How Smokey the house ! ! ! ! ! ! ! OH $#it

Yesterday was a beautiful sunny day albeit a tad chilly, and time to give the big Whit a quick "HOT CLEAN"

This is when I shut down and as soon as the fire is out clear the fire box, pot and do a quicky on the glass just as soon as it's not hot, as opposed to a cold clean when she is stone cold and we go after the baffles and everything.

I get it all done in a jiffy and go to toss a fire back in and THEN IT HAPPENS

I press the start button and the fan comes on (I stand by the RH front side by the door) I stuff the torch into a handful of pellets in the pot and get them going, then close the door.

The fire does not "Brisk up" but rather falters and goes out and then the smoke starts pouring out

Oh !!@#$%, Immediately its obvious that the draft fan had not spun up, but the first order of business is this huge cloud of smoke pouring out of the stove.

I open the door, grab the fire pot (grate) and toss the smoldering pile into my cleaning bucket and haul butt out on the deck and toss the contents off on the ground.

Toooooooooooooooo late, the house is all skunked up.

Grab the kitty and toss her in the bathroom (indoor only type) and get windows and doors open to vent the stench.

GAWD, WHAT A PITA.

OK now to see what happened.

Open the side panel and turn the power back on, ahhhhh hah, the draft fan is struggling to turn.

Get out the 0-20 synthetic motor oil and give the bushings several drops each and carefully turn the motor with a small screw driver through the cooling fan housing grille.

Shortly the fan frees up and a retry of the power has it spinning along dandy.

Bottom line, this should not have happened as far as I'm concerned ! ! ! !

The fan was lubed just before seasons end and we have barely started running the big Whit, so the sleeve bearings should have been fine.

Obviously not.

The Adv 2 T that we recently picked up cheap suffered the same malady, a STUCK combustion blower motor.

All the new motors are ball bearing type, so a new unit is on the list of TO DO items.

The stove had been running fine, but during the cool down period the sleeve bearing likely shrunk some with the heat loss and then the lube was sticky enough or ??? that the motor could not spin freely.

To anyone running a stove with a sleeve type (needs oil) bearing combustion fan motor, increase your lube schedule to every couple months during season.

This does not mean DROWN the motor with oil, but a couple small drops in each port will keep things happy.

Fasco recommends Anderol synthetic.

I have no clue if that stuff is any better than other light oils, but some oil is better than NO OIL.

An oil that will withstand high heat is the ticket though.

Myself, I am going to replace the combustion fan/motor with a new ball bearing unit.

The old one has been there since 1992 and It seems reasonable to change out this "Mission critical" part, even though lube has gotten it up and going.

Likely keep the old one as a fall back to get by if need be in a pinch.

Looking at the various types/makes/models of draft fans available.

Fasco offers a new upgraded ball bearing motor as does Gleason Avery

The Fasco is a closed frame (Round) motor that looks just like the old one, other than the ball bearings.

The G A is an open frame type, which I am leaning towards heavily as it should run cooler and the bearings are less "closed in" and will likely retain less conducted heat.

We will see.

Have a great holiday, and go lube your draft fan bearings

Snowy

 

Sorry to hear about the breakdown Snowy. I always lubed the conv. motor bearing during every monthly cleaning......just 2 drops. Never had to replace or "unstick" a seized-up motor. And all I ever used was the 3 in 1 Blue can.

Glad she's up & running......

 

That sucks Snowy!!! I have a couple combustion fans and a convection fan that has sleeve "bearings" (always thought that is a funny term as it's really a bushing) Anyway, only had them a couple years but so far so good, I just keep them lubed. Had some issues with the fans that have the roller bearings as it seemed the heat would eventually get to them and they would start squealing. I guess sometimes it's six of one and half a dozen on the other....sometimes you just can't win!

 

Even though they're "sealed", I always tried to get some oil to "soak" it's way into the bearings......don't know if it actually did, but never had one go "dry" or squeal.

 

I am still at a loss for a "Bottom line" answer.

I'm looking at all options right now, and still have not ordered a fresh anything as yet.

I am not happy though that the Adv 2 T does not have a vacuum switch on the fire box.

My refit is very likely gonna get one added into the auger circuit with a green panel lamp showing that the combustion fan is running.

I will never go through the same screw up as yesterday, by simply paying closer attention.

But, having a fan go off while we are away or asleep could be nasty.

Easy to add a vacuum switch with a lamp.

Wire the thing into the feed to the cycle timer that runs the auger.
No power, no auger, no panel lamp = easy diagnostics.

Ahhhh, no smokey house either

Snowy

 

Sorry to hear of the issues with the Whit. Not a good day for it, especially if you have company coming over or had planned on going out somewhere. Glad you are the type of person who can power thru and figure out the issue and think of way to not only fix the problem, but to come up with ingenious answers to keeping it from happening again.

 

Glad things got back on track, sadly enough you had to go through the stench of smoke. I do not know enough of the Whitfield stoves or your vent arrangements, I think I seen it somewhere it's a straight out vent. A good draft in the vent should of taken care of the smoke or am I way off base? It could be another thing to look into for future improvements.

 

We have had power outages and things just die out and with little bother.
This was a cold start up, and with the draft fan not running and the room air fan running it created a slight negative pressure in the cabinet and sucked the smoke from the smoldering pellets back down the air tube under the pot and then into the room.

Had this been a draft fan failure during a running stove up to full heat things could have gotten real ugly.

We have a direct vent out the wall, so there is little natural draft, and the stove must have an active draft fan.

For this reason I am going to do some testing with the magnahelic gauge and find a good spot in the exhaust passage to install a fitting to connect a vacuum switch.

With this, any failures of the draft fan will stop the auger motor completely, and within a short time the low limit switch will shut the unit down due to no fire.

Pretty much eliminates a bad smoke job in the house.

The vacuum switch can be added to the current pressure switch circuit and in conjunction with the safety of the pressure switch during a plugged flue incident, a no draft situation will limit any issues with smoking the house all up.

I am surprised that this was not thought of by Whitfield.

REALLY make a stinky mess if the draft fan stops

Snowy

 

Just curious Snowy.....what not add 3-4' of vertical outside?....helps remove the smoke during shutdowns/power losses.

 

good thing to try, but Ive never seen a big difference.....

 

My main reason for the straight direct vent is simple.

"Walk up to vent, remove cap, stick on the leaf blower, let it howl a bit till the blow is clear, stuff the brush in and out a couple times, re-run the leafer, replace cap, DONE"

The issue of smoke in the room on a power outage is minimal at worst and generally nothing more than a slight "Whiff"

My worries after the issue the other day are still the worst case scenario, if the draft fan fails and the auger continues to feed to a smoldering fire.

Most newer stoves have a vacuum switch connected to the fire box that will not allow feeding if the draft fan fails or the door is opened.

The old Whit only has a pressure switch to stop things if the vent plugs up.

Also, where my vent is there is really no good way to add a stack that would do much.

The other issue is that the route of the gas flow is up from the grate, through the heat exchange tubes, then down into the primary ash baffles, then back up and through a slot and into the secondary ash traps and down to the main vent chamber, then sideways (towards the left side of the stove) to the draft fan housing and then out the rear of the stove near the bottom left.

A very tortuous path without a good fan sucking it out.

Even with a tall stack, the incident the other day would have doubtfully ended better, as the stack was cold and would have offered little if any help.
The room air fans were generating a negative pressure (slight) in the cabinet and it was far easier for the smoke to back flow only about 12" into the cabinet and then into the room air fan.

A stove that has all the flow up and out the top would be far different for sure.

Just a little BUG A BOO that I need to fix.

Had I realized that the draft fan had not started I would not have lit the fuel and hence the issue would never have happened.

Even with a vacuum switch in the system, this same FUBAR could happen.

OPERATOR ERROR is the real reason.

Hence the addition of a GREEN lamp on the panel to indicate that the fan is running.
REAL VACUUM IN THE EXHAUST PLENUM and not just power to the motor.

The motor had power and was trying to turn all along.

Buttttt, ya gotta look at the lamp as well

No biggy, just need to change the protocols a bit is all

 

IF the stove had a tall vent, AND there was a power outage AFTER the fire and vent was HOT the natural draft might help on this unit.


The basic designs of most pellet stoves still requires a mechanical assist to extract combustion gases.

Whitfield tried the Prodigy 1 without a draft fan and the unit required a tall chimney.

Was a real iffy thing.

Snowy

 

...and other issues....tall vents usually would require a screen (spark arrestor) to keep wayward birds out during the off-season....this screen should be frequently checked and cleaned....and therein lies the rub. If the end of the pipe is inaccessible, no one cleans it. They tend to clog off with fly ash, creating air issues, eventually causing the unit to fail on the coldest, snowiest evening, when that dang hearth guy just isn't available! Also factor in pulling air thru a dirty vent, thru the air holes in the burn pot, thru a stopped fan, theu a closed intake damper, and I think you'll find your stove still smokes. Best you can do is check gasketing, replace where necessary, don't open the door....any doors.
Now, I've only checked Harman units, but with a draft gauge, I found no difference in draft after the power stops between a minimal run of pipe (horizontal out), and 3' of vertical.....both drafts absolutely negligible within a minute, on a draft gauge reading down to the hundredths of inches...other stoves may vary, as well as longer runs of piping. Of course with longer pipe, you need to worry about dirty pipe, etc.....I guess you pick your poison!

 

That makes sense LW - learned something new today. Always learn something new when Snowy posts too. (Reminder to self: keep those motors lubricated during the season.)

 

yep! lube those motors!

 

Another issue to mull over.

The draft fan shaft extends through a hole in the mounting plate.
The shaft is 5/16" in diameter and the hole is approx 1/2" and there is no seal on any of these.

That gap alone can allow a metric buttload of smoke to vent into the room if the fan has stopped creating a neg pressure in the fan housing.

The other area is the air inlet tube that is open to the bottom of the fire pot/grate
This tube on the Whit is about 1-1/4" diameter and can literally allow huge amounts of smoke to vent back out into the room.

Bottom line, the fan has to run for the system to work right.

There really is not much of a stop gap to get around the way these beasts work.

Negative firebox pressure is the key phrase here troops.

On a stove that has a top flow exhaust without any up down cycles through baffles would probably fare far better than those like the whit that are bottom flow types.