My stove starts normal, fires up, then after about 10 minutes shuts down

Snap switchs are good, convection fan starts at 145degrees, I jumpered snap#2 , no change.

TC is ok, reads 250mA when the fire is hot.

Jumpered the thermostat, no change

The auger is running backward at times, and making a noise when it does. Should a Quad auger ever turn counter clock wise? Should I replace the capacitor in the motor connector?

Hi Joe, and welcome to the forum. The only quad stove that will turn backwards is the AE, to try and clear a jam. You are right in suspecting the capacitor as its job is to keep the auger turning one direction. They are around 12.00. Hope this helps.kap

Does anyone know the size of the capacitor? Wondering if can buy one in Radio Shack while I wait for the replacement online. My dealer is over an hour away.

Sorry, my knowledged only goes so far. But i know there are a few on here that do. If you do a search, i think they even posted. kap

Joe was over on the other forum too. He ordered one on line and got one coming from his dealer. He'll have a spare, which is more than I can say.

Back ordered at Black Swan in CT. I called Woodheatstoves.com, they touched the part, and I ordered from them. I don't think the dealers stock a lot of inventory, and when the season hits, its first come first serve. Hopefully I'll get it by Wednesday. If you have a Quadrafire stove, order one to keep one on hand, if you plan to own your stove more than 5 years, its probably a good investment.


Now why does the circuit need a capacitor. I suspect that the motor in the pellet stove is an AC Induction Motor which produces torque when the angle between the alternating magnetic field produced by the stator is greater than zero. This is called slip. The article below shows how a capacitor is often included in series with one of the stator windings so as to introduce a phase shift in the stator magnetic field to increase the torque. There are also systems that only include the capacitor in the “auxiliary winding” at start-up and switch the cap out with a centrifugal switch in the rotor. See below


www.allaboutcircuits.com/vol_2/chpt_13/9.html


I imagine that a shorted cap would reduce the torque significantly and an open cap might do the same. If the cap were a start-up cap then the motor might not even move.

Why does it sometimes move backwards? I’m guessing because it has been a long time that I thought about these things.

1. In an AC-induction motor, the excitation of the stator coils causes the magnetic field of the stator field to rotate.

2. This rotating magnetic field induces currents in the rotor windings.

3. The current in the rotor winding produces a magnetic field.

4. The when the fields are not coincident there is a torque. When the torque is equal to the drag, in the steady state, the rotor moves at constant speed.

5. When the angle between the two field is positive (positive slip angle) there is a positive torque when there is a negative slip angle the torque is negative.

6. The presence or absence of the cap or a short in the auxiliary winding will affect the phase of the stator magnetic waveform relative to the rotor.

7. I suspect that with a shorted cap depending on the load and the normal “phase lead/lag operating point” one could have the stator/rotor slip angle positive rather than negative with the cap in place so that a negative torque is applied rather than positive, hence the rotation in the opposite direction.

8. If I really knew this stuff I would be writing Wikipedia articles.

All i know is it is mainly to keep the auger turning in the same direction.Electrical is not my strong point.

Like the guy on the Ford commercial says, 'It's magic'.

Got the replacement kit. Problem solved. Stove seems like its running fine.

Here's a video of the replacment:

Glad you let us know how it went. Glad you are up and running. kap