Gas fireplace not providing flame?

15 years ago

Quickly... we have a dual fireplace unit that's a direct vent. At full blast, it creates barely noticable flames, and casts no light into either room. The rep was there today and said it was performing at factory specs regarding something about water columns.

We paid a lot of $$ to engineer the house around this dual fireplace, and I'm already upset that I can't open a door on the unit to get heat out. Since it can't provide much heat, I then at least wanted the visual effect of a fire, which I can't get either.

I'm rather irritated and would like some opinions on the matter. We have a single direct-vent unit in our mbr that works great. The flames easily clear the logs. The lower unit, the flames barely reach the logs.

Here is a link that might be useful:

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Comment (1)

SeattlePioneer
15 years ago
Water column is referring to the gas pressure supplied to the fireplace. Presumably that was checked and found to be within the acceptable range.

You might look for the BTU input on both fireplaces, which should be listed on the rating plate of the fireplace, commonly found below the fireplace inside a grill.

The BTU input is the heating value of the gas burned per hour. If one fireplace has a BTU input of 20,000 and the other 40,000, the second should produce about twice the heat as the first.

Also, the BTU input is often adjustable within certain limits by turnin a knob. If so, there will be a range of BTU input given --- such as 15,000-20,000 BTU. If that's the case, you want to find the right knob and adjust that to whatever level you find acceptable.

That should be discussed in your owner's manual.
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