Gas fireplace repair and yearly service in Lake Davis/Greenwood

Standing pilot, intermittent pilot or direct ignition

Under Florida's fuel gas code, a gas fireplace may light its main burner with a direct ignition device, an ignitor or a pilot flame. That gives three families. A standing pilot burns the whole time the system is in service, an intermittent pilot is lit only when heat is called for, and a direct ignition device lights the burner itself.

The family can often be read on sight. One Heatilator manual, for example, says a red or black ignitor button in the control area marks a standing pilot, and no button marks its electronic intermittent pilot system. Some controls can even be set up either way, as one maker's command center allows.

The family decides the diagnosis because the parts differ. A millivolt standing pilot depends on a thermocouple and thermopile, while an electronic pilot depends on a module and a flame sensor, so our technician confirms the family before any test is run.

Reading the pilot flame

A pilot has a shape the maker expects, and the manuals print it. On a millivolt pilot the drawing shows which part each flame must reach, and one insert owner's manual prints its electronic pilot patterns in a figure and puts pattern and strength on the technician's yearly list.

The pattern shows a problem before it becomes a failed start. A pilot that falls short of the thermopile, or an electronic pilot that does not cover its flame rod with a steady blue flame, is already telling the story. One direct vent manual adds that the pilot flame must always be present while the fireplace is running.

At your Lake Davis/Greenwood home, the flame is compared with the figure for that model. Cleaning or adjustment follows the manual, and a pattern that cannot be corrected is quoted as a pilot repair.

Control module fault codes and lights

Electronic controls on the models we have read report their own faults with a light and sometimes a beep. Heat & Glo's IntelliFire Touch module, for example, blinks a red and green code with a beep when it locks out.

Each maker prints its own chart, so a code is read only against the chart for that exact control. A code also narrows the fault without finishing the job, since a spark fail still needs the wire, electrode and module checked.

Our technician notes the code at your Lake Davis/Greenwood home, confirms the cause behind it and lists that cause on the estimate. One maker's command center flashes its LED in a different pattern for faults such as these.

• Spark fail
• No sensor signal
• Pilot lockout after a failed trial or a lost flame
• Low battery or low thermopile power

A broken log means the fireplace stays off

Two vent manuals from one maker put it bluntly. Do not operate the fireplace if any log is broken. A broken log no longer sits the way the diagram shows, and until it is replaced the fireplace stays off.

Logs are fragile, as one set of installation instructions warns, and they can crack when they are handled. A yearly checklist we work from has the technician inspect for damaged or missing logs, replace them as necessary and then confirm the set is placed so that no flame strikes a log and leaves soot.

Replacement logs come from the maker's parts list for your model, identified by part number. The estimate lists each log that needs replacing by that number, so the set goes back complete and in the positions the diagram shows.