Fireplace Repair for Eagle Mountain Homes

Four complaints account for most of the calls we take from this city. It will not light. It lights and then goes out. The remote or wall switch does nothing. The glass has sooted over to black. Each has a different cause and a different answer, and only one of them is usually a reason to replace the unit.

It will not stay lit

On a standing-pilot unit, the part that fails is the thermocouple or thermopile, a small probe sitting in the pilot flame that generates the tiny voltage telling the gas valve it is safe to stay open. They wear out. When they weaken, the fireplace lights, runs for a minute or two, and shuts itself off, and it gets worse in cold weather. That is a straightforward part replacement, not a new fireplace.

There is a second cause that shows up more here than in sheltered neighborhoods. Eagle Mountain sits high and open with very little to break the wind, and a gust hitting a vent termination on an exposed roof can pressurize the vent enough to disturb the pilot. If your unit only misbehaves when it is blowing, the fault is not in the valve, it is at the termination, and the fix is a correctly specified termination cap rather than a new gas control.

The glass is black, or the flames look wrong

Sooting on a sealed direct-vent unit is a combustion problem and it should be taken seriously, because whatever is producing soot is also producing carbon monoxide. Usual causes are logs that have been knocked out of position, a blocked or partly blocked termination screen, or a burner port clogged with dust. That last one is common in this area. New subdivisions have a lot of bare ground and very little canopy, so fine dust gets everywhere, and a burner that has drawn dusty air for years does not burn cleanly. Cleaning the burner, resetting the logs to the manufacturer's diagram and clearing the termination usually restores it. If the flames stay lazy and yellow after that, we stop and investigate rather than reassemble it.

Nothing happens when you press the switch

Start with the obvious. Many units have a battery backup pack behind the lower louver that people forget exists, and dead batteries in it will disable an electronic ignition unit even when the house has power. Beyond that, it is usually the receiver module, the wall switch wiring, or the igniter itself. All are serviceable parts.

When we tell you not to repair it

Some builder-grade units from the early 2000s are out of production and their control valves are no longer made. If the valve on one of those has failed, a repair means hunting salvage parts for a unit that will fail again. We will tell you that plainly, quote a replacement insert that fits the existing opening and venting, and let you decide. We are licensed and insured, and we would rather lose a repair than sell you one that does not last.