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So I have a gas fireplace that originally didn't have a fan installed. And this issue occurs whether or not the fan is connected or not.

The issue is that whenever the fan switch is placed in the on position the flame will go out if the fireplace is on, or not be able to light if it was off before.

I'm assuming it has something to do with the electric pilot, since when the fan switch is in the ON position, I can't hear the click sound that my electric pilot does. However I thought my electric pilot was battery powered (by 2 D batteries) so I don't understand why the switch would cause issues.

Also this fireplace runs on propane not NG.

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    This sounds like the thermocouple safety may have failed. Usually 8-20$ depending on the model if no flame is detected it turns the gas valve off.
    – Ed Beal
    Sep 16, 2016 at 23:35
  • "Originally didn't have a fan" -- how was it decided a fan could be added?
    – Tyson
    Sep 16, 2016 at 23:46
  • So the fireplace had a switch for a fan, and the plug areas for a fan, but no fan when I bought the house.
    – nbppp2
    Sep 17, 2016 at 14:18
  • Thanks for the help. Apparently I have a neighbor that is good with electrical in addition to having good mechanical skills. I brought it up to him & he went through it with me to figure out what was wrong.
    – nbppp2
    Sep 17, 2016 at 21:49

1 Answer 1

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So the batteries are only for when the house looses power. The "fan" switch actually cuts all power to the outlets under the fireplace. According to the manual, there is one for the fan, one for the pilot, and one for the REM/AUX.

According to the fan manual, it uses a temperature sensor to control the fan.

The reason the flame cut off when the "fan" switch was turned off, is that the batteries were dead despite having been new when installed last December. Since the batteries were dead, and power to the fireplace's control module was cut, it turned off the flame as a failsafe.

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