When people think about cruising to warm places aboard a fine yacht, they probably don't envision what life is really like. Here is a brief sample:
Aboard Samadhi V we have a fantastic 4 burner gas range with an infrared broiler in the oven (to cast the perfect caramel glow onto your Creme Brulée). Unfortunately, one of the four burners decided to malfunction. After some time of cooking on only three (so difficult!), it was time to dig in and find the issue.
The stove is equipped with flame sensors on each burner. The flame sensors detect if the stove or oven flame is inadvertently extinguished while the gas supply is on. Since propane is both heavier than air (fills up the boat) and explosive (makes the boat go away), these are important safety measures. Safety is good, but in our case, the flame sensor for one of the burners has decided to stage a revolt. No matter how we try, the stove would dutifully shut off the gas to this burner even though it was lit.
I performed surgery on the stove, carefully removing about 30 tiny stainless screws. After the screws are out, you can lift the top surface off of the stove exposing the delicate "guts" (technical term).
Once you have exposed the "guts", you must go about figuring out how the thing works. Our stove did not come with a service manual that covers the flame sensors. What I discovered is that each flame sensor is a thermocouple. The thermocouple powers (directly!!) a tiny electromagnet that apparently has enough oomph to hold the gas valve open. I started by testing the tiny electromagnet, which tested good. Next, I tested the thermocouple itself which did not produce a voltage. Normally, this would indicate it was bad. Upon closer inspection, I found a tiny bit of white corrosion at the base of the thermocouple. I cleaned the corrosion off and tested again. Lo and behold! The thermocouple was working!
Terribly impressed with myself, I removed and cleaned each thermocouple in the stove. I, then, reassembled the thermocouples with a corrosion blocking product to (hopefully) avoid this in the future.
After carefully reassembling the stove with its myriad micro-sized stainless screws, two hours later, I declared official victory!
Just imagine how much easier this is than calling a repairman "back home". Makes me wonder why everyone isn't out here cruising.
Next time, I'll share my adventures with the plumbing leak under the guest cabin's berth... Woohoo!
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