Ruined my Refrigerator Burner

[Sloop_Smitten]

I have a Dometic Servel S620 refrigerator. The burner flame was sputtering and while attempting to clean it I altered the dimension of the orifice in the burner tube. (0958164006) I have looked high and low for a replacement to no avail. I did find a Norcold burner 621957 which looks very similar and I was thinking of trying to rig it as a replacement. Was wondering if others have faced this dilemma and what their solutions was, short of replacing the frig. It cools well and has never been an issue in the five years I have owned it.

[RJsfishin]

If shutting the air down a bit produces a proper flame, I know what I would do 🙂

[Chris_Bryant]

Often if the slots have rusted out and are too large it will do that.

[Sloop_Smitten]

The flame is cutting in and out. Sometimes as little as a few milliseconds. Other times long enough that the igniter starts sparking. Kind of like trying to drive a car that has a bad miss.

[RJsfishin]

Flame sputtering ?? Is it cooling ? I hope you aren't just talking the usual noisy roaring flame that really does get quieter when you shut down the air,.....because except in hi altitude, is supposed to be that way.
If you were to make the flame quiet at sea level, it would burn nasty dirty at hi altitude.

[Sloop_Smitten]

I wanted to provide an update to this thread since I was the original poster. Original problem was a stuttering refrigerator burner flame. I took off the burner assembly LP lines and cutoff solenoid and cleaned each of them thoroughly as well as the burner flue. I then replaced the burner orifice and the igniter/thermocouple on the refrigerator with new parts, added a new copper washer and checked the connections for any leaks. When I powered up the refrigerator the flame was still sputtering as before. :?

The burner tube has a hole on each side about 3/16” in circumference which provides the proper amount of air for the flame. There is no adjustment to allow you to adjust the air volume. On a lark I plugged one of the holes and the flame immediately stabilized and looked normal. So I am theorizing the sputtering appears to be an air/fuel mixture issue. My initial thought was just to use some metal tape to cover one of the holes and call it a day. However, I am wondering what changed.:h

The amount of LP used is regulated by the main pressure regulator mounted on the LP tank. It is supposed to provide 11” of Water Column. I am leaning towards the regulator malfunctioning or a leak somewhere allowing LP to escape. The stove, furnace and water heater all work flawlessly but they use a great deal more LP than the miniscule amount the refrigerator uses. My next step is to construct a homemade manometer to measure the water column present at the fridge. This should identify whether the LP pressure is an issue or not. Could mean I just need to adjust or replace the regulator.

I’ll update this post once I have measured the water column.

[Sloop_Smitten]

Thanks to everyone for your suggestions. I am going to go with Chris' recommendation since it is hands down the cheapest. Now if I can just figure out how to get the old orifice out of the burner tube with out destroying the tube?

[Chris_Bryant]

That's it- That model Servel does have a Norcold cooling unit- for a while Dometic built them for Norcold and used them in their own version of the 600 series, so burner, etc is interchangeable- electronics would be as well, but the plugs are different.

[Matt_Colie]

Smitty,

Did you contact Dometic directly? If they can't help, look up National RV Refrigeration They may be in Indiana, but they do this for us and the local Amish community.

Good Luck

Matt

[Sloop_Smitten]

Chris Bryant wrote:
That will work fine- you will have to change the tubing, as the new one is flared- or you can buy the Norcold orifice, which will work as well, but you do need the copper ring for the replacement orifice.

Chris,
Is that the Norcold copper ring?
Norcold Copper ring

[Chris_Bryant]

That will work fine- you will have to change the tubing, as the new one is flared- or you can buy the Norcold orifice, which will work as well, but you do need the copper ring for the replacement orifice.

[RJsfishin]

Any repair place, mobile or otherwise carrys those. They are replaced often because they get rusty. But that is the burner, which is separate of the orfice.
Hard to ruin the burner just cleaning it, but the orfice can be ruined by poking metal objects thru them. And I'm talking norcold, don't know it they'll interchange.