Halloween appropriate service call...

Unknown

the only steamer I got, I checked it out 2 weeks ago and everything seemed to be working just fine. So yesterday I get a call. The unit popped on startup and set the cardboard that was on the boiler room floor on fire. Luckily it wasnt much cardboard and the room is all brick anyways, so it wasn't going to get far. Upon arrival I go in there and turn it on, I hear the spark ignitor, I hear the pilot light and spark stop, then the MV opens, a little hesitation and then sure enough, KABOOM!! Wow, that's strange, it sure wasn't doing that last time I looked at it. So I dutifully pull the diverter and the cleanout cover and have a look inside, clean as a whistle. Then I pull all the burners, clean them up and pay special attention to the pilot assembly, I looked down through the orifice, I can see plenty of light. Put it all back together and STILL the thing is cycling MV in and out and popping. Must be the ignition control, go out to the truck, get the new one I have, put it in and it's doing the same thing. I check voltage to the box, steady as a rock but the control is cycling. Pull the pilot assembly again and clean it all up nice and shiny, maybe it's too dirty to allow proper continuity. Nope, still no good. Well, now the only thing left to do is put my face all the way down there where the flames are going to come shooting out(something I had been trying to avoid)and eyeball the pilot while this foolishness is going on. Sure enough, weak pilot flame. Well, that's funny, I KNOW I saw plenty of light coming through that orifice but, I take it all apart again! I run a piece of wire through it and it's no cleaner or bigger than before. Hmph...I just don't get it. I don't know what made me do it but I looked down the outlet side of the pilot assembly and spotted something white. Well I'll be, I reach down in there with my wire, wiggle it around a bit and out comes a teeny weeny dead spider and it's teeny weeny web. Slap it back together and it fires up and runs like a champ. I put the old control back on and my new one back in the box and away I went thinking, hmmm, strangely appropriate, finding a spider web in the works the day before Halloween. ;)