never had issues with the stove. I didn't like the way those pellets felt but figured it would still burn maybe just not as hot.

So now the stove is stuck in autoclean with the open door messages stuck on. I have unplugged it, plugged it back in etc etc. I can't seem to get the error to fix.

Any thoughts? Is it something I can do myself or do I need to have a service tech come out?

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

I am not sure the year. The stove was there when I bought the house.

I know this thread is old but when I googled the issues I found this thread and I had a similar issue to Bob. It wasn't a hopper fire but the pellets seemed to gum up in the Auger and the pellets heated all the way up into the hopper. Fortunately I was home and was able to clean it etc before it got to a fire. Just had a lot of smoke.

I think it was from the pellets. I don't normally buy Pellets from Home Depot but did because I had a gift card and I regret ever since. I have never had issues with the stove. I didn't like the way those pellets felt but figured it would still burn maybe just not as hot.

So now the stove is stuck in autoclean with the open door messages stuck on. I have unplugged it, plugged it back in etc etc. I can't seem to get the error to fix.

Any thoughts? Is it something I can do myself or do I need to have a service tech come out?

You were burning back which is the fuse that lights off a hopper fire.

Most stoves do a very good job of confining even a full blown hopper fire if installed properly, however confining doesn't mean that the stove will work once properly cleaned.

You make case number three on here in the last month that I have seen.

It can also cause all kinds of damage to the other parts of the stove.

That stove needs a qualified tech to go over it before you try to do anything more with it.

It will at the very least need a complete cleaning and you likely do not know what that involves, followed by a full inspection of all parts of the stove to determine if they were affected or are working properly.

Your call, I know what mine would be. I would want a factory trained tech to do the work.

 

[L Free Or Die]

Thanks, I agree. I just didn't know if it was an easy fix like a safety switch that was tripped or something like that.

Most likely I will got with have a trained Tech fix it.

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

Excellent.