My daughter owns a three-year old townhome with a ventless gas fireplace. When she turns it on, it spells like "gas fume." Is this dangerous? If so, can she remove the gas one and replace it with an electric one? What about the gas line?

Most ventless gas fireplaces use an automatic system that ignites the pilot, pilot heats the thermocouple, thermocouple opens the fuel and the fire ignites. You should get little of no fuel smell,natural gas or propane, but you will get a slight odor. It really isn't much diffrentb than turning on all of the burners of your stove. You need to check to see if the smell is raw fuel or the odor of burning fuel.
The gas line can be shut off and capped but I doubt if you even have electricity near or in the fireplace.

OK, people who read my posts are going to say there he goes again. I don't agree with ventless fire places, particularly in a well sealed modern home. I know the manufactures say they are safe, but if I'm not mistaken they are selling something. The fireplace requires oxygen to burn gas, when you burn gas 100% efficiently (impossible) the products of combustion are C02 (carbon dioxide) and H20 (water vapor) as the O2 (oxygen) is consumed by the fire and the room fills with CO2 the fuel is robbed of the oxygen the fuel needs for efficient combustion. Now the poducts of combustion are CO (carbon monoxide) CO2 and water vapor. If the thing is going to run for an extended length of time you may as well park your Chevy in the Living room.

In the HVAC world such a furnace would never be allowed.

I'm done.

Northernheat does have a point. I installed one of these 99.9% efficient gas fireplaces (propane) and it does not produce like the manufacturer claims.. There are odors and gas that don't trip my carbon monoxide detector but they are bad. I use this unit in a remote cabin just to help jump start the heat when I arrive. It has be so unpleasant that I just spent $240 to buy a thermostat that can be controlled by any telephone.

One day I will get around to posting some faq's on CO detectors. Please don't get me wrong, CO detectors save lives. But here are a few of the facts, CO detector sensor lives are not that long, a good one lasts about 5 years. CO levels have to be at a dangerous (not lethal) level for, on average, 20 minutes before they alarm you. This is for a good reason, nuisance alarms, you don't want it to go off every time you turn on the stove or open the garage door for to long.

I do understand about the well sealed modern home being an issue but what about a 1990's house with a dog door in the wall. Or should I just wait (albeit impatiently) until I can put in a zero clearance?

Ventless heaters that are UL or CSA approved are OK to use BUT they have to be serviced by a qualified repair person. If you look at the instructions that came with the unit you will see this stated there. I am not a fan of ventless products myself and I do feel that they can be a hazzard if not maintained properly. Usually the service man will make adjustments and then check the unit with his CO detector to make sure it is operating in spec as per the manufactures instructions. They will also replace or test the oxygen depletion sensor for proper operation.

Most people install these things and never have them serviced. Then something goes wrong and the heater gets blamed when it is actually a lack of service that causes the problems.

I had a ventless fireplace installed in the existing fireplace when we moved to our house and I am very unhappy with it. I don't notice the smell too much, but the noises it makes are dreadful... the hissing and whoosing of gas makes in the completely unenjoyable. And I don't think it looks that great either.

Is this normal?

I'm having similar problems of smells and headaches, as well as regulator-whine from a brand new DynaGlo ventless blue-flame gas heater, which I installed a month ago in my basement. Even after four weeks, the odor persists. So I suspect that these fumes are originating from something other than the freshly painted metal surfaces in the heater. They may simply be a natural byproduct of the burning gas, as noted earlier in this thread.

I found that by turning the valve feeding the heater to near-off, the whine disappeared and the heater smelled somewhat less. Of course, it produced less heat too. Now I know that leaving the valve partially closed is not a kosher way to reduce gas pressure. So my brother-in-law is coming to read the water column value on the fully-open gas line. If the pressure reads too high, then I'll seek a better and permanent pressure reducing solution.

I'm hoping that these troubles are due to excessive gas pressure. At least we can do something about that. However, I'm doubtful that even lowering the pressure will make the heater burn wthout the offensive and noxious odors. Does anyone out there have a similar heater that burns without odors? If so, how did you get it to do that?

Thanks much,
Tom Hesley

I have a ventless propane fireplace in our family room. This is the first winter that we have used it. The past couple of days I have noticed that even when the unit is off there is a terrible gas smell coming from the logs. Is this normal?

Not normal. If it smells like gas(propane) open the window and turn off the appliance. Call your propane dealer for immediate service.

I had a similar problem with the oder of gas so bad it burned your eyes. I had to shut it down and open the house and turn on the attic fan. I took it apart cleaned the thermal coupler with emery cloth and adjusted the pilot line (gently). Bending the alluminum gas line to the pilot so the flame was completely split by the thermal coupler. I have been using it odor free for 3 months. I was told its possible that if the flame is barely kissing the thermal coupler the pilot might be kicking on and off so fast that it could be letting gas spill out just enough to create the odor. I don't know It worked for me and I love it.

I have a thermoheat cabinet heater (propane.. 20 lb tank) it suddenly has started to smell like its burning very rich... making my eyes sting and smells terrible... no gas smell or leak.. whats going on?

What did you do about fixing the problem, is there a way to use the fire place,or do I have get rid of it, we had problem with this unit last year? [email protected]

Question: For an art project I'm using a small propane torch in a small windowless room for short intervals (10 minutes at a time). It heats up the room and sometimes my eyes and nose begin to sting. What gases are the by-products of the torch flame and are they harmful?