Model BAY-GDV or BAY-GDVDSI Installed 1996

It has piezo ignitor. Dad went on vacation in July. He insisted that the pilot be turned off while he was gone. I told him he might be sorry.

Anyway, tried this past weekend to relight the pilot for him. Nothing. No spark, no pilot no smell of gas nothing. (In July) I had turned off a valve to the gas line in the basement that directly led to the unit although I left the immediate valve (inside the unit) open as well as one where the unit's supply line connects to the house gas line.

I cleaned and swept out the unit prior to trying to get the unit started again.

Any ideas what to look for? How to tell if the piezo is providing a spark? Can I light one of these manually with a grill type lighter?

Is it possible a spider plugged things up? Does the thermopile
typically go bad on something like this that is not used most of the year?

Thanks for your suggestions, etc.

yes, it can be manually lit with a grill lighter. a piezo ignitor makes a sharp blue spark between the electrode and pilot when the click is heard. it should be bright blue and visible easily. spiders frequently plug the pilot tube and orifice of the burner. a powerpile never really fails when not in use unless it got smashed by something.

make sure you purge the gas line until you can smell it. a frequent cause of no-starts is massive amounts of non-combustible vapors in the gas line. trying to get it all to go thru the pilot may take a while. crack the nearest union or supply tube to help get the gas closer.

To add to punky's post, turn the gas back off, wait 15-20 seconds, then SLOWLY turn the gas back on. Now purge the line of air...

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Manually lighting would be the way to go the first time...

I you don't sense gas at the pilot, check through this.

http://handymanwire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/topics/684293/gas_water_heater#Post684293

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