It looks like the same bottles I have on my
boat. Shouldn't be too much trouble finding a place to fill it for ya.
Mike's Happy Little
Boat Story Time:
Not having ever really used propane for much of anything, I was a bit befuddled by the various hoses and fittings and adapters tossed in the locker when I took possession of my first boat (this one, yes. A 41' 20 year old production boat. In
Florida. Stupid? Possibly, we don't know yet.). The
surveyor had mentioned that the bottle that was hooked up was empty, which is why he couldn't check the
stove. (It wasn't empty.) So I took it to a Tractor Supply in town to have them fill it, also allowing me to see what sort of hose/adapter witchcraft was necessary to not detonate my
new boat but still create masterful hot
dogs and grilled chikinz at my leisure on my new yacht. The guy went through all the trouble to set up the whole rig and that tank took less than 1/2lb. I guess the "other" tank is empty then, huh? I felt like such an idiot...
Took it back to the boat and plumbed it in according to the spells and incantations I had witnessed at the tractor store. Rotated valve to the 'open' position and heard the little whoosh
noise I was expecting. All is well, no fires or fatalities. Quick hop downstairs to flip the switch for the gas solenoid then stood over the
stove with my lighter on a stick. Turn the little knob... didn't hear anything but maybe it takes a second for the gas to reach all the way from over there to over here..? Didn't smell sulfur, no hissing noises, and about a thousand attempts with the lighter yielded zero satisfying blue tongues of fire in my
galley. This is Not what I was expecting in return for several hours of
work and driving around town and looking stupid at the tractor store.
Well, I know for a solid fact that the tank is full. I know it's hooked up correctly. I know it pressurized the line correctly when I opened the main valve. But there's no gas at the stove... hmm... For S&G I decided to use one of the other random adapter thingies in the propane locker to connect one of my 1lb disposable bottles, thus bypassing the now-suspect hose situation that connects the big tanks in an effort to determine whether this is a supply problem at the tank or a device problem at the stove. I didn't know at that exact moment that I was also bypassing the solenoid valve, not knowing what a solenoid valve looked like in this capacity. I know what solenoids are and I know what valves are. But I didn't know much of anything about the two when combined in a
marine installation, particularly what such a thing might look like. So anyways, I connect the 1 pounder and it hisses when I open the valve just like the big tank did. Back downstairs. Find lighter on a stick that I have managed to lose in the seven minutes since I last used it. Found after brief search and minor cursing. Approach stove. Turn knob. Hear actual noise! Apply lighter on a stick and POOF! Little blue tongues of fire!!! Now if I only had pots and pans.. or maybe something to cook on a skewer.. but sadly no.
What had happened wuz that the previous owner, in his infinite and absolutely bat---- crazy logic, had destroyed the solenoid valve whilst attempting to troubleshoot it. What I couldn't know was that he had taken/ripped/beaten the
electrical bit off of it, just leaving the brass valve part inline with the rest of the witchcraft in there. It just looked like another random piece of something-that-was-possibly-important but with no wires going to it, my electrician's brain did not make the association that it may be the valve I seek. I had torn apart the stbd lazarette, gone
diving behind the
galley cabinets, nearly took the stove out trying to find this stupid valve that I now know has to be the bad part. I've isolated everything else and built a functioning system from one end to the other so where is this stupid valve at!?
Well, when all else fails and I'm running low on
beer, thus needing to find a resolution before nightfall lest I die in my sleep of acute failure to fix something, I went to a few websites to just see if I could locate a
single picture of this alleged "solenoid valve" that I now suspected may well have been a huge practical joke on me and that they don't actually exist at all. And there it was (for $270 &$@*%#* dollars!). Hey, I've seen at least half of that assembly quite recently... hmm... Back to the
cockpit, open the propane locker, dig past the discarded bits of witchcraft. Ahah! Yep, that's a valve alright. But.. isn't it supposed to have wi-- oh there they are. Cut short and stuffed back into a recess with a piece of prehistoric
electrical tape and some cobwebs holding them just out of easy visual detection range.
The electrical actuator is gone. Long gone. Probably beyond the orbit of Jupiter by now. But the valve part is there. I go grab some of my vicious pliers that can ruin stainless and put some torque on that suspicious looking post sticking out and behold! The valve turns! So we're all on the same page at this point: Mr P/O had destroyed the actuator, hacked the wires, left the valve stuck in the closed position, hidden it in with the other random debris in there, left a full tank hooked up, and left the breaker on sending 12VDC to two bare wires in a propane locker. Yep. And you know what? That's not the worst thing I've found. But that's a story for another thread. Back to your regularly scheduled reading