GCI60 Ignitor Replacement (Bonus Agitator Replacement)

This is probably going to be pretty similar to the freestanding GC60 and Enviro M55 variants. Oddly, not a ton of info out there on this procedure.

Backstory: I was flying to NOLA on Sunday; gave the stove a solid deep clean Saturday….and loaded a bunch of pellets in the garage for my wife. We had a big snow storm coming. I get a call Monday AM. “The stove isn’t on…and there’s a big pile of pellets in the burn pot.” My wife was a trooper and we did some troubleshooting over FaceTime. Long story short, the ignitor was cooked. (She did get it running via propane torch!)

I ordered a new ignitor and agitator from stoveandgrillparts.com. I think someone here posted that link awhile back. Thank you! The cost of the OEM ignitor is preposterous($699!!!!). This one was just a tick under $120 shipped.

The installation was pretty straight forward. I thought I would maybe have to remove the auger drive motor, but I didn’t have to. You can get to the single Torx T15 (I think?) bolt that holds the ignitor in place. I used a 1/4” ratchet and an extension. There’s not a lot of room back there, so it was a lot of 1/4 turns to back it out. It has two wires connected to it and two vacuum lines which were zip tied from the factory. The mounting hole on the new unit didn’t line up perfectly, so it took a little finagling. But for the price delta with OEM, not a big deal at all. It added maybe 2-3 minutes to the job. I did test the new and old one with my multi meter on ohms and the old one was in fact bad. I suppose it’s better to test things before ordering parts, but I was pretty confident what the issue was here.

Since I’ve noticed the agitator was seeing a little wear as of late, I decided to order one of those as well. Ironically, same price as the ignitor. (OEM is $249) As you can imagine, the install was straight forward.

Stove lit right up after I got things buttoned up! I’d say it lights quicker than before. That being said, the original ignitor lasted over 10 years. I can’t recall exactly when we had the unit installed, but it was over 10 years ago…maybe closer to 15? So a good run! We’ll see how this one holds up.

 

Nice stove!

 

Looks like you got $$ worth out of both parts. Nice job.

 

Thanks everyone! Definitely got some life out of both of those parts.

This stove has been really reliable over the years. These are the first parts I’ve replaced. Only other upkeep (aside from cleanings) has been a bit of grease in the bearings for the blower fan that circulates the air.

 

Well, the new igniter went south. My attempt at humor hear: Old igniter, 10 years, new igniter…10 days.

Anyways, the part had a 90 day warranty. I called up the placed I purchased it from, filled out a form online and one has been shipped out no charge.

 

Nice job! I’ll keep an eye on that agitator going forward.

Well, the replacement igniter unfortunately doesn’t get hot enough. I’ve done a bunch of testing, but the stove won’t lit off using it. I also put in another burn pot liner I had; same results. I’ll reach out to the company again. They’ve been easy to deal with. Long story short, the ignitor heads up (it glows), but doesn’t get hot enough to light the pellets. Airflow is good around the unit based on my testing.

 

I ordered from Stove parts the first time and was very pleased! This time I ordered from Moutain Hearth products and the first one was damaged and they told me to fix it, the second one the wiring was different! Glad you got your stove all fixed up! How tight do you have your agitator chain, I tightened mine up tonight as it seemed to have some slop in it?

 

Unfortunately, the second ignitor is no longer working. Reached out the seller via e-mail and will keep you all updated.

The chain definitely has some slack in it! Maybe just the way it was designed?