Date: Tue, 15 Jul 2008 00:43:01 -0400
Reply-To: Kim Brennan <kimbrennan@MAC.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Kim Brennan <kimbrennan@MAC.COM>
Subject: Re: Dometic won't light troubleshooting
In-Reply-To: <1CB5B457-38E2-4C39-A05A-5E81CD4F5D00@xochi.com>
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I'm not sure what year you are dealing with. Up to 1989 (I think), the
sparker was a manual process. The 90 and 91's had an electronic
sparker. So I apologize if the info I give here isn't appropriate to
yours.
On my 91, there is an indicator lamp for when the piezo electric
sparker is firing off. It should flicker, and you should be able to
hear a clicking sound (if you are outside the vehicle you can hear
this through the exhaust vent.) In noisy locations it may not be
obvious.
If you aren't getting the spark, then you aren't going to be able to
get the fridge lit.
Even if you have the spark, it isn't going to stay lit, unless...
There's a button you depress that allows for propane to flow into the
combustion chamber. When first firing up the fridge this button needs
to be depressed to allow propane to flow into the combustion chamber.
The air pump is to allow oxygen to get into the chamber (propane won't
burn without it). You need to hold this button in for a while so that
the thermocouple in the exhaust vent gets sufficiently hot so as to
feed back to the circuitry so as to allow propane to flow when you
don't have that button closed.
You won't smell propane (especially not inside the van) unless you
have unburned propane (and you really shouldn't be smelling it inside
the van anyway.
What I usually do is light the stove to make sure propane is in the
system (yes, it's different tubing, but it's all the same regulated
system.) That way it shouldn't take long to get propane flowing
through to the fridge. Unless of course, you have a leak (but then
you'd smell the propane.)
On Jul 15, 2008, at 12:23 AM, Michael Diehr wrote:
> Thanks for all the responses! :)
>
> So, I cleaned & refurbished my dometic, but was out of propane so
> reinstalled it w/o checking the function on the bench. It works very
> nicely on 120VAC. However, I just got the propane tank filled and now
> can't get it to light at all - no visible flame or spark. I tried
> sucking on the drain tube with a hose, but can't smell any propane.
>
> Before I remove the unit again (ugh) is there anything stupidly easy
> that I'm missing? I'm pretty sure I hooked everything back up
> properly and didn't have any parts left over (a good sign). How long
> does it take to "bleed" the system of air after it's been taken
> apart? I've tried holding the gas button for about 5 minutes but no
> luck.
>
> Any tips?
