About a week and a half ago, our two-year old Reliance 606 gas water heater started… well… NOT heating water. Turns out that the pilot light (the small jet of gas that keeps burning so it can light the main burner to heat the water) kept going out.
A quick troll of several appliance message boards (read: gripefests) revealed that this was a common problem. I emailed someone at the water heater company, and got this from them:
Thank you for contacting help@hotwater.com, it sounds as if the flame arrestor on the water heater is restricted not allowing air to flow through the burner chamber. I am sending you a link to a video which will show you the correct way to clean your water heater’s screen and flame arrestor. Simply click on the following link to view the short video (you will have to push the play button “>” for the video to start).
http://www.hotwater101.com/video/gas-filtercleaning.html
If you are unable to play the video, there is also a PDF you could print out or view on your computer. The PDF contains an illustrated step by step instructions guide for cleaning your water heater’s filter and flame arrestor.
Thank you, Technical Support Department
If I can figure out how to embed the video here, I’ll do it later. But click the link above and watch it. It seems to have worked.
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