Monday, August 18, 2008

Hot Water Heater...

A couple of weeks ago I started to notice that occasionally the hot water that came out of the tap was not as hot as it usually was. I didn't think much of it at first but as the problem persisted and eventually got worse, I started to notice a pattern. Usually, when we do something that uses enough hot water, you will hear the hot water heater come on to create more hot water. While I was hearing the hot water heater blower start, it would only last for a short period of time and then stop (not long enough to heat enough water to replenish what was used). When I went downstairs, I noticed the green light on the water heater was blinking a series of six blinks. I read the instruction manual for the A. O. Smith FPSH 50 Series 260 and found several reasons that it might be blinking like this. The six flashes meant the system was in lockout mode - meaning that it had a problem during normal operation and shutdown to the lockout mode. Once in lockout mode, the system would wait a long period of time before attempting to light the burner again to create hot water.

Looking on the internet I found several discussions that suggested the problem was due to a corroded flame sensing wire. This wire is responsible for making sure the gas hot water heater is indeed burning gas as opposed to dangerously leaking gas into the environment. I turned off the power and gas to the hot water heater, removed the bottom access panels, and investigated the components located at the bottom of the tank. I saw the flame sensing wire had some brown rust like corrosion on it. I took a small bit of steel wool and lightly removed the corrosion, replaced the access panels, and tested the system. It has now been several weeks and the hot water heater has been operating perfectly.

A BIG 'Thank You' to the numerous people that posted their similar experiences, your advice saved me from having to purchase a new hot water heater or call a service technician. :-)

Friday, August 15, 2008

Lionfish...

Before going to Turks and Caicos in June, I read the captain logs for the Turks and Caicos Aggressor. They reported seeing lionfish in multiple locations. I thought it was strange as the lionfish is known to be a Pacific fish but recently there have been reports of lionfish in the caribbean. I was excited at the chance to see them and they are magnificient to see in person but more recently I am starting to become concerned about their effect on the caribbean environment. This article is just one of the many articles that has recently spotlighted the problems that these fish can cause.

Monday, August 04, 2008

Bizarro World...

Everything was perfect for our run on Saturday morning. Friday night we'd eaten big plates of pasta as usual. We had gotten up right on time at 3:45am in order to make it to the trail by 5:00. I ate two pieces of toast, Kim ate her usual PB&J, and we were all dressed and ready to go. That is when Kim noticed the rain, and then that it wasn't just raining, it was storming.



We headed down to the trail anyway (had to, we are group leaders), and as we headed down it proceeded to pour and huge streaks of lightning went across the sky. We listened to the weather report and it certainly did sound like this was going to last all day.



The trail was chaotic and disorganized. We ran around to everyone's cars in the dark and pouring rain, trying to figure out which people were members of our group and which people were not. Each group ended up making our own decision about what to do - some groups chose to wait. Kim and I ended up postponing the run due to weather for the first time in the 2 1/2 years we've been in the program.



We're fairly used to getting up that early to run, so the time was not a big deal. What we are not used to is getting up that early and then not running. We tried to sleep, and we did fall asleep for an hour or so. We ended up discovering that we need those endorphins from running to keep us sane. Saturday was a bizarro world of feeling jet-lagged, bickering with each other, and just plain feeling miserable. We were not the same Todd and Kim that people are used to.



Fast forward to Sunday. Again, we were awake at 3:45am, went down to the trail and this time ran. It was beautiful weather, cooler than it had been on Saturday, clear and beautiful. I ran an easy 20 miles. After the run, we were totally normal, feeling great, and had a wonderful day. It's amazing what a change a little endorphins will make.