Help - No Propane Flowing!

[dave14117]

On road near Yellowstone, dw likes to cook and it's a little chilly at night. For our 06 Cougar 5'er filled both propane tanks yesterday but since then cannot get any gas to flow to the trailer. Red/green indicator stays red. Smelled a little propane near the tanks occasionally before the refill. Have tried the very slow opening thing with no change on both tanks individually. Turned the water heater electric option off to have something open in the gas line.Original regulator and tanks. Nothing helps. Thinking need new regulator. Or maybe one of the gas feed tank-to-regulator lines. Any suggestions appreciated.

[Flattman]

Glad you got it fixed. For anyone else reading this post this happened to me and after replacing several pieces of the system it ended up being a bad valve on the tank. An unrepairable piece and had to buy new tank. I bought both new tanks figuring the other was probably not going to be far behind it. No problems since.

[sadiesassy]

INteresting - Had problems with my Propane system over JUly 4th.

Went into camping world and they suggested new pigtail since they are usually the first to go.
That did not help

After doing some tear down and leak checking - Turns out the step down regulator on the drivers side was leaking - alot. We replaced it and we purge the lines and everything is working better

Also had problems getting the water heater propane heater to light. Initially they thought it was altitude ( Yellowstone and Tetons). Turns out the nozzle was partially plugged.

[dave14117]

It was the regulator, and also one of the tank-to-regulator hoses. Thanks everyone for all the good suggestions.

[Sport45]

dave14117 wrote:
I think one of the Acme nuts may be broken. When it's tight there is still play in the line...so no way it could be closing the tank valve. QUESTION - if I steal the line from the other tank, leaving nothing attaching to that tank (it's Sunday and nothing's open), will the system still run?

I'd take it off and clean the threads with a stiff brush then try it again.

[Old-Biscuit]

dave14117 wrote:
I think one of the Acme nuts may be broken. When it's tight there is still play in the line...so no way it could be closing the tank valve. QUESTION - if I steal the line from the other tank, leaving nothing attaching to that tank (it's Sunday and nothing's open), will the system still run?

Yes that pigtail is bad....when connected there should be no movement.

You can use other pigtail but why?

Valve out both cylinders
Swap lever to other cylinder and slowly open valve

Which ever cylinder is opened first is primary...lever switches indication for RED/GREEN dial.

IF neither cylinder flows you could have 2 bad pigtails

(Without a hose connected to cylinder service valve--OPD----no propane will flow out if valve is opened. The spring loaded shut-off inside the connection has to be pushed open bu the 'center stub in ACME Nut)

[dave14117]

I think one of the Acme nuts may be broken. When it's tight there is still play in the line...so no way it could be closing the tank valve. QUESTION - if I steal the line from the other tank, leaving nothing attaching to that tank (it's Sunday and nothing's open), will the system still run?

[wcjeep]

The fast moving Propane could have iced up. This happened the one time my wife switched tanks. She didn't know to open the next tank valve slowly.

[RoyB]

I think the cold air had something to do with it as well... When it is real cold mine doesn't work as well at regular temps outside. I guess high altitude plays hectic on flow as well...

I of course always do the stove top test with a lit burner to check out the flow. If that works normal with good blue flame and no RED flare-up then I know I am not mixing air with the flow...

[edatlanta]

I went through all of the suggestions above when my rig was 4 years old last year. Nothing worked, but a new regulator and when I still didn't have flow, 2 new pigtails to the tanks (I did put put the old pigtails on the new regulator just to make sure the regulator was in fact bad). No problems since. It did seem strange to me that all three items failed about the same time. I did work through checking each item individually and yes, they were all three bad.

[Happy_Prospecto]

When opening my tanks too fast after refilling, what I had to do was shut the tanks off, remove the pigtails from the tank, then reattach the pigtails to the tanks, then slowly turn on the tank that the selector valve was pointing to. After turning on the tanks slowly the red indicator would turn green.

[2324delk]

Very slowly is the key, watch for indicator to go green when you go slow enough.

My Cougar does same thing, When I fill both tanks.

[laknox]

dave14117 wrote:
On road near Yellowstone, dw likes to cook and it's a little chilly at night. For our 06 Cougar 5'er filled both propane tanks yesterday but since then cannot get any gas to flow to the trailer. Red/green indicator stays red. Smelled a little propane near the tanks occasionally before the refill. Have tried the very slow opening thing with no change on both tanks individually. Turned the water heater electric option off to have something open in the gas line.Original regulator and tanks. Nothing helps. Thinking need new regulator. Or maybe one of the gas feed tank-to-regulator lines. Any suggestions appreciated.

Likely the excess flow valve on the tank has shut off. Shut off the tanks, open the stove valves to allow any propane to escape. VERY SLOWLY open your tanks and try it again. You might have air in the lines, so it may take a while for things to light off.

Lyle

[newman_fulltime]

if you smelled a buildup of propane good chance your regulator went bad

[Old-Biscuit]

Both propane cylinders valves OPEN...swapping 'in service' lever from tank to tank and RED/GREEN stays RED??

Remove pigtails from cylinders........When you turn ACME NUT (Green nut) do you get a 'piff' of propane being released?

Inside that ACME Nut is a stub that pushes open a spring loaded shut-off valve inside the valve connection. If ACME NUT not fully tightened....no flow out of cylinder

Crack outlet fitting on regulator to main hose...any 'piff' of propane
Bad regulator.


Also........check that ALL propane appliances are turned OFF when trying to reset ACME excess flow device. Valve out cylinder/wait then slowly valve back in.
Should hear click.

Anything OPEN will act like excess flow because line pressure can not build up/equalize in hoses.