St. Croix "SmartStat" system

[ylomnstr]

I'm totally confused with this SmartStat system. I just got a St. Croix, and I'm going to be hooking up a thermostat to it. Perhaps I need it broken down in simple terms for me. The manual says that the stove is setup in SmartStat mode. It says when heat is only needed occasionally. The stove shuts down after piloting for one hour. What does that mean? Does that mean that right now, with no thermostat hooked up, the stove shuts down after running for an hour? I don't think that's what it means, but what do I know?

Then it says to use a thermostat, I have to remove a jumper (easy enough) to remove the SmartStat system.

Maybe someone who isn't as dumb as me can break this all down for me? Thanks

 

[imacman]

Why don't you send a PM to "MKMH". He's pretty active on this site, and he has a St. Croix

 

[DiggerJim]

St. Croix models operate on 3 modes - a manual mode, thermostat mode and their "smartstat" mode. Manual mode is where you controll it all from the stove's control panel - it goes on when you push the on button and off when you turn it off. It's blower speed and heat level are set by you pushing the buttons.

In Thermostat mode the thermostat controls when the stove fires up to higher feed rates/blower speeds (you set it for instance at high blower & auger feed) and when the room reaches temperature the stove drops down to low until the next time the thermostat calls for heat and then it will return to high (or whatever you set the stove for). It won't turn off (no fire, no pellets) until you hit the off button. This is the mode some stoves use for "thermostat" mode so that you're not turning it on & off several times/day which some people believe shortens the life of the igniter. But you don't want this in the "hump" months when it's not cold enough to run the stove 24x7.

In Smartstat mode the stove fires up when the thermostat calls for heat and then drops to low when the thermostat registers enough temperature rise. Then it stays on low for an hour waiting for the thermostat to call for heat again. If it does (in cold weather) then it just ramps the fire back up. If it doesn't call for heat again in an hour (like the Sept/Oct/Mar/Apr hump months), then it turns off until the thermostat calls for heat again. This is a compromise postion between the thermostat cycling it on & off a lot (and potentially shortening the igniter lifespan) and staying 24x7 and overheating the house. Leave it on Smartstat - it will switch to 24x7 on behavior (like normal thermostat mode) when it senses that the recycle times are getting too close together to warrant turning it off.

 

[hossthehermit]

DiggerJim has it right. Thanks for saving me from typing all that

 

[ylomnstr]

Thanks Digger. You should send that to St. Croix to add to their manual

 

[mkmh]

Thanks Digger. You should send that to St. Croix to add to their manual

Which manual do you have? I have a 27 page PDF copy that does have this information. My printed manual that came with the stove didn't have this though.
Feel free to drop me a note if you'd like me to e-mail this to you.

 

[ylomnstr]

I've got the PDF's too, but I believe the PDF is for the new style of control board which has a switch to change these modes. My stove apparently sat at the dealer or in a warehouse for a while because when I called St. Croix, he determined I had the old control board style.

 

[woodsman23]

Digger, I could not have explained it better myself.! great job.

 

[I love cheap heat]

The Smartstat system allows your stove to shut down if the themostat does not call for heat for more than an hour (Mild Weather). It will restart the next time the thermostat calls for heat. If the thermostat calls for heat regularly (Cold Weather), the stove will never shut down. This is exactly the way you want your stove to operate, the control board "knows" when to shut down and when to keep the stove burning. Buy a wireless thermostat and connect the receiver to the thermostat terminal on the back of the stove, leave it in Smartstat mode and your stove will do the rest. Happy Burning!!

 

[DiggerJim]

Thanks Digger. You should send that to St. Croix to add to their manual

It's there. I was looking at a St. Croix York when I got my insert so I spent some time figuring out if I wanted this feature (no one else seemed to have it) and whether I could live without it if I couldn't get the stove (which turned out to be yes because I couldn't get the stove until "December" )

 

[mkmh]

I've got the PDF's too, but I believe the PDF is for the new style of control board which has a switch to change these modes. My stove apparently sat at the dealer or in a warehouse for a while because when I called St. Croix, he determined I had the old control board style.

Gotcha, that is what I have as well. I had to manually move the jumper to get into thermostat mode. Honestly I was never thrilled with my results in Smartstat mode. I didn't like that the stove seemed to be cycling a lot, so I basically just use the thermostat now for auto start and auto shutdown at specific times. So I have it programmed to start shutting down at 10 PM and then to turn back on at 4 AM. This works well for us most nights, but when I see that we're getting down to single digits i'll override the thermostat and just set the stove to low through the nights.
It'll take you a season or so to figure out what works best for you.

 

[hossthehermit]

I have an el-cheapo wall thermostat for my Revolution, and the few burns I've had seems to work fine, but understand (finally) the advantages of a wireless on a free standing unit. Revolution has the slide to switch from tstat to smartstat. Have been leaving it on smart for the last two weeks, think it's kicked on three times. Running on tstat this time of year seems to be way too much, runs in pilot mode all the time, house gets wayyy too hot.