Dayton Heater - Check the Thermostat Wiring

[Don Jarvie]

Everyone who has a Dayton G73 or similar model needs to open the case and check the wiring from the thermostat. The thermostat is defective and is causing one of the leads to burn up.

See Mike Cruz's thread below with more pictures and how he ordered a replacement.

I have added a picture of mine below.

The serial number of the bad thermostat is: 5813-11002-000

DSCN0988.jpg

[Rick Moyer]

I checked mine earlier today and everything appears fine. Now that you posted a serial number I'll go look again. Are you comfortable that all the ones with a problem will likely have that serial number? Or is that merely YOUR serial number? If the defective ones all have the same serial number it should be an easy check. What does Grainger/Dayton have to say about all this? btw, thanks for posting the serial number. I'll again look at mine and post the number, too.

mine says 5813-2050-000

Incidently, the wires are both black, not red, and they are 14 AWG.

[Ian Wormsbecker]

I had the same issue. They sent me an entire new heater (after 6 months of waiting ).

ian

[Rick Moyer]

Ian, would you mind checking your thermostat serial number? I'm curious if it is like mine or the other ones that have had a problem.

[Don Jarvie]

Rick, seems like the thermostat you have is OK so we should assume its the serial no I posted above that is defective.

[Rick Moyer]

Hope so to both counts. It would be nice to know that that serial number was the problem for anyone involved. It would also be nice if we knew WHY there was this problem.

[Don Jarvie]

If a few more come forward with a bad thermostat with the same serial no then we know it was the lot. Hopefully it was a bad lot. We'll see what others post.

It amy be wise to check the wires every few weeks to see if there is any issue. The manual does indicate it has a shut off if the unit malfunctions.

[Ian Wormsbecker]

I returned my Dayton heater in March or so this year for repair. The Acklands-Grainger took FOREVER to get it back to me. Eventually I got a new heater in mid October. They told me it was the 'new model' (looks exactly the same from the outside, as well as the inside. perhaps the only difference is in fact the thermostat?)

My serial number on the new thermostat is 5813-11002-000. There is also a number of ATC-26B as well as L57C. All are on separate lines on the back of the thermostat. Unfortunately, I do not have the old unit that was problematic

I _think_ the new heater has thicker gauge wiring from the junction block to the thermostat and into the heater.

My heater had the exact same issue as other peoples: the contact point on the thermostat burned itself off the connector.

For what it is worth, I re-attached this after it happened and it burned off again.

My new heater I have had running on low for about a month with no issue.



Ian

[Ian Wormsbecker]

Well, this isn't good. I didn't think to _actually_ compare my serial number with that of the faulty ones. Sure enough, mine is the same

I will have to keep an eye on it.

Also, both of the wires attaching to my thermostat are 14 gauge red wires.


Ian.

[Chris Mahmood]

I posted this in Mike's thread but probably should have just put it here, sorry for the duplication.

I contacted the manufacturer, Marley Engineered Products, about this and sent them your pictures Mike and they called me back within a few hours. The person I talked to was very interested in the problem. He explained that they've had some problems in the past with the supplier not crimping the terminals properly and the arcing eventually destroys the wire. I asked if soldering the terminals would help and he said probably not and judging from discoloration on the side of the thermostat there may be a problem with the riveting as well. Anyway, he asked that the defective thermostats be sent to him so they can try to narrow down the date ranges of the bad ones and offer replacements:

Marley Engineered Products
Attn:Mike Phi
470 Beauty Spot Road East
Bennettsville, SC 29501

[Rick Moyer]

Thanks Chris for taking the initiative. Hopefully there will be some resolution at some point.

[Thomas Short]

Hey all-

New guy here, came across this thread and thought I'd add my experience.

I have a Dayton G73 in my workshop. Bought the first one December 2009; failed in the exact same way as those above about 5 months later. Received a replacement through Grainger, installed it, and didn't run it until this winter (late Oct). It failed in the exact same way.
Mine has the same numbers / markings: 5813-11002-000 as well as ATC-26B and L57C. Unfortunately I don't know the numbers from the first unit that failed.

I have emailed Marley ... will see what happens. I like this heater, it does a good job keeping the shop comfortable. Hopefully I can keep things from freezing until this gets fixed.

Thomas

[Don Jarvie]

Thomas, I pried out the burnt out wire and recrimped a piece of 10g wire in its place and put it back in. It has been working fine. I'm going to wait until the warm weather and get a replacement part.

[Anthony Diodati]

I had the same issue. They sent me an entire new heater (after 6 months of waiting ).
ian

6 months, OMG. Well at least you can buy a new T-Stat and have a 2nd. heater almost free.
TY, Tony

[Casey Scott]

I just bought a Dayton 3UG73 on 12-3-10 Ive had it running almost 3 weeks. Was in the shop last night painting and noticed it would run for a short period of time and shut down. So I figured the tstat was cutting it out. I opened the bottom and saw the wire going to the tstat was burnt somewhat.