# Lets talk heaters...



## ih772 (Jan 28, 2003)

I have three buddy heaters that I've used the heck out of the last 9 years and never any problems with them staying lit.

Clean out the pilot orifice, they can get a bit of crud in them keeping the flame from reaching the thermocouple properly.


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## JJ Mac (Dec 29, 2003)

+1 on cleaning the orifice. I had some trouble with the pilot on mine at the start of a season...pushed a Q tip with alcohol down the orifice and pulled up some cobweb and other **** that was never visible.

I wouldn't go back to the Mr. Heater personally. It's overkill for most shanties and you find yourself running as low as you can get without getting too much unburned fumes many days. It's loud and unforgiving if anything gets close to it for a second. I've used them in the past, had some flamethowers, bad connections to the tank when it's cold, and didn't get as much longevity out of them than the buddy heater. No offense to those than run them, hopefully they work for you.

They cook a great hot dog in no time! 

I would think cleaning the orifice and maybe even swapping/cleaning parts from your other buddy units would get you a working heater again without spending a cent.


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## ih772 (Jan 28, 2003)

JJ Mac said:


> +1 on cleaning the orifice. I had some trouble with the pilot on mine at the start of a season...pushed a Q tip with alcohol down the orifice and pulled up some cobweb and other **** that was never visible.
> 
> I wouldn't go back to the Mr. Heater personally. It's overkill for most shanties and you find yourself running as low as you can get without getting too much unburned fumes many days. It's loud and unforgiving if anything gets close to it for a second. I've used them in the past, had some flamethowers, bad connections to the tank when it's cold, and didn't get as much longevity out of them than the buddy heater. No offense to those than run them, hopefully they work for you.
> 
> ...


I saw the spider web thing happen to a friends buddy heater. You can't see the dirt and crud unless you blow it out into something white like a paper towel. It worked perfectly after that.


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## UNCLE AL (Jan 5, 2002)

I've had my buddy heater for a long time, tore the plumbing off and cleaned some of the nastiest looking spunk out of it that i've ever seen. All from running it on a 20lb tank without a filter. This year I called buddy, and got new plastic for it, the handle was broken, the bars on the bottom broke, and one of the clips that hold the sides on was also broken. All the plastic and a new thermocouple was less than 50.00. I use it in a clam pro and on the low setting it's HOT.


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## Steellord (Sep 24, 2006)

MSUICEMAN said:


> I've never used the bigger tanks on mine. For whatever reason the pilot wont stay lit on one of them, another one lights up but wont stay lit for more than like 30 seconds. Another one just doesn't work (but it got mangled pretty bad on sag bay).
> 
> Maybe someone knows how to fix the pilot and I suspect a thermocouple or pilot issue with the other one also.
> 
> Sent from my Droid using Tapatalk


I have a mod done by a friend on another board that is supposed to fix the thermocouple issue and it also shows how to 
bypass the anti tip switch to use the heater to cook with. PM me if you would like a copy.


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