I finally got tired enough of the piezoelectric igniter on my Atwood stovetop that I decided to replace it with a battery-powered igniter unit. You know what I’m talking about. You twist the knob; bam, bam, bam . . . bam, bam, bam and sometimes the burner lights and sometimes not.:M
I removed the old igniter and took some measurement to determine the available real estate. I found a replacement electronic igniter for Charbroil grills from Home Depot for $30 that looked promising.
The hole for the original igniter was 5/8” and the new one requires 7/8”. If you have a unibit step drill, that would work nice. But since I don’t and didn’t want to spend the $$ I used a stone grinder bit and “hogged” the hole out to 7/8. You need to “cheat” the hole slightly up and to the left for a little more clearance for the igniter.
Pull the wires off the old igniter and slide them on to the new, order does not matter. Even though the old igniter has round pins and the new has spade pins, the terminals slide on with a tight fit and work fine. Due to the higher voltage of this unit I saw occasional flashover between the terminals when it was activated. I solved that by adding a second layer of heat shrink over the terminals.
The new igniter has four terminals and since the stovetop only has three burners, that left one to add a sparker for the oven pilot light. The new unit comes with spare 37” and 32” igniter wires. I joined the two together and they were long enough to reach across the stovetop, and follow the oven control plumbing down into the oven. The longer wire looks like it has a high-temp coating, but I also wrapped the part that is actually in the oven with high-temp fiberglass tape. I needed a sparker so I removed the one from my gas grill side burner, which I never use anyway. After removing the burner assembly from the oven, I “guesstimated” the location for the sparker and drilled a 7/16” hole in the pilot support plate. Once the sparker was in place, I reinstalled the burner assembly. The sparker electrode had to be “tweaked” slightly to get a reliable spark to the outlet end of the pilot light tube.
If you don’t add the oven igniter, you need to install one of the supplied wires on the fourth terminal and coil and stow the wire so that it won’t short to the stove. If you don’t do this, the bare terminal on the igniter will flashover to the others.
After installing the single AA battery and turning on the gas, it was time for a test run.
Aaaahh . . . The stovetop burners light almost instantly, quietly and reliably. The electronic ignition sparks about six times per second for as long as you hold the button as opposed to three sparks per half-revolution of the knob on the old one.
The oven pilot lights nicely. I’ve found that if you turn the oven knob to “pilot” and hold it for about 10 seconds and then push the igniter button, it will light almost instantly. I was a little concerned about the wire in the oven, so I heated the oven to 500 degrees for a test. Everything looks good and smoke check passed.
DW is HAPPY, and you know what that means . . .:B
Before
Old Piezoelectric Igniter
New Electronic Igniter
Oven Pilot Light Sparker Installation
After
I removed the old igniter and took some measurement to determine the available real estate. I found a replacement electronic igniter for Charbroil grills from Home Depot for $30 that looked promising.
The hole for the original igniter was 5/8” and the new one requires 7/8”. If you have a unibit step drill, that would work nice. But since I don’t and didn’t want to spend the $$ I used a stone grinder bit and “hogged” the hole out to 7/8. You need to “cheat” the hole slightly up and to the left for a little more clearance for the igniter.
Pull the wires off the old igniter and slide them on to the new, order does not matter. Even though the old igniter has round pins and the new has spade pins, the terminals slide on with a tight fit and work fine. Due to the higher voltage of this unit I saw occasional flashover between the terminals when it was activated. I solved that by adding a second layer of heat shrink over the terminals.
The new igniter has four terminals and since the stovetop only has three burners, that left one to add a sparker for the oven pilot light. The new unit comes with spare 37” and 32” igniter wires. I joined the two together and they were long enough to reach across the stovetop, and follow the oven control plumbing down into the oven. The longer wire looks like it has a high-temp coating, but I also wrapped the part that is actually in the oven with high-temp fiberglass tape. I needed a sparker so I removed the one from my gas grill side burner, which I never use anyway. After removing the burner assembly from the oven, I “guesstimated” the location for the sparker and drilled a 7/16” hole in the pilot support plate. Once the sparker was in place, I reinstalled the burner assembly. The sparker electrode had to be “tweaked” slightly to get a reliable spark to the outlet end of the pilot light tube.
If you don’t add the oven igniter, you need to install one of the supplied wires on the fourth terminal and coil and stow the wire so that it won’t short to the stove. If you don’t do this, the bare terminal on the igniter will flashover to the others.
After installing the single AA battery and turning on the gas, it was time for a test run.
Aaaahh . . . The stovetop burners light almost instantly, quietly and reliably. The electronic ignition sparks about six times per second for as long as you hold the button as opposed to three sparks per half-revolution of the knob on the old one.
The oven pilot lights nicely. I’ve found that if you turn the oven knob to “pilot” and hold it for about 10 seconds and then push the igniter button, it will light almost instantly. I was a little concerned about the wire in the oven, so I heated the oven to 500 degrees for a test. Everything looks good and smoke check passed.
DW is HAPPY, and you know what that means . . .:B
Before
Old Piezoelectric Igniter
New Electronic Igniter
Oven Pilot Light Sparker Installation
After
Duramax1 wrote:
How are you going to make the hole in the front of the stove to accommodate the ignitor mechanism?
I would use a Greenlee. Rent one if necessary, or borrow from ANY electrian friend. 7/8" = 1/2" conduit.
I installed this mod this morning, and had a lot of trouble with the oven igniter. I tried one from my BBQ, and it seemed to fit nicely, but I could not find a position for the electrode that would consistently light the pilot. The spark appeared rather yellowish to me, and it occured to me that it never worked well on the BBQ either. Our local HD doesn't carry such a part, so I had to go to BBQ Galore and found the one below. The mount was easy, and I drilled the hole with the burner assembly in place. Mounts with a #8 screw. I found that it was critical to get the electrode right at the end of the pilot tube. Seems to be working well now. Here is a pic to show my alternative way to mount the igniter.
