At 04:55 PM 29/06/03 -0500, you wrote:
How do you light the fire on a gas Aster Climax??? The front doesn't open,
the burner doesn't pull out. There is a big hole in the side of the burner,
but so far this doesn't seem to do it. Lighting there seems to pull the
fire out of the butane lighter, but no reassuring pop in the burner. I can
cook a hot dog on the flame at the top of the stack.
You light it at the top of the stack, after opening the gas valve until you
can hear the hiss of gas. Once lit, turn the gas down until the flame
'pops' back to the burner. Failure of the flame to pop back suggests a
partially blocked gas jet is the problem. As I don't have an Aster Climax
I can't give you specifics of the steps to dismantle it sufficiently to
access the jet, however, in general terms:
remove sufficient bodywork to access the burner assembly, disconnect the
gas supply line from the burner, if you get lucky here the jet assembly is
a simple push fit in the burner, if not dis-assemble to the point you have
the jet assembly in your hands (generally this is a jet holder that the gas
supply line connects to, with the jet screwed into the other end). Hold
the jet by the body with soft-grip needle-nose pliers (not by the
threads). Hold the jet outlet end down on the nozzle of a can of gas
(butane, iso or butane/propane mix) and push down on the gas can nozzle
with the jet - liquid gas will squirt through the jet and clear any grunge
from it. You can tell it is clear when a solid stream of liquid gas comes
out of the jet.
When you re-assemble everything, seal the jet in the holder with ptfe tape
on the threads, same on the jet holder to burner body threads if it is not
a push fit. You want to ensure there is no source of extraneous air to
mess up the combustion process.
Once it's all back together, try lighting again. With the age of the loco
it is likely that it has a fairly coarse thread on the gas control
valve. This may make it difficult to adjust the burner to to get good
operation, but practise is required to recognize what is a 'good' setting.
good luck with ti,
pf
