Re: Econo Stove Blower Problems

I have a Hyfire 2 and this same thing happened...feed rate was high (90+..started a couple hours earlier and was bringing house up to temp) and suddenly my wife and I noticed the blowers stopped. Tried shutting power button off and restarting soon after and they still would not go . Reached down and felt blower motors and both were verry hot to touch. Shut stove down,put box fan on motors, waited a few minutes, hit power button and fans started and ran fine. I then went and set temp setpoint down on coltron so the feedrate/blower speed would slow and the blower motors are now cool. I think the blower motors running all out for a couple hours to bring the house up to temp after starting the stove was too much of a load and exceeded their cooling ability. The motors on the fans were too hot (i could not keep my hand on one for more than a second or 2) I would like to know whats going on here,its only october here in maine with alot of colder weather to come.

cmperry wrote: The motors on the fans were too hot (i could not keep my hand on one for more than a second or 2) I would like to know whats going on here,its only october here in maine with alot of colder weather to come.

Where is the heat coming from? the burning stove, or the motors themselves? Can the blower motors be oiled/lubricated?

the actual blower motors were hot..too hot I think. once we cooled them with the fan they took off. The temp behind the stove by the motors didn't seem unusually hot. The next time I start up the stove i;m going to bring the house up in smaller increments (5 deg) on coaltrol instead of asking the stove to bring this big house up 11 degrees all at once. maybe the load asked of these 2 blower motors running 2 hours at high feed rate exceeded their cooling ability. Seemed it to me anyway.

I guess my big worry here is what will happen if this occurs when nobody is home(fr is high and convection fans quit). Is there a stove overheating issue? Would the convection motors burn up if I didn't get them cooled?

cmperry wrote:I guess my big worry here is what will happen if this occurs when nobody is home(fr is high and convection fans quit). Is there a stove overheating issue? Would the convection motors burn up if I didn't get them cooled?

In the normal course of stove operation (not trying to overcome a setback larger than 2*F or cold house and just started stove) the fan being off while you are gone shouldn't hurt anything. Based on what you said I doubt the fans shut off due to overheating, I have run these fans for 8 hours straight to warm a cold garage with no overheating. As has been previously described, being ware of the feed rate at the time of convection fan shut down is very important. If they ever quit again, you can immediately bring an extension cord over and confirm that it was not due to normal Coal-Trol operation. If they did quit on overtemp make sure all the plugs fit tightly and none of the cords are hot (except where the stove might provide some heat of course).

These stoves have been around for quite some time with no issue with overheating fans that I know of so, if they shut off at the same time, what are the odds that they both overheated??? ya gotta ask yourself.

Matthaus wrote:

cmperry wrote:I guess my big worry here is what will happen if this occurs when nobody is home(fr is high and convection fans quit). Is there a stove overheating issue? Would the convection motors burn up if I didn't get them cooled?

In the normal course of stove operation (not trying to overcome a setback larger than 2*F or cold house and just started stove) the fan being off while you are gone shouldn't hurt anything. Based on what you said I doubt the fans shut off due to overheating, I have run these fans for 8 hours straight to warm a cold garage with no overheating. As has been previously described, being ware of the feed rate at the time of convection fan shut down is very important. If they ever quit again, you can immediately bring an extension cord over and confirm that it was not due to normal Coal-Trol operation. If they did quit on overtemp make sure all the plugs fit tightly and none of the cords are hot (except where the stove might provide some heat of course).

These stoves have been around for quite some time with no issue with overheating fans that I know of so, if they shut off at the same time, what are the odds that they both overheated??? ya gotta ask yourself.

Hi, there is another member with a similar issue a few threads back "blower died" by jimc. The feed rate was high,the convection motors were running high and suddenly quit,stove kept running at high feed rate,motors were very hot. I'm not new to coal stoker stoves and this was not normal. Hopefully LL can give me and jimc some advise because I'm not sure where to begin besides limit the amount of time stove runs at high feed rate. Also they may not have stopped at the same time, I just noticed it when I heard no noise (even 1 is loud at high speed). Seems to me the outboard facing motor (one facing away from stove pipe) did start before the inboard facing on when the box fan was applied.

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, sorry if it sounded like you didn't know what you were talking about! I would still check the cords to make sure there is not something loose. Obviously something is wrong, now you just need to find it, yeah I know you were posting on here to do just that.

Have you talked with your LL dealer? If he can't help you then Jerry at LL surely can.

Matthaus wrote:hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, sorry if it sounded like you didn't know what you were talking about! I would still check the cords to make sure there is not something loose. Obviously something is wrong, now you just need to find it, yeah I know you were posting on here to do just that.

Have you talked with your LL dealer? If he can't help you then Jerry at LL surely can.

Just posting to top to see if LL/coltrol will respond to this problem or point me in the direction of an answer if ones already out there. Thanks for everyones help so far

cmperry wrote:

Matthaus wrote:hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, sorry if it sounded like you didn't know what you were talking about! I would still check the cords to make sure there is not something loose. Obviously something is wrong, now you just need to find it, yeah I know you were posting on here to do just that.

Have you talked with your LL dealer? If he can't help you then Jerry at LL surely can.

Just posting to top to see if LL/coltrol will respond to this problem or point me in the direction of an answer if ones already out there. Thanks for everyones help so far

If it happens again some things to check:

1) How are the motors getting hot? Is the fan casing hot due to conduction from the stove back it is attached to or are the motors themselves generating the heat? Is the air around the motors hot?

2) On the cover plate to the Coal-trol control module box there are two rivets. Touch in the area around and between these rivets and see how hot it is.

3) While the blowers are stopped and in the presumed overheated state, unplug the fans from the Coal-trol and plug in a single fan (like a box or floor stand fan, set to low speed) to make sure the Coal-trol is sending proper power to the fan output.

4) As an experiment, try running just one of the blowers by unplugging one of them from the coaltrol, then do what you normally do in order to make the problem occur to see if it happens.

5) Check the one or two blower fans on the stove. Is the inlet screen clear? Are the squirrel cages clear of dust and debris? On the motor side of the blower, are the air cooling holes on the side of the motor casing clear? Have you tried oiling the fan motors (instructions should be included with the stove).

Gather this info next time or two it happens and then give us a call at 315-299-3589 to discuss the issue. We should be able to determine if it is a Coal-trol issue or a fan issue and help you with the next steps.

Also, if you're running on generator power, that could be the source of your problem. I'm not sure if you were the guy with that or not though... the thread kind of went in two directions.

Alternately, run the cooling fan on low speed all the time in order to keep the motors cool and avoid the problem.

My Hyfire convection fans failed again the other night..it was a cold night (teens) and woke up to smell "stove burning off" smell. Went downstairs and found stove running along fine with a FR of around 45-50 and no convection fans blowing. Set fans up manually to 99 and still didn't go..placed a small fan on motors(were hot) and the outboard motor started,soon after inboard motor started. set fan speed back to auto and left fan on motors and ran the rest of the night. I still say the motors overheat when the demands of the stove increase (at least my stove acts this way). I don't know whats going to happen when it really gets cold out...I hope the stove doesn't need the fans to prevent overheating.

cmperry, I think you may have hit on one possible reason for the issue. During normal operation the stove does not run flat out for hours. My recommendation would be to start the stove with the Tstat at 2* under room temp, let the fire stabilize and the stove heat up. Then in 2* increments get the house up to temp. I think in this weather (warm days then cold days, stove on then off) you are expereincing out of norm conditions by trying to heat a cold house all at once.

Also as has been suggested a couple drop of oil in each motor can't hurt. Keep us posted, your issue is different from the econo fan problem with back up power but is no less important. Thanks for taking the time to post your information.

Matthaus wrote:cmperry, I think you may have hit on one possible reason for the issue. During normal operation the stove does not run flat out for hours. My recommendation would be to start the stove with the Tstat at 2* under room temp, let the fire stabilize and the stove heat up. Then in 2* increments get the house up to temp. I think in this weather (warm days then cold days, stove on then off) you are expereincing out of norm conditions by trying to heat a cold house all at once.

Also as has been suggested a couple drop of oil in each motor can't hurt. Keep us posted, your issue is different from the econo fan problem with back up power but is no less important. Thanks for taking the time to post your information.

Hi, this was normal operating conditions,just a little colder this night and the stove had to work a little harder ( the feed rate was only in the 40's). My stove has been running for over a month and it was colder (teens) 2 nights and the fans failed both nights.. The thermostat has been set to 68 and hasn't been adjusted. I had a pocono in a previous house and it worked fine/no problems, so I'm kinda familiar with how it should work. Was it concluded that this post was an electric problem or something related to the load on the convection fans. If this was indeed a generator problem than we could move my post a few down to "blower motor hot" or "blower died" post. Again, my biggest worry is the stove overheating when the fans die with a high fr on a cold night and nothing I have heard so far reassures me this isn't a concern.

cmperry, please try increasing your CFM setting to its maximum setting and seeing if that helps. It is possible the fan needs to be running faster than it is at lower FR's in order to properly cool itself. If it does help, you can try backing that CFM setting off little by little over several days to see what setting maintains a good motor temp for you.

Hi, would that be the CFT setting in the set-up menu? In my manual the max is 30...is that correct? My current CFT setting is 8.

cmperry wrote:snip..my biggest worry is the stove overheating when the fans die with a high fr on a cold night and nothing I have heard so far reassures me this isn't a concern.

I hear you and agree that nothing said so far is going to fix your issue,and as far as where this discussion gets posted we could start a new thread specific to your issue but not sure if that matters all that much. My main concern ius understanding what is happeneing.

To be clear on the CFM Vs CFT issue:
"CFT (Convection Fan Threshold): Located in the SETUP menu, the user can adjust the feedrate at which the convection fan will turn on. In later V2 versions this was included as the "FSET" option.
CFM (Convection Fan Minimum): Also located in the Adavanced Menu, this allows the user to change the lowest speed the convection fan will be run at."

Paul is suggesting changing the minimum speed not when the fan comes on or shuts off with repsect to feed rate. As I understand the problem we have an issue of excess heat, this could be a result of lots of factors including fans that don't meet temp spec.

As a side note we have hundreds of the Hyfires out there with no indicated design flaw, so the issue here will just take a little patience and analysis, hang in there we are here for you and are not going to leave you with a stove that doesn't work.