Have the Mt Vernon AE. Wood pellets. For about a week, the stove will often cycle through, ignite the pellets, then go into to shutdown mode (with a normal fire in the firepot). Sometimes it will into low, then shutdown - occasionally keep going. Everything appears fine, including dropping the right amount of pellets.

I've tried heating the thermocouple a bit with a torch during start up, but does not seems to work. What often does work is putting some pellets into the firepot, removing the ash pan, and heating the firepot some with a torch.

Hoping something (relatively) simple as thermocouple dying out, but wanted to get some thoughts before I buy one.

A properly operating TC will give you a green light at 200 F and a red light 600 F in the control box.

no red or green light on a mt vernon ae model. The only way to really know if the TC is bad is to test it on the netbook or unplug it from the board and test to make sure it is giving the correct millivolts. It "should" show an error on the wall control if it is bad.

hmmm, no error, just shutting down. Any other thoughts then?

Thanks

Still could be tc, is the stove clean, exhaust and all? If it doesn't move enough heat past the tc it can go into shut down. I have seen bad tc without showing bad on the laptop or popping an error on the wall control

yea, I even removed the exhaust fan and vacuumed in there to make sure. Same problem.

Keep track of what cycle it is in when it goes into shutdown mode. Also make sure the firepot thermocouple is touching the inside end of the cover, or it won't register right either. kap

thanks kap. I'll take the cover off tonight when it cools down to make sure (still lighting it from underneath with added pellets to get it working during the day). almost all times it goes into shutdown mode after startup. I've seen it go to low then shutdown only once.

If the fire is not starting fast enough, it will go into shut down mode.It only so much time to heat the thermocouple, or it will shut down. Use a mirror and a flashlight and look at the slit in the bottom of the pot where the heated air from the igniter comes in from, and see if there is any obstruction. If it is starting slow from a partially blocked slit, it will shut down. From your description of using a torch and extra pellets makes me wonder about this. Also if the igniter has loosened and slid part way out of the housing, it will cause this also. kap

just an update - I haven't had time to pull off the thermocouple cover yet, but I wiggled the wire at the base of the cover and that seems to work (for a few starts anyway). So its likely there. I checked the slit in the bottom of the pot for obstructions, and made sure the igniter is properly seated - both ok. I'll try to check thermocouple placement inside cover this weekend and then post the result.

thanks again for the help