The woes of a New to Me Quadrafire CB1200 insert

[Jeremy15]

I have been perusing this forum for the last few months while my wife and I kicked around the idea of picking up a pellet insert to put in the fireplace of our new home. I came cross a Quadrafire Classic Bay 1200 insert last week at a price that I could not look past, so I picked it up. It has a manufacturing date of October 2009. Got everything lined up and installed this past weekend and the thing worked great for about a day and a half. Apparently when my wife got off shift yesterday morning it was off. It was not out of fuel, and she said it would not light, so she left it be and used the oil heat. So when I came home this morning I gave it a go. It started right up. I left it alone, and after about two hours the damn thing decided to shut itself off so I started to troubleshoot. I checked the vacuum line, which is clear. Tried to start it, and it would feed fine, the exhaust blower would run for about ten minutes and then the thing would shut off. It was at this point that I decided to pull it out and give it a good cleaning. Its only seen about three bags so far but I vacuumed everything out real good, checked the thermocouple, which seemed fine so I reset it in the cover. Checked the exhaust cover which was clean. Hit the button and the same thing. It feeds but does not fire. There were no blinking LEDs in the control box..

So I unplugged it and let it set for about 30 seconds. Plug it back in and hit the switch. I get a blue LED, and the unit feeds. I get a blue LED blink every 10 seconds for a minute. I check the igniter and it is warming up, and then BAM fire.. Alright, so I watch. The green LED comes on, and the unit starts to feed again.. Then the red LED. and now after about 40 minutes of the unit running perfectly fine, the convection fan has just kicked on.. I have a feeling this is some sort of intermittent issue that I am going to have to deal with. So, any ideas?

 

[Ssyko]

It may be a connection issue with the control box, sometimes i have to pull mine and reinstall it to get it going. I just ordered a new card edge connector to help with that. Sometimes quads have what we call CSS Cold Start Syndrome. After a failed start hit reset and its off to the races

 

[kappel15]

These stoves are timed. It has a certain amount of time for proof of fire, or it will go into shut down mode, and as Ssyko said above, hitting reset will restart the stove. Usually once there is some ash in the firepot, they will start up fine. I would recommend emptying the pot at least three times a day as too much ash can block the fire from starting too. The firepot thermocouples are very sensitive as far as having to be touching the inside end of the cover to read temp correctly, and positioned 3/4 to inch inside pot. And 40 minutes is way too long for the conv fan to come on. Best way to get fire is have it set on med. After stove gets going, then you can turn it to low or high. kap

 

[Jeremy15]

Thanks for the replies. The stove is still going. Funny you should mention ash in the firepot. I have been watching this intently all afternoon. It seems that every time the auger drops into the pot I get some fireworks all over the firebox. I found it interesting that earlier when I cleaned the unit, there was essentially nothing in the ash pan but the firebox was full of ash on the sides and around the top of the firepot. Is the exhaust fan blowing too strongly and not allowing any ash to actually fall into the ash pan??

 

[Jeremy15]

Please keep in mind that this is my first venture into the world of pellet stoves.. We have just moved back home from being in and out of North Carolina since 1997.. There is no need for these kinds of things down there...

 

[kappel15]

No. Fan is fine. And read your manual cover to cover. It is your best friend right now, as far as the stove is concerned. It will tell you how to set the flame height for the stove. There is a lot of info in there, and more on the internet with video's of how to do things. And some of the best advice I can give you is a clean stove, is a happy stove. Stay warm. kap

 

[Ssyko]

I get some fireworks all over the firebox.

AKA Fire Flies.