Saturday, November 3, 2012

Canned air and gas logs

It seems like every year I struggle to light the gas logs (any gas logs) for the first time after 3 seasons of rest.  I can never get the pilot to stay lit.  Last year someone told me to vacuum everything real well.  It worked.  Last year, that is.  This year I vacuumed and vacuumed to no avail.  The pilot would go out as soon as I released the button.  The flame was blue and yellow also, not just blue as I knew it was supposed to be.  So I went to my good friend, Google, to get help. 

There are forums for just about every topic you can think of and that's where I found the solution to my problem.   The first person suggested I needed a new thermocouple.   I wanted another answer so I read further.  Someone else said, "don't waste your money, try this first".   Aha, the answer I wanted.   Something simple.

 
About 2 inches behind where the spark comes out there's a small hole.  I sprayed the canned air into this hole.  Voila!  We have fire.  We also had a burner that wasn't working on our gas stove and the canned air fixed it right up too.

Unfortunately the canned air can't help us with another problem we're now having.   We have no water.  Our well pump must have died.  Wouldn't you know it waited to die until Friday after 5 PM.  Nothing ever dies on a weekday, does it?  We're lucky we have another well in the field where the pigs and donkeys are.  We've been filling buckets of water until we're back in service.  If we need showers we can always go to our cabin 4 miles away.  Who needs a shower, right?    I know many people in NJ and NY are without power and this doesn't even compare to what they're going through.

1 comment:

  1. Hope you've got water back now! Also hope you're enjoying your new computer! ;)
    Em~

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