Hayward H200 issues

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T

TCool

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Aug 31, 2012
7
Hi all,

I recently bought a house with a pool (first time owning a pool). An issue I'm having at the moment is only one of the four burners on my heater appears to be lighting. It is the last burner in the series (not sure if that matters).

I'm hoping it is just clogged orifices, so I am going to pull them off and clean them tomorrow. But, I was hoping for some input from some pros. Anything else I should try if cleaning the orifices fail? Does anyone know of anything major it could be that would require a professional?

House warming party is this weekend, and I live in WI, so I would really like to have a heated pool for it. So, any help anyone could give me would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Tim
 
By all means try cleaning the orifices and the burners.
It is possible that there is a low gas pressure issue though.
On the Hayward heater, I believe the left most burner is the first to ignite? When it's on is the flame nice and blue and about 2 inches tall?
 
I can't really see much of the flame, just the very little coming out of the orifice, which does look very blue. I was actually afraid someone would mention low gas pressure as I get an error message on my water heater about low gas pressure occasionally. I had thought it was something wrong with the water heater, but am starting to suspect something might be wrong with the gas flow into my house (I've also had my gas fireplace go out and refuse to fire back up a few times--no issues with stove or furnace yet tho).

So, if you believe this sounds like low gas pressure, and given my other issues, I think I'm going to consider that the issue and call in a professional.

Thanks for the help.
 
TCool said:
I can't really see much of the flame, just the very little coming out of the orifice, which does look very blue. I was actually afraid someone would mention low gas pressure as I get an error message on my water heater about low gas pressure occasionally. I had thought it was something wrong with the water heater, but am starting to suspect something might be wrong with the gas flow into my house (I've also had my gas fireplace go out and refuse to fire back up a few times--no issues with stove or furnace yet tho).

So, if you believe this sounds like low gas pressure, and given my other issues, I think I'm going to consider that the issue and call in a professional.

Thanks for the help.
Click to expand...

There shouldn't be any flame coming out of the orifice (the orifice is the nozzle attached to the horizontal tube that all the burners are attached to).

All those other appliances you mentioned don't require nearly as much gas as your 200.000 BTU pool heater does.

I think you need to call the gas company. :hammer:
 
Interesting development (at least I think so). Took a look at it again tonight and it seemed like all 4 burners were going good. I still didn't get to take a look at the flame, but could see a glow underneath all. The one thing I noticed is that it definitely looked different than when only one burner was going yesterday. What I mean is, yesterday I could see a flame near the orifice going into the burner, tonight not even a glow in that same spot on any of the burners. So, not only were 3 of the 4 not going, but the one that was clearly wasn't working correctly. I'm still having the gas company come out tomorrow, but any pros have thoughts on this?
 
So what it sounds like is you have flame shooting back toward the front of the unit. In that case it could be a clogged burner. If the first burner, left most burner, doesn't light properly, none of the others will light. The only way to see if they are clogged is to remove the burner tray, separate the manifold from the burners and look inside the burners. Even spider webs can cause the burners to not burn correctly.
 
Yes, there was flame shooting back towards the front of the unit for sure (thought that was normal--shows how much I know). So, if it was clogged, but last night appeared to be working good, is it safe to assume whatever clogged it is no longer there? I could definitely see it being spider webs as they're all over my house, perhaps it just burned them out.

So, if it turns out today the gas pressure is fine, is there anything else you can think of that would cause issues for multiple appliances hooked to my gas lines? Or is it likely just coincidence?

Also, my problems are only occasional on all things it seems. Any chance gas pressure could fluctuate? I'll ask the gas company that as well, but I always like multiple opinions.

Anyway, thanks for the help. I really appreciate the feedback from all of you, it is very helpful.
 
Usually most gas appliances have a regulator attached on the gas line close to the unit depending on the gas meter and length of run between the appliance and meter. If you have a regulator, it could be bad and thus you're losing pressure.

I would still look into the burners as best as you can with a flash light, when the heater is not running, and see if you can see anything that might be plugging it up. Down here in FL we have mud daubers that like to get into the burners and pack them with mud that use to make a cocoon for their babies. I don't think you have those up there but it could be spider webs or maybe a hornet.
 

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I will check that.

Gas guy was out today and said pressure was good (but he raised it a bit anyway). He said he thinks the meter is too small and we need to be upgraded. Apparently tankless water heaters use a large amount of gas to get going and he thinks the "charge" of the meter gets depleted. The rest of my issues are likely the result of trying to fire those things up after I've depleted the charge. So, I have to call someone else in the company to discuss the meter. This make sense at all?

Thanks again for the help.
 
"He said he thinks the meter is too small and we need to be upgraded." Oh come on. He works for the gas company and he should have been able to tell you exactly what you need and not say "I think." Tankless heaters shouldn't put any large demand on the system at all. The tankless water heater is probably about 50,000 less BTU's than your pool heater.

If you upgrade your meter you should probably install regulators before each device, if they aren't already there.
 
Yeah, it seemed like an odd answer to me as well. He did increase the gas pressure from 7 to 8 (not sure of the unit of measure here)--do this numbers make sense? No issues since, and I've been putting a lot of demand on the pool heater. Pool is 86 degrees and climbing :)

I'm going to give the gas company a call and chat with them about the meter. As far as the regulators, what will those do for me?
 
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