fish house furnace problems

[minnbowhunter]

I have an Atwood forced air furnace in my house. 5 years old and it has never let me down till this weekend. The fan will run and I can hear the igniter run, it does this 3 times and then shuts down, I'm sure that is a safety setting. I cracked the gas line going in to the furnace and there is pressure there so it's not the reg. I looked at some troubleshooting info and restting the board was mentioned, anyone know the process to reset it. thanks.

[dairyman]

turn all electrical power to it off---wait 10-20 secs and then turn on again. Most newer furnaces have a trouble code built into the board. Its a series of flashes. when the furnace does not start after a shut down check for the flash code. Check your owners manual for reading the flash code and it will give you a general direction to look for the possible problem. Hope this helps

[minnbowhunter]

diaryman, thanks I am getting 3 flashes that tells me failure to ignite, the weird thing is if I diconnect the main power to the board the led keeps blinking so its getting power from somewhere. I looked for some kind of backup battery and could'nt see anything, but it was 2am and a bit chilly in the house.

[Glockwinger]

MBH,

I have a similar furnace in my fish house ('05 Ice Castle). Is your furnace wired with the propane leak detector? Is that what you are getting your codes from? Also, are you running two batteries for your house? Maybe the detector is hooked to a different battery than your furnace? Just a shot in the dark...good luck. I have had to chase around a gremlin like this with my house and it ended up being the battery wasn't holding a good enough charge. I think the furnace needed at least 11.7 volts or something like that. I replaced the battery and all is well with my issue. Hope you find the issue!

Glock

[GoneFish'n71]

I had finces try to build a nest in my vent once. A twig got between the ignitor and electrode causing it not to spark, and the same thing happend. Tried to start 3 times and quit. I have also heard of wasp nest interfering. Might want to take an air hose in your vents to see if anything blows out of there.

[mmartin]

It sounds like it just needs a good cleaning.

[Phred52]

minnbowhunter, the fan starts and the ignitor starts 'snapping' but won't ignite the gas. Goes through this cycle 3 times and needs to be reset, correct? The next time you go to light it, when it does that, go out by the intake/exhaust port and when you hear the ignitor start snapping, put your hand briefly over the port, you just want to slow the air flow a bit. My Attwood did that after coming out of storage, (don't know why, works fine now). I thought maybe something had built a nest in the system, but I had plugged the vent when I stored it. Phred52

[Mainehazmt]

if the fan flow switch sticks it might not light too but Id bet it is the batteries are low

[daylate]

I had this problem and it turned out that I had my battery leads hooked up backwards! I never thought that was the problem until I tried a new battery and discovered that it was hooked up wrong. Also after this season I would recommend taking it out and having it serviced this summer. well worth the cash for a 5 year old unit.

[minnbowhunter]

Thanks for all the advice guys, I will use all of your seggestions. The house is at the cabin, will check it out this weekend.

[Smoker]

We had a guy with a one year old house bring his in the shop doing the same thing and it was the gas valve that was bad.

[JumpStart73]

I also say bad gas valve.

[shamrock7]

Mine had an auto changeover valve and in the super cold around new years, did about the same thing. The cook top would work but the furnace would not light. Boiled some water and poured it onto the gas valve and I could hear a shhhhhh and all was good. I had pressure before but not enough to light the furnace. Have a new valve to install next time out.