Problem with Gas burner on camper

[Ean Austral]

Gday All,

We have a issue with 1 of the burners on our campers gas stove. To get the gas to flow and light , you push the dial in and turn it , you need to keep it held in for about 10 seconds then release it and it stays on. The small burner works fine, but the large burner just kills the supply when you release it. You can hold it in for as long as you like and it will stay lit , let it go and it cuts off the gas.


They are pretty firmly fitted , so don't think it can move and not be aligned , plus I don't see why it would work if it was and alignment issue.


Anyone had this issue , and how do you fix it.?


Thanks and Cheers Ean

[bee utey]

Sounds like your burners are fitted with safety shut offs, like in traditional gas ovens. They rely on a thermocouple in the flame to energise a low voltage magnetic coil to hold the valve open. When I used to muck around with stove conversions you would occasionally have to dismantle a safety to clean the contacts, LPG does contain a small amount of dissolved goo and a well used stove will need an occasional mechanism clean.

[Ean Austral]

Sounds like your burners are fitted with safety shut offs, like in traditional gas ovens. They rely on a thermocouple in the flame to energise a low voltage magnetic coil to hold the valve open. When I used to muck around with stove conversions you would occasionally have to dismantle a safety to clean the contacts, LPG does contain a small amount of dissolved goo and a well used stove will need an occasional mechanism clean.

Thanks for the reply , so where would I likely find the contacts , and you clean them with -Solvent , emery ????


Thanks and Cheers Ean

[bee utey]

Thanks for the reply , so where would I likely find the contacts , and you clean them with -Solvent , emery ????


Thanks and Cheers Ean

It's been a while but I think the contacts are behind the shaft that the knob attaches to. Dismantling is required or even a new valve. Most of the stuff I played with was 60's to 80's vintage, yours may of course be entirely different. Pictures of the valve exposed to view would of course help. [smilebigeye]

[Ean Austral]

It's been a while but I think the contacts are behind the shaft that the knob attaches to. Dismantling is required or even a new valve. Most of the stuff I played with was 60's to 80's vintage, yours may of course be entirely different. Pictures of the valve exposed to view would of course help. [smilebigeye]

I pullet the burner apart and the valve and cleaned whatever parts I could see , put it back together and it seems to be working. Not sure what or why it does but I will take it.


Thanks for your input .


Cheers Ean

[bee utey]

It appears that there isn't an extra contact in the valve but the thermocouple may be connecting poorly to the back of the electromagnet. The thermocouple produces a very low voltage so the outer copper tube and the wire core inside must have a very low resistance to operate. So any slight corrosion on the tip where it screws into the back of the valve will suffice to stop it working. You seem to have cleaned that.

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2017/07/604.jpg

Valves with extra connections could be used where a separate switch or fusible link can interrupt the current to shut the gas off.

[Don 130]

It seems you've solved your problem, but I'll report an issue I once had. I'd left the gas bottle off the camper and the mud wasps/ mason bees got into the end of the hose and filled it up with mud. I didn't notice it when I connected up a fresh gas bottle and opened the supply. The gas flow pushed all the mud up through the system into the stove valves. A hell of a job to clear it all out and get the stove going again. Now if I leave the hose detached, I insert a twig or screwed up paper into the end of it to deter the buggers.
Don.