a photoblog of what i did today.....

[Gravdigr]

Glatt - You might want to check out RockAuto, if you haven't already. They don't have the hippest website, but, they're reasonably quick, shipping-wise, and all the parts we've ever gotten from them were top quality parts. They also have a variety of brand names, and prices (some amazingly low) for most parts.

Damn, that was dangerously close to a commercial, wasn't it?

[glatt]

I've bought some stuff from RockAuto and they are everything you say they are. But we had a gift card for Amazon to use up.

[Gravdigr]

Word.

[glatt]

The gas oven has been on the fritz. You could hear it the last several times we used it, cycling on and off every ten seconds or so. But there was a glow coming out from under the floor pan, so something was lit down there.

So I took the bottom floor pan of the oven off to watch the burner. It was definitely messed up. I figured it could be the igniter or the valve, or the pressure regulator. Or the control panel or the thermostat.



I did a little research and found that the igniter actually controls the valve. When the igniter heats up it starts drawing more current, and when it hits a magic number of amps, the valve opens and sends gas to the burner. So I dug out my multimeter and measured the current. I had read in one place that the magic number was 2.8 amps, an I read somewhere else that you should replace any igniter that draws fewer than 3.2 amps.

This guy was drawing 2.5 amps. So I think it's the igniter. That's good, because they are only $30 online. The valves are more like $150.

So now you know what an oven burner looks like just as the igniter is starting to fail.

I ordered one from Amazon with two-day shipping. Need to get this fixed this weekend before the holiday. It should be easy. Just remove a couple screws from the old igniter. Unplug the connecter, an swap in the new one.

[BigV]

well done glatt. boring pics of your success would be nice, but the actual victory is what matters most. I have every confidence in you.

[glatt]

Fewer than twenty minutes to install it, including putting the tools back. It works perfectly now.

[BigV]

Go, you Pro, you!

well done.

[Griff]

Well done!

[glatt]

Have I mentioned lately how much I freaking love the internet? First thing I did when I noticed this problem was open up our filing cabinet to pull out the owner's manual. There was NOTHING in there. Not even a parts list or schematic. Actually, that's not true. There was a circuit diagram, but no parts list. Going to the manufacturer's web page gave me a parts list but no details about how the parts work together. It could have been half a dozen faulty components causing this problem.

But going to two different appliance web forums and a separate appliance repair page gave me a great explanation of how the oven works and what measurements I had to take to see if the part was faulty or not.

20 years ago, I would have had to replace parts randomly or hire a repairman to probably replace parts randomly. But today I could ID the problem with certainty and order the damn part with expedited shipping for a fraction of the cost of a repairman and exponentially less than a new oven.

I love you, Internet.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by glatt

Have I mentioned lately how much I freaking love the internet? First thing I did when I noticed this problem was open up our filing cabinet to pull out the owner's manual. There was NOTHING in there. Not even a parts list or schematic. Actually, that's not true. There was a circuit diagram, but no parts list. Going to the manufacturer's web page gave me a parts list but no details about how the parts work together. It could have been half a dozen faulty components causing this problem.

But going to two different appliance web forums and a separate appliance repair page gave me a great explanation of how the oven works and what measurements I had to take to see if the part was faulty or not.

20 years ago, I would have had to replace parts randomly or hire a repairman to probably replace parts randomly. But today I could ID the problem with certainty and order the damn part with expedited shipping for a fraction of the cost of a repairman and exponentially less than a new oven.

I love you, Internet.

I concur.

This could go in the Interesting links to share thread, but it is relevant here and now. I do the same thing as you described for lots of home and car repairs, and I've found this site (there are others like it) invaluable. Sometimes it's not actually broken, I just need to look up how something is "supposed" to work. Enjoy.

http://www.manualsonline.com/

[classicman]

Really? Good for you glatt. I jsut come here - via the internet - and ask you guys & gals. I assume you all go to other sites - via the internet - then reply with logical solutions sounding all smart & shit.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by BigV

This could go in the Interesting links to share thread, but it is relevant here and now.

It's so damn easy to find good info on the net I've given up saving links for that kind of stuff.

[chrisinhouston]

We had to put some money into our furnace last week... No fun!

We noticed we had hardly any heat, it would cut on and run and for a minute or 2 it was warm and then ran cold. Our furnace is a high end Trane model we put in about 8 years ago and winters here in Houston don't really put a big demand on it. Technician came out and tried changing out the sensor (kind of like a thermocouple) but that didn't fix it and the voltage from the circuit board was wrong which led him to suspect a bad board. He quoted $650 to replace the board. I looked on line and found some parts places would sell the board for $400 but it's a newer design so it has a new wiring harness and someone with the knowledge to transfer the 30 or so wires to the new board only made sense.

Not happy about the money spent but sometimes it's unavoidable.

The really frustrating thing is that we were told the unit had a 10 year warranty when we got it but later found out that it is a 5 year warranty unless the consumer goes to the trouble of registering it with Trane, then it gets a 10 year warranty. We used a different company to install the system from the repair company I use now so it's not their fault. But I don't remember the original installers telling us to register it, I think they either forgot or just failed to tell us because we would have done that for sure if we had know.

[glatt]

That's just ridiculous. A furnace should last more than 8 years, and if they are using cheap components in their circuit board to save literally a couple bucks per unit, they deserve to have their name dragged through the mud.

Did you get to keep the old circuit board? Was there anything obvious wrong with it, like bulging capacitors?

We have a 70 year old furnace, and I keep thinking I should get a new one that's more energy efficient, but if this is the kind of crap you can get today, then forget it.

[glatt]

I was inspired to order some cheap LED rolls and a transformer from China through ebay. I got these LEDs, and this power supply.

What does it mean that this power supply is a "switching" power supply? I ordered the stuff on Jan 3, and it arrived from China on Jan 13th. Very impressive for free shipping.

At first I was confused when trying to figure out what the brown, blue, and yellow/green wires were for. But with a little Google, I found out brown is hot, blue is neutral, and yellow/green is ground. Then I dug through my junk piles and found an old iMac power cord, and cut it open to wire to the power supply. It also used brown, blue, and yellow/green, so it was easier than I expected to wire it up. I had ordered a 45 watt power supply, and wanted to see if it would drive both rolls of LEDs wired in parallel. It did!

So here are some pictures. This shows both rolls lit up:

And for this one, I unwound one of the rolls a little and aimed at the counter so I can get a sense of the color and brightness. I like it. Not blue at all. A little whiter than the halogen hockey pucks under the cabinets now, but not obnoxiously so. And the brightness is good. This was taken with the ceiling lights turned off.

I'm going to use the existing halogen hockey puck wiring. They were wired years ago by an electrician who put switched outlets under the sink, and plugged the halogen power supplies into those outlets. I can just plug my new power supply into those same outlets and use the existing wiring to the halogens.

One thing I noticed is that after a couple minutes of being plugged in, the rolls of LEDs started to get a bit warm. I guess it's the cheap quality with the black resistors after every third LED on the strip. They were only $9 after all. I unplugged the power supply when I noticed the heat. I didn't want to melt the double sticky tape on the back of the strips. I am hoping that once the LEDs are installed, the heat won't be too bad because the strips will be unrolled and the heat not so concentrated. One of the reasons I wanted the LEDs instead of the halogens is that the halogens get hot and can melt forgotten chocolate chips on the bottom shelf of the corner pantry cabinet.

So this weekend, I'll have some time to install these permanently. I'll make sure to update the thread with better pictures that show before and after shots with identical white balance and exposure settings.