Grandma Stampie needs help with her gas stove

I didn't troubleshoot this too far because I'm not going to break it totally for my mom that lives by her stove.  First a beautiful picture of the stove top made by me.

We were up there this weekend and she mentioned that her stove wasn't working right.  She initially said that the bottom right burner wasn't working.  She also said that she only uses the right two burners 99% of the time.  I tried all of the burners and the only one that did work was top right.  She didn't notice because she just went top right since she normally uses it more anyway.  I could smell gas coming from the burners that didn't work.  The igniters worked on all burners.  This would have been early to mid afternoon.  I looked under the cabinet and the gas line comes up and enters the stove top on the top right where the only working burner at the time is.

Don't know if this helps but later that evening (much colder outside) I tried the bottom left burner and it worked.  Quickly tested the others and they all worked.  I did notice that of the 20 or so flames coming out of each burner, several on the front two burners had shorter flames than the rest of the flames.  I only did that on the front two burners.  I was thinking low on propane but cold as berk outside so we waited to check the next day.  Next day we checked the tank and it read at 70%.  For the rest of the visit all the burners worked (still stubbie flames on some) but it also remained colder for the rest of the visit than that first day.  Not saying temp is a factor just pointing it out as a maybe.

The stove is a Dacor SMG365 if that helps.  We come to you humble as the first place she contacted politely declined to work on it even though they are factory authorized service techs.

Seems like I fixed a problem with my MIL's gas range, but it was so long ago, I fergit what it was.

https://propanehq.com/causes-of-weak-flame-on-a-gas-stove/

Don't the burners need periodic cleaning?  All the orifices and such?

In reply to Stampie :

If the propane tank is above ground and it's been unusually cold where Grandma Stampie lives (I think that's the case), the cold ambient temperatures could be causing lower than normal pressure delivery to the burners. Propane needs to vaporize in the tank and that energy will come from outside the tank, if its cold that obviously gets harder to do.  Tanks where it's normal for it to be in the single digits for long periods of time are often buried to use the heat from the ground to help vaporize the propane.

To test if this is actually what's happening someone could pour several pans of hot water over the tank to warm it up temporarily.  If the stove then works properly for a bit the outdoor temps are the problem.  If not, it could be the pressure regulator at the tank is malfunctioning and the propane provider would have to look at that.  A call to the propane people might not be a bad idea, they may be getting similar calls with the extreme cold weather and can at least confirm that it will get better as temperatures get back to normal.

In reply to 1988RedT2 :

Ok that confirms my basic thoughts.  I'm leaning towards a pressure regulator issue.

In reply to Mr_Asa :

I I believe so and we thought that might be the case because of something else but that wouldn't explain issues with several burners either working or not working at once.  Also that I could smell gas from a burner, the igniter was working, but it wouldn't light.

In reply to 11GTCS :

The tank is underground so that might eliminate temperature as an issue.  Also it's opposite of what you would think.  Works better cold than warm.  

Where is the demark on propane?  Does the propane provider stop after the gas leaves the tank?  Appliance repair checks the house side?  Who would you guys call first?

In reply to Stampie :

Where the appliance guys have already brushed you off I'd try calling the propane provider.   Are there other propane appliances beside the stove (furnace, water heater)?  If the other appliances are OK it could be something with the stove but where you describe small flames at the burners it really sounds like a pressure problem.

In reply to 11GTCS :

I just got off the phone with her and that's our idea also.  She's very happy with her propane provider but doesn't have an appliance company that she's worked with before.  No other gas appliances. I thought her hot water heater was but not so.

I second the propane provider. They set up our stove top when we installed ours. We owned our own tank and they installed the line to the house. 

11GTCS said:

In reply to Stampie :

If the propane tank is above ground and it's been unusually cold where Grandma Stampie lives (I think that's the case), the cold ambient temperatures could be causing lower than normal pressure delivery to the burners. Propane needs to vaporize in the tank and that energy will come from outside the tank, if its cold that obviously gets harder to do.  Tanks where it's normal for it to be in the single digits for long periods of time are often buried to use the heat from the ground to help vaporize the propane.

To test if this is actually what's happening someone could pour several pans of hot water over the tank to warm it up temporarily.  If the stove then works properly for a bit the outdoor temps are the problem.  If not, it could be the pressure regulator at the tank is malfunctioning and the propane provider would have to look at that.  A call to the propane people might not be a bad idea, they may be getting similar calls with the extreme cold weather and can at least confirm that it will get better as temperatures get back to normal.

I disagree somewhat.  Yes, the cold reduces the pressure, but propane vapor pressure is still over 100 psi at 50F and the regulator only spits out 0.3 psi.  In order for propane to drop below 0.3 psi, it would have to be -150F.  Not very healthy for grandma Stampie

I'm late to the discussion and this likely isn't any help, but here it goes anyway. Did by chance she recently clean the stove? Our gas cooktop is very sensitive to getting the prices back in just the right spots. Ours has a gas distribution ring(my words, not the official or correct term for them)and then a cap which fits on top. If either of those is just slightly off and not 100% correctly seated, it won't light. The gas will flow but the burner won't light. This happens here every time my lovely better half fools around with MY stove, she puts stuff together but not correctly. Anyway, maybe she has the parts/pieces in the wrong spot? Maybe she took everything apart to clean it and it's want reassembled right or the parts are just far enough off to not allow it to work. It's difficult to explain, but here are pix of the pieces I'm trying to explain.

***Dont mind the dirty stove***

In reply to lotusseven7 (Forum Supporter) :

That's a very good catch because you know what happened between them not working and them working as I stated above?  I think I took all of those caps off just looking to see if anything was blocked.

I also have to clean out the tubes on my outdoor things like the grill and the cooker.  It doesn't take much in there to block proper flow, like even a spider web can cause it to be funky.