Hi again :)
Also, does anyone know WHERE on the range the spark module is located? i.e. how do we get at it?
Thanks!!
Stacey

The burners clicking may indicate that the flame is not 100% correct. Does this happen on all burners or just one? If you have one that works without the 5 min clicking, you can move that assembly to the other locations and see if it works there w/out the clicking. If it does, then the module is good, and the burners will need some good cleaning.

Thanks for the reply. It's all the burners. Here is a more thorough description of the issue:

It has been getting increasingly worse over the last 9 months. Now, when I begin to cook dinner after the cooktop has not been used all day, the burners will light fine but click for a looooong time. I haven't timed it, but maybe like 5 minutes. If I fiddle with the control I can sometimes find a "sweet spot" that will stop the clicking for a while, but I can't choose the flame height I need. Very aggravating!. Eventually it stops. But if I light another burner for another pan, that one clicks for a while as well. We theorize it has something to do with the things being heated up...???

This is somewhat confirmed by the fact that the burders don't click if the stove has been used recently. We used it at breakfast about 2 hours ago, and when I just went to test it out (I was going to time how long the clicking continues) I found -of course!- that there was no clicking problem at all.

Do these clues mean anything to you????

Another problem, which may or may not be related, is that several of the burners do a sort of sputtering, coughing thing, especially at certain settings. Sometimes gas comes out below the burner ring, where it isn't supposed to. Is this simply due to dirty burners? The burners are cast iron, and almost immediately after installing it they became discolored. I asked other NXR owners on line and they said their burners looked fine after years of use, still black and shiny. Mine look sort of rusty... well not really rusty but discolored in a rusty way. Hard to explain! We wondered if it has something to do with using LPG rather than gas, or our coastal climate? or maybe they're just a bad set of burners!? Any thoughts on this? We do periodically clean the burners, but perhaps not often or thoroughly enough? Is there something else besides the burner caps (2 per burner) we should be cleaning?

Sputtering of any kind will cause the clicks to happen.

I had two stoves; I had switched all four of the burner assemblies between them. The symptoms when I did this were as you describe above. Once I swapped them back I got clean blue flames on all burners. Both sets of burners were never used.

The discoloration and sputtering will be a symptom of an incomplete burn. Either the burners will need to be cleaned or adjusted. I expect that this might have to do with LPG. My flame is 100% blue, with even flame all the way around even at the lowest setting.

Cleaning the burners is not just the caps, but the complete assembly. Confirm that there is no buildup of any white residue inside any of the pieces, and that all the holes (both rings) are clear and clean. There are several tips here how to do this. Make sure that you don't use anything that will enlarge the holes in any way.

This is a flat guess, but I had a similar issue where the clicking was linked to the temp of the house.

The tech theorized that the re-ignition bit on a burner was causing the sparking. Apparently the igniters have some sort of temperature sensor. When you light a burner, the sensor knows its lit or thinks it should re-ignite because of the change in temp. According to the tech, the sensor is in the igniter base. For us, it was heat related - as in if the temp of the house was over 70, it didn't do it but below and it did.

It was also localized to a burner.

Other than that, if you have the part number/maker of the thing you need, you might try calling appliance parts places in your local area or within your state. Lots of them do not have online search or ordering, but will take phone inquiries.

Good luck to you!

Stacy:

I replied to some of your questions in olahego's thread, but for the sake of anybody who doesn't find that thread, here is what I know about the reignitor/ignitor units:

The OEM reignitor was a Tytronics unit. When I checked on prices and availability a couple of years ago when I was stove shopping, one of the local parts warehouses here had a couple of them in stock as they were used on other stoves. The warehouse now tells me that they will have to order it at a cost of $140.

The price might (or might not) be the result of Tytronics selling its reignitor line of business to a German based company called Elektro-Gerätebau GmbH in Oberderdingen which, in English, uses the unfortunate-sounding moniker "E.G.O. Hightec."

The $40 price mentioned above may be an Amazon price for generic reignitor replacement for Viking gas ranges. IIRC, Viking also used Tytronics 0-4 ignitor/reignitor units as original equipment. Since the generic reiginitors use the same connectors, those generic replacements may work in the NXR, at least in theory. I Haven't been able to track down any info on the interoperablity, yet, though a quick google search turned up some current Amazon prices for under $30 for the units.

Before replacing the reignitor, though, I would follow the above suggestions to clean out the burners and fiddle with the adjustment screws in shafts of the burner knobs to make sure the flame is adjusted correctly.

I would start with a thorough cleaning of the burner assemblies. When I've had the symptoms you describe, I've found some crud, or boil-over foam and water in the burner ports and also found that that the burner parts were not seated tightly together. It is worth taking a paper clip (or pipe cleaner if you can find any small enough) and ream out all the ports. Some washing may be required. Then also blow them out with compressed air. The store-bought cans of electronics duster work great for this because you can get the red straw-nozzles into the the burner ports. Also, I blow out the vertical brass feed pipes that connect to the burner assembly just in case there is something in there.. So far, that process has always fixed the problem for me.

If you get them all cleaned out, and still have too much clicking I would check the flame adjustment as suggested above. (If you had found there is clicking on just one burner, I would say to check the bezel position around the knob to make sure the knob is not sticking.) IIRC, you've had your NXR since 2009, so it may be time to check flame adjustment if you still get clicking after cleaning and reassembling the burners.

(FWIW, my NXR's burners are a dark gray and seem to be cast brass instead of cast iron.)

If you do all of the above and still have the problem, the next thing I would check next is the burner ignitors themselves. They are like sparkplugs in a car. Periodic cleaning (and blowing off) may help. Also, like spark plugs, they wear out over time, When the wiring starts to go, it may no longer register heat rapidly and that will trigger the reignitor circuits when they are being fired up after a complete cool down. (As I understand it, electrical resistance changes with the heat level and, as things wear out, they will not be sending the correct resistance signal to the reignition module.) An ignitor will be much less expensive to start with than the whole reignitor module. A stove repair person may have the information and tools to check the resistance, but it might be less expensive to just buy one ignitor and see if that improves things.

I would look at replacing the reignitor module only if the stove keeps clicking on the burner with the replaced ignitor.

This post was edited by JWVideo on Thu, Jan 9, 14 at 16:19

Stacy, did you ever determine the solution to your problem? (I'm curious, as I've had similar problems with my NXR burners clicking.) And if you did, where did you end up sourcing your parts? I'm in Northern California, so Dvorsens is doable for occasional repairs, but if there's a more affordable generic option for parts that will continually need replacing, I'd love to hear about it. Thanks!

At the moment, I can't find the other thread where Stacy posted her follow-up but, IIRC, She cleaned out all the burner ports. Don't recall if she use pipe cleaners or paper clips. Canned air is my own go-to.