Jotul pilot light goes out after 15ish minutes

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ManInAManSuit

New Member
Mar 2, 2015
3
Vermont
I moved into my house last summer, and it has a Jotul 3 DVII Allagash gas burning stove to heat the basement. In the fall. I tried to turn on the stove for the first time and I couldn't get the pilot light to stay lit. I ended up replacing the thermocouple on my own, and it seemed to fix the problem. The stove has run fine off the thermostat all winter, up until now. One day last week, the pilot light just went out. I was able to re-light the pilot, and turn the stove back on. The burner stayed lit for about 15 minutes, then the pilot light went out again, along with the burner I have repeated this process over and over, but it always seems to go out after about 15 minutes.

The pilot flame looks good, and is making good contact with everything.. I cleaned all parts, and air/gas flow seems to be fine. After reading a few other posts, I am thinking it might be the thermopile this time? (just to be sure am saying the right word, i believe the thermocouple is skinnier with more of a cone shape, which I already replaced. And, the thermopile is the larger cylinder shaped one, which I think I may need to replace.)

In other posts I have seen, people have trouble getting the pilot to light at all, so I was hopiing to get an answer as to why it is staying lit for a period of time before it goes out. Any help would be great!!

PS. I don't have a multimeter to test it with. Let me know if this is an absolute necessity before I go out and buy one.
 
I did a visual check from the ground, and didn't see any snow or ice on or around the vent opening. I also have a wood fireplace, and both the gas stove vents and wood chimney share the same shaft to the roof. I burn the wood fireplace often, so I think it would keep the gas vent fairly thawed.

I just removed the thermopile to get a closer look at if I could see any damage to it, or the wiring going to it, and it looked ok. I put it back into place, but turned it so the opposite side is now facing the pilot flame. This seems to have fixed the problem for now. The stove has been running for a few hours turning on and off fine with the thermostat. We will see if it stays that way, or if the pilot shuts off again. Since all I did was turn the thermopile around, I'm thinking that it may be bad, or going bad? I'll post an update in a few days.
 
False alarm. Almost as I was writing the last post, the pilot went out again. It burned fine for almost 4 hours this time. I don't know if that rules out any ventilation issues or not, but I'm all ears for what my next move should be.
 
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