Category Archives: Appliances

May 28
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Air for Your Gas Appliances

By | Appliances | No Comments

There are two forms of air that are needed to make gas appliances work properly. Without them things go haywire and it could kill you and your family. There is makeup air and there is combustion air. Although they both do the same thing they are though of in different ways. First off, fire needs the triangle to work. Then the products of combustion need to leave the home through a flu pipe. (High performance appliances are now extracting so much heat out of the gas that they can be vented through PVC pipe) Combustion air: The air needed to…

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Nov 19
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Happy holidays

Holiday appliance advice

By | Appliances, News | No Comments

Hello LevcoCare Nation! The Holiday Season is rapidly approaching, at least on the calendar. I know in Boise it seems like we just can’t shake fall, but winter is lurking just around the corner, Trust me, I about froze my buns off at the football game last night. I just received a cool post that I decided to share from a trusted source. It has to do with what to and not to do around this time with our appliances. Odds are you are going to give your appliances a workout and no one wants a failure to muck up…

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May 10
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dryer vent

Dryer not working well solution

By | Appliances, Safe Practices, Understanding your home | No Comments

I got a concerned call the other day from an old friend about a dryer problem. The first indication of the problem was prolonged drying times. There was the suspicion that when the new roof was installed that the roofer had neglected to reattach a vent to the outside and just had covered up the exhaust. (Roofers always get the blame). These build ups happen slowly and could cause an owner to suspect the dryer is at fault. Upon inspecting the place where the exhaust vent entered the wall lots of moist lint existed and that had everyone concerned and…

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Mar 25
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Ode To An Old Appliance.

By | Appliances, Understanding your home | No Comments

Most folks don’t think much about dishwashers, they have become a necessity of modern life. Most kitchens have them and if they do, the most common decision is what color they will be. Stainless is all the rage right now but black and white are still selling according to my sales rep. Is this modern contraption over rated? I do remember washing dishes by hand at home for many years and I am no worse for wear. I think dishwashers are a great appliance, they generally use less water than doing the dishes by hand and they use hotter water…

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Dec 16
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I Got up on the Wrong Side of the Bed

By | Appliances, Plumbing, Understanding your home, Water Awareness | No Comments

Did you ever have one of those days? I awoke groggy I inadvertently kicked the cat water bowl and tipped over their food. While cursing and cleaning it up I noticed another spot of water near the corner of my refrigerator that was suspicious. Those that live on hardwood floors need to be really careful with water so I investigated. What I saw was a bit of an emergency. Floor cupping and a small amount of water. Could I have spilled some water there? Had an ice cube or two fallen there and not gotten picked up before it melted?…

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Dec 02
2

Thermocouple with a button?

By | Appliances, Safe Practices, Understanding your home | 66 Comments

This situation caught me off guard. I was presented with a thermocouple from an AO Smith, sealed combustion chamber water heater. The symptoms included that the water heater would go off for no reason. Eventually he couldn’t even get the pilot lit. With careful inspection, you could see it had a little button in line. I had never seen one before, but this is what what I learned. What is a thermocouple for anyway? Thermocouples are used in gas appliances that use a standing pilot. That means that there is a small gas flame on all the time.  Without the…

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Nov 25
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I Like Fixing Stuff

By | Appliances, Understanding your home | No Comments

Although repairing broken things is not for everyone, I have fixed  some amazing things in my day. The wise among us realize that this is not always the most cost effective or smart thing to do. Even I will admit that there are un-fixable things in this world, usually right after I tear into something that I can’t figure out how to reassemble. There are also certain things that are designed to be thrown away ( like the early versions of mini-vans). Some call me cheap, some call me stubborn, but I’ll reiterate I find pleasure in fixing broken things…

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Jul 01
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Refrigerator Failure

By | Appliances, Electrical, Green Remodeling, Understanding your home | No Comments

At Levco we normally repair other peoples problems and rarely have time or give much thought to care for our own problems. Here is a situation that happened to me recently that probably happens often to others. My wife noticed that the refrigerator side seemed a bit warm and the freezer side was definitely not freezing.  I suppose a thermometer would have been a more scientific method of determining a problem, but I digress. The first thing I hear is ” I turned the refrigerator up because it isn’t cold enough to freeze everything” This caught my attention because of…

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