The most common reason that your pilot light on your water heater keeps going out is a damaged, bent or dirty thermocouple.
The pilot should always be burning on your water heater. Sometimes the pilot flame is hard to see through the viewing window. To be sure if the pilot is on or off, you need to remove the access door and shield and look at the burner and pilot through the opening.
Since automatic pilot lights cannot be lit by hand, the procedure for lighting them is entirely different. In fact, it is really not a matter of "relighting" the pilot, but rather of resetting the pilot light. To do this, you must shut off the gas supply, effectively resetting the system and resetting the pilot.
If you can't get the flame to light at all, and you're sure the gas is on, there's probably an obstruction in the pilot tube. If the flame lights and goes out when you release the gas control knob after holding it in for the recommended 20 to 30 seconds, that's the sign of a thermocouple malfunction.
Thermocouple – $20 to $150The thermocouple is an apparatus that senses whether the pilot light is lit and triggers the gas control valve. Repairs typically cost about $150 to have it done professionally, though a new thermocouple itself only costs about $20 on average.
Note that it is totally normal on automatic pilots (pilots that do NOT stay lit all the time) to smell a little natural gas when the are first turned on. A little gas will escape as the pilot and burners light on your heat or appliance.
Yes, setting the thermostat to “pilot” will save energy, and no, heating the tank full of water upon your return does not negate those savings. If you leave it on “pilot” and set the temperature when you return, the burner will run for about an hour one time to bring the tank back up to temperature.
If this leak continues, its concentration may reach a point where a spark – such as that from a cigarette lighter, static electricity, or even the pilot light itself as it is re-lit – will cause a fire or even an explosion.
It is located on the outside of the water heater where the gas pipe enters the unit and has have a knob on it. The valve regulates gas flow to the pilot burner beneath the hot water tank. Turn the valve knob to the “Off” position. Wait five minutes.
If the pilot light goes out on a storage or instantaneous hot water heater, space heater or a ducted heater, you will not have a gas leak. This is because all modern gas appliances with pilot lights have a fail-safe device that closes off the gas to the appliance in the case when the pilot may go out.
How to Relight a Pilot Light: 5 Steps
- Find the pilot light assembly and its reset switch. The furnace's pilot light is usually positioned at the bottom of the unit by a knob.
- Set the reset switch to off. Turn the knob to the “Off” setting.
- Wait a moment.
- Relight the pilot light.
- Observe the furnace.
The standing pilot light is the traditional ignition source for most natural gas-fueled combustion heating systems. It is comprised of a small burner, a gas valve to supply the burner, and a thermocouple. When the flame goes out, the current stops and the gas valve closes.
Can a Pilot Light Outage Be Dangerous? The worry here is that when a pilot goes out, the gas valve that supplies the fuel for the pilot flame could still be pumping gas. This can mean a buildup of gas, and when the pilot is relit or relights itself it could result in a very serious explosion.
