Water Heater Woes

[noaddress]

I've got a new Reliance 606 water heater (5 months old) that was working fine until about a month ago. Now the pilot light will go out at random times, sometimes it won't go out for days or weeks, some days it will go out several times. It's always easy to relight, but annoying. When it's heating the water, I hear a constant "snapping" noise about every 20-30 seconds coming from inside the unit. The pliot flame is a lazy blue color, more or less, and seems to be contacting the thermocouple nicely. Any suggestions?

Thanks, Ron

[Rolling Thunder]

Are you on propane? If so, you may have a bad batch.

Thunder

[RAlex]

No it's natural gas from the local utility. Does anybody know if the snapping noise that's coming from the gas control valve when the unit is heating the water is normal? It's different from the noise that the valve makes when it shuts off after the water reaches the set temperature- that's more of a "clunk", but when it's heating the water, the control valve emits a snapping noise that I can hear in the next room.......

Thanks, R>On Sun, 13 Mar 2005 21:15:19 GMT, [e-mail] wrote: >

[m Ransley]

No noise is normal , noise of popping or a clunk is usualy scale in the tank it is boiling through the sediment, if that is the noise yearly flushing would have prevented it

[RAlex]

Thank you for your response.

The water heater is only 5 months old, and the noise doesn't seem to coming fom inside the tank, it's coming from the control valve. Could it be a defective unit? How are control valves tested?

Thanks again, Ron