I received an Email from British Gas a few week back stating that they were coming on 31st May to fit my new Smart Meter.
And the man duly arrived yesterday. On time.
So, he fit the meters (we have both as and electric from BG), Installed the remote display.
Then checked out the gas appliances in the house.
And he condemned our cooker.
And the reason ? Proving that we do not live in the Age of Reason, one of the burners had a yellowish flame. That's all.
This particular cooker, although I bought it, had been used by one of my daughters. She moved house and had no need for it. So I hauled it home (I had just spent £400 on this thing, I wasn't going to let her give it to the scrap man) and wrapped it in plastic. Leaving it out by the shed. Unfortunately there was a leak in the plastic and water got into the burners.
Anyway, I had been having trouble with the oven door on my own cooker and decided to use the 'spare' one. And as one of the jets was blocked I ran a very small drill through it to clear it. Not small enough. So it burned slightly rich. Hence the yellowish flame and the soot on the bottom of my pans. I got around this by not using that burner. No problem. Or so I thought.
So he condemned it. And said that he could cap of the pipe (depriving us of a cooker) there and then, or if I wanted a second opinion he would inform the supplier who would come and look at it, then cap of the system. I chose the second option and told him I would change the cooker.
So he left. My wife said that someone will be here within the hour. She was right, twenty minutes later there was a knock at the door and the man was there.
But by then we had removed the cooker and told him we were replacing it.
He was happy and went away.
Fortunately I had managed to get my original cooker into a shed and it was in good condition. The only reason we stopped using it was because the oven door wouldn't latch properly ant it was losing heat. I managed to fix the latch today. So we are back in business. 'Cooking on gas' as they say.
What annoys me about this whole business is that all it needed was a new jet. A ten minute job that I know I should have done way back when. But the cooker wasn't dangerous.
I'll probably fit a new jet and sell it.
Dave.
