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help with united technologies 1018

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HEATON
HEATON Member Posts: 118
in Gas Heating
burner lights, flame for 30 secs, click in control and flame off, burner motor continues 45secs ignitor glows and flame established again . constant cycles and never locks out on hard l.o. can you give me test procedure? many thanks , john

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  • icesailor
    icesailor Member Posts: 7,265
    edited February 2014
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    Flame failure:

    Sorry, read again.

    If the flame is established, it can still be the igniter with a very small crack. It needs another igniter or a new control. I don't know any resistance values for them. If you had a new one and the old one, you could test them together. Whenever I found one, either the igniter was cracked or the module had left its body behind.

    If it is a hot surface igniter where a "rod" glows to ignite the flame, it is probably cracked and not getting hot. If you carefully take it out, you will see the crack. DO NOT  touch the surface.

    The control is designed to "lock out" the flame sequence but not the blower running. The control is locked out until you re-set it by turning off the power.

    When the igniter is working, and it glows, it ignites the gas. It immediately switches to a flame sensor. If it doesn't immediately sense a flame, it locks out. No matter how many times you try it.

    It is on a Warm Air Furnace or a Power Vented water heater, usually.
  • Tim McElwain
    Tim McElwain Member Posts: 4,621
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    It sounds like you are not sensing the flame

    either the igniter is acting as both an igniter & sensor or you may have a separate sensor in either case you need to check microamps on the sensor. It should be between 2 to 10 normal is 3 to 5.



    You can also check the AMP draw on the igniter which should be between 4.25 to 4.75 AMPS. You should also do a RTR test (room temperature resistance test) on the igntiter. On the Norton 201 (34 second igniter) it should be 45 to 400 Ohms and the 271(17 second igniter) it should be 40 to 75 OHMS.



    The 1018 is a United Technology control send a picture and also what piece of equipment is this on?
  • Tim McElwain
    Tim McElwain Member Posts: 4,621
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    By the way the thing

    about touching the igniter portion of an HSI causing a problem is a myth, no such thing.
  • HEATON
    HEATON Member Posts: 118
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    test devise

    thanks tim I printed your article re: testing ignitor/sensor and found it very useful. I found a tester I bought several yrs ago never put it to use : it has blk/wht leads coming out both sides one w/ moldex fem and one w/ male ignitor plug obviously to put the igniter in series with this devise. A switch , momentary type and a red indicator lamp is on top. Leads out the bottom have banana clips for the meter. " DCtransducer switch box (as-21820-02)" label reads in part in red letters(1.0 DCvolt=1.0DC microamp) Meter Impendence>10 Megohms" looks like a neat devise, what meter scale should I use?
  • HEATON
    HEATON Member Posts: 118
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    testor

    found this for $11.00 at surplus city.
  • icesailor
    icesailor Member Posts: 7,265
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    Urban Myths:

    Another Urban Myth promoted by manufacturers reps and Tech Support to explain why they aren't going to cover a broken warranty failure. I remember being told by a rep to never touch the surface because if you got any finger oil on the surface, it would cause the element to heat unevenly and break. And it wouldn't be covered.

    Who knew?
  • Tim McElwain
    Tim McElwain Member Posts: 4,621
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    HEATON, if that switch you have

    was produced by Robertshaw, Carlin or Firedragonent then it is actually a switch I developed and gave their rep (Robertshaw and Carlin) not sure how Firedragon connected up with it,  one for his personal use and six months later it was in their catalog (Robertshaw). That by the way is somewhat the story of my life, Oh well if it helps folks that is a good thing.



    You want your meter on the microaamp scale.
  • Tim McElwain
    Tim McElwain Member Posts: 4,621
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    Icesailor

    Actually the myth was started by a training rep from Trane. He was tired of passing his igniters around his classes and finding when it got to the back of the room it was broken. So he made up the story about oils from the hands to keep people from breaking his igniters. No malice on the part of manufacturers just a trainer trying to save his props. The folks at Norton (Saint Gobain) found it very interesting how that myth traveled world wide, we would wish the truth traveled as well and as fast. They issued a factory bulletin dispelling the myth by the way.
  • unclejohn
    unclejohn Member Posts: 1,833
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    So Tim

    If I touch the next one I put in and it fails will you replace it?
  • Tim McElwain
    Tim McElwain Member Posts: 4,621
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    Now why would I

    stake my reputation on something that was not true. In fact the old silicon carbide igniters from Norton are now pretty much obsolete and replaced by the nitride igniters and those you can touch till your hearts content.



    Norton (Saint Gobain) is no longer around they were purchased by Kors Tech so contact them and ask them about the myth.



    And no I will not replace any igniters.
  • icesailor
    icesailor Member Posts: 7,265
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    Urban Myths and other inconsequential nonsense:

    Tim,

    Remember those Amtrol "Super Hot Water Makers, the ones that were a 43 gallon power vented gas water heater that used liquid sodium in a coil that boiled and heated the water? The one that put Amtrol into bankruptcy? Because one year it was so cold in New England that the gas companies couldn't keep the pressure  up and the heaters locked out constantly from low gas pressure and too little gas mised. I installed three on a job on LP. There was never an issue with gas pressure but they still would lock out. Some snapped and popped like a bag of pop corn. Every time I went there, one of the three was off. There was a guy named "Arthur" who worked at the main office of the wholesaler I exclusively purchased from. He knew more about controls and how to cross reference them than did the manufacturers. He's long retired and has probably joined the old dead control experts. But he told me that to be careful about touching the flame rod. And to carefully wipe it off if it was dusty. Sometimes, after wiping them down, they ran for a longer time. When he told me about all the problems they had over where you live in Natural Gas land, I decided to put my oil burner skills to work. There was no way to control the air/fuel ratio going in to the burner but there was a place where I could put a screw and hold a piece of sheet metal to control the air inlet. It stopped the snapping because the burner was condensing so badly on the fire side of the coil that the water vapor was exploding. The gas was set to 9" so I raised it to 12" to give me more fuel to play with. I futzed around with the three heaters with my oil wet kit, not knowing what I was doing but when the snapping and popping went away, so did the lock-outs. The fingers and ash dust on the rods had no effect.

    Amazing how far a CYA story can travel. Like Joseph Goebbels said, if you tell a lie long enough, people will come to believe it as the truth.

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