We have an old caravan with a Carver Cascade water heater (series 1 I believe - mushroom shaped tank but having searched around on the internet, the control unit has only 1 light and a manual I found indicated 3 but otherwise it's pretty identical). I also believe our runs just off the battery (no gas) - could this be right or am I being a muppet (!!)?
The heater's worked fine for the first few trips of the year but on out most recent trip, didn't work at all. The light is green but no hot water. I wonder if anyone could suggest where to look for the problem.
We only bought the van this Easter so don't have much experience with it. Is there a significance of a flashing green light? The missus previously has noticed (when working fine) that at times, the green light flashes and I was wondering what this might mean?
OK - you can call me a muppet! Of course it's working off gas - we're looking at the problem now and clearly hear the ignition and then the gas lighting. We're just waiting now to see if it works OK.
Flashing green light seems to mean that the gas hasn't ignited. This leaves a bit of a problem then. Last weekend, the light was solid green - just no hot water. The trip over was particularly wet - could this have dampened the ignition to the point of failing? It's odd though - we tried the following day as well.
Anyway, while I'm writing this the water is hot so there isn't much going wrong. If anyone could suggest what might of happened and how we might avoid it, i'd be grateful!
It appears even a bit of a cobweb can stop it from lighting. Any damp on the electrodes also wont light.
Plenty of charge in the battery?
Did you run it with no water?
Cannot find the link at the moment but im sure there is a fuse, some are a button to reset others need it to be replaced.
Quote: Originally posted by Grampian91 on 28/6/2009
It appears even a bit of a cobweb can stop it from lighting. Any damp on the electrodes also wont light.
Plenty of charge in the battery?
Did you run it with no water? Cannot find the link at the moment but im sure there is a fuse, some are a button to reset others need it to be replaced.
Hi!
Thanks for the reply! I suspect the electrodes must have got damp. We've ran a test today and it works fine and last weekends trip was very wet while traveling.
Close but damp eletrodes won't cause it, as soon as it lights it will cure that!
My guess is the wire connection block on the control switch has a little corrosion on one of the connection pins.
The likely one is the yellow wire and a little corrosion/damp here will stop the 'brain' knowing the flames lit so it shuts down.
To cure it, I tell people to pull the block off and back on a few times to scratch a fresh connection on all the pins.
Moving/vibration while travelling can have the same effect so you may find it stops working again next time out?
There's a Cascade mk1 manual on my website, in the fault finding chart, the red fail light on the 3 LED switch should be read as green flashing for your switch.
Many thanks for the reply and advice. As it happens, I was on your site earlier and downloaded the manual so I could have a clue what I was looking at!
I'll take a look at the wire connection as you suggest.