It’s 20 degrees (F) outside, and about 65 in my apartment. My furnace won’t blow out warm air. I don’t know how to use the gas fireplace (but the pilot is lit on it… it’s supposed to have a pilot, right?). I’m so cold. I need like a billion blankets tonight, and the phone number to call maintanence in the morning.
brrrrrr…
65 in the house isn’t that cold. If it was 65 outside you’d probably be fine with a sweater and no jacket, wouldn’t you? So why is it that much colder to have the same temperature inside the house?
Of course, you’ll get little sympathy from me; when I lived in upstate New York a winter would never go by that we didn’t lose power from the snow downing a line, and I remember once we didn’t get it back for a week.
Quick! Rub your hands together really fast!
hhmmmm, many gas fireplaces don’t have pilot lights, they have a piezeoelectric clicky thing [turn the knob to a certain point, you hear clicky sounds and a psssss of gas, and either it clicks til it lights or you turn the knob off because you are leaking too much gas into the room and are afraid it will go boom…] We had a nonvented propane gas log in an old wood burning stove we used to heat our bedroom when we were in the top floor of the barn, and it had a small battery that powered the clicky thing, but I generally used one of the long skinny BBQ lighters and lit it immediately [was in a fire one time and am SERIOUSLY nervous about anything combustable. 2nd degree burns over about 15% of the body makes me really paranoid now, so I dont risk anything if i can help it. Got very lucky that it was only 1st [reddening like sunburn] and 2nd [blistering] … ]
Does a neighbor have the same sort of fireplace? Is there some sort of brand name on it somewhere you can websearch for? Might have directions on how to use it online.
Actually, we frequently dont turn the heating part of the furnace on until into november, and I frequently leave the thermostat at 40 fahrenheit and heat during the day with our wood stove, and been known to sleep with a window open in winter when mrAru was away on a cruise. I was in heaven visiting Gaertringen last feb, I got to sleep with the window open, in a flat that was kept nice and cold even during the day=) I overheat very easily, and can go from shivering to sweating and back again in a 70 degree room in 10 minutes time.
Regarding the gas fireplace: if the pilot is lit, the unit should be functioning properly. All that is likely required is to activate it with the “on” switch, or in the case of older gas models, to turn the gas valve fully open. On a modern fireplace, you can usually open an access panel beneath it which will reveal the pilot igniter and gas control valve - usually, if the pilot is out, you turn this knob to the “pilot” or “light” position, depress it, and hit the button to light the pilot. Keep the button depressed for 30 to 60 seconds (this heats an element in the pilot flow to keep it lit in the event of momentary interruption), then turn the knob to the full “on” position. The fireplace is usually switched, so if it doesn’t go on at that point, look for a wall switch in close proximity.
With regard to the furnace, I used to have a forced air furnace and a gas water heater in a utility room, and for some reason, the pilot light on the water heater would occasionally be extinguished. Eventually I figured out that the closed door to the utility room was not permitting sufficient airflow to oxygenate both devices (through the small space under the door), so that when the furnace/blower was on full blast, the pilot on the water heater would suffocate. I installed a ventilation grate in the door - problem solved.
If the pilot on your furnace has gone out, you should be able to re-light it without too much trouble. Depends on the age of the unit. My water heater had an instruction label on the outside with lighting directions. I’m not sure how the furnace worked, but I never had it fail.
I had a wall-mounted gas heater in my apartment in L.A. This is how it worked:
[ul][li]Press down on the pilot light knob and turn 90° anti-clockwise[/li][li]Hold the knob down while lighting the pilot with a match or lighter[/li][li]Continue to hold the knob down for about 15 seconds. If you don’t, then the flame will go out.[/li][li]Release the knob. The flame will be lit.[/li][li]Turn the knob another 90° anti-clockwise. This makes the heater ready to operate.[/li][li]Set the thermostat to the desired temperature. There will be a “click” as a relay closes, and the heater will start up in a few seconds.[/ul][/li]This was how my heater operated. YMMV.
:smack: Had I bothered to read the thread first, I would have seen that Fuji Kitakyusho said the same thing.
Yes, 65 in my apartment is cold. I only like wearing pants when I absolutely must, and would much prefer to wear shorts in my 72 degree apartment. Pants just feel icky when I’m on the couch.
As far as the pilot light goes: I can’t check it. It’s locked in a little room on my balcony, and I don’t have the key.
YAY!! Maintanence just came and lit my pilot light! I have heat again!
It’s cold here too 28 degrees
CELSIUS
:eek: :eek: 
Ohhhh… that’s coooolllld. How could you bring up your weather like that to a freezing Michiganian?
Ahem…Michigander.
Next time that happens, crank your oven up past 500 degrees, open the oven door and leave it open till your place gets toasty. Close door or turn off stove. Repeat till maintenance appears or you have to go to sleep. Obviously, make sure the pilot lights on the stove are lit first so you don’t die one of those horrible ‘alone-person’ deaths where no one knows you’re dead until the neighbor’s whining dog digs frantically at your front door and your mail bulges out of the mailbox, and the black flies are so thick on you the EMTs can’t tell your race/gender.
The one and only week I worked for an apartment maintenance crew, and the reason for my resignation…