Piezo spark lighter in both oven and cooktop

[Bill]

There have been at least three threads about adding a piezo lighter to the oven, and to the cooktop, and to both. This fourth thread will continue the adventure.

In the original thread, I added a spark lighter to the oven, and several members followed suit. It was a great mod, freeing me from the need to kneel down in front of the oven and stick a match into that dark inaccessible space under the broiler.
http://www.trailmanorowners.com/foru...ead.php?t=3833

In the second thread, Harry Womack added a spark lighter to both the oven and the cooktop. It was an even better mod, but he had to buy new burners. Our member 13Dano found some stuff on eBay that made it a bit cheaper, but I have not found the same stuff since then.
http://www.trailmanorowners.com/foru...ead.php?t=4928

Then tfcmarty performed a mod for both the oven and cooktop in
http://www.trailmanorowners.com/foru...ead.php?t=5084
But he had to buy new burners, too, and there was some question about lighting four gas flames with a three-burner snapper.

So this is a fourth approach. My goal was to light the oven pilot and the main cooktop burner with one snapper, without having to buy replacement burners. Did I mention I'm cheap? We often use only the front burner of the cooktop, so this is a good solution. When we need a rear burner, a handy scrap of paper, lit on the front burner, will transfer the flame to the rear ones.

It turns out that one standard piezo lighter will produce a spark on two electrodes wired in series. That is, one side of the snapper goes to one electrode, the other side of the snapper goes to the other electrode. That is the way that the snapper manufacturer says they can be used in a propane barbeque. By way of background, you need to go to Home Depot, Lowe's, etc, and buy two replacement piezo lighter kits in the barbeque department, in order to get two "sideburner" electrodes - these are the units with the long electrodes.

Picture 1 shows the sideburner (long) electrode. You need one of these for the oven, and another one for the front burner of the stovetop.

Picture 2 shows the snapper as I originally wired it for oven-only operation in the first thread linked above. The red wire runs behind the stove and down into the oven. The black wire is a ground to complete the circuit.

In Picture 3, I have removed the screw that holds the stovetop front burner in place, and pulled the burner off (out of the picture). I have mounted the new electrode on a Z-shaped metal bracket near the spot where the burner will be reinstalled. I also dropped a short bit of glass tube over the electrode, to serve as an insulator.

In picture 4, the front burner has been reinstalled, but the electrode still sticks straight up in the air. The glass tube insulator over the electrode prevents it from sparking to the nearby burner body. The spark, of course, should occur off the tip of the electrode wire.

In picture 5, I have bent the electrode wire so that it produces a spark at one of the gas holes in the burner.

Picture 6 shows a couple things. First, the black ground wire that was originally connected to the snapper (in picture 2) has been disconnected and moved out of the way. It has been replaced by the red wire to the new electrode. Second, the new electrode has a lot of extra wire (red). I could have cut it out and removed it, but I simply coiled it up and taped it out of the way.

If you look carefully, Picture 7 shows that the new electrode protrudes up through the gap between the burner and the black stovetop cover. Again, the glass insulates it, preventing it from sparking to either the burner body or the cover.

It is not a wonderful solution - but it is another approach, and if you have already done the oven mod, it is a cheap and easy addition.

Bill