Westy Fridge Help

Post by **sundial** » 03 Feb 2008, 15:59

Spent some time the other day removing the fridge from the unit, not so bad I thought..........hope it goes in as easy...!!

Now that the fridge is out its time to investigate, it as always worked on 240v ok but not on gas or 12v.

firstly I thought I'd check out the gas operation which I thought may have been down to the ignitor unit, this did not activate rapidly when gas was selected from the front panel (unlike others I've seen).
Further checks have proofed the ignitor to be ok, it will fire rapidly (red indicator flashing) as long as the high voltage wire is disconnect, as soon as this fire is connected to the unit it stops...!!

Secondly I checked the 12 operation, alls ok with the wiring, relay etc as I can see, the relay allows the 12 volts to be switched thru to the element only when the engine is running, but my concern is that the resistance of the 12v element is less than 2 ohms...??? this appears low to me, does anybody know any different.
The 240 v element is about 500 ohms.

Does anybody have ant further suggestions to my next step in getting the 12v and gas operational, else I guess I'll have to call someone in??

thanks

Post by **lagerhead** » 03 Feb 2008, 20:58

When the ignitor stops is the red light on or off? If its off then it is likely that the electrode is shorted to earth. the way these ignitors work is that they monitor the resistance between electrode and earth - if high the sparker sparks, if low (caused by the pilot light flame) the sparker will stop.

If your ignitor stops with the red light on then you have a similar fault to mine which i think can only be the ignitor not charging sufficiently and will require a new one.

Post by **lhd** » 03 Feb 2008, 21:11

To get these fridges to ignite every time without fail is an art if you have a problem.
I must have removed mine turned it upside down you name it about 10-15 times and everybodies problems seems to be diiferent.
Mine was that the electrode (I think) the thing the spark produces was either to close or too far away to produce a decent spark.
It was only through trial and error that the problem was recognised.
So get used to taking it out and putting it back in.

One thing I would advise is be very careful when pushing the fridge back into place as its very easy to break the plastic instrument panel, and I mean very easy. If it doesn't go back gently dont push as the top right mounting bracket will break the panel.

Post by **lagerhead** » 03 Feb 2008, 21:16

Spark gap should be 3-4mm max however there should be plenty of voltage to jump a much larger gap.

Post by **sundial** » 03 Feb 2008, 21:34

Answer to lagerhead is the red indicator is out when the ignitor wire is connected to the sparker unit, if the ignitor wire (lug) is offered to the ignitor terminal whilst the ignitor is clicking then a spark can be seen at quite a distance, it only stops when fully connected, therfore will it be correct to assume it is the electode at fault, if so how easy is it to replace?

thanks for the replies

Post by **lagerhead** » 03 Feb 2008, 21:50

looks like a short to earth - probably the insulation broken down. You should be able to check this with a multimeter. the electrode is very easy to replace; not sure where to get one from though!