With something like a bbq or weedburner etc. Do you crack the valve or open it up completely or does it matter.

The valve has three seals, one at bottom, for fully closed, one at top, for fully open, and a stem seal. You will most likely get different answers, but it's best to have it fully open.

^^^
Agree!

Guy at the place where I fill mine says "just a crack" is OK. I rarely twist it all the way open, but the above info. on seals makes a lot of sense.

Potential threadjack warning!!!

When shutting down, in what order do you turn off valves? Burners then tank, or tank then burners? I usually do the former, but it seems the latter might be less risky in terms of lower likelihood of a unburned gas buildup inside the cover from leakage out of the lines.

I shut down the tank valve first, for the very reason you state.

As for during cooking, I don't open the valve wide, but I'd never heard that I should. I figured if I could cook okay with it less open, it's quicker to shut should there be a need to.

I always open my tank on my grill all the way then back it down like an 1/8th turn

One thing I learned from a neighbor is to shut the tank off and not the grill first; you will let all the propane in the tubes/hose and burners burn off, and you won’t have any residual in there which can cause issues. Then turn the grill knobs off.

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
I always open my tank on my grill all the way then back it down like an 1/8th turn

This exactly what I do.

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
One thing I learned from a neighbor is to shut the tank off and not the grill first; you will let all the propane in the tubes/hose and burners burn off, and you won’t have any residual in there which can cause issues. Then turn the grill knobs off.

I used to do this, my supposition was the same as listed above.

The Weber manual for my grill says burners first then tank. I decided it really didn't matter but started doing it burners out first this past May.

Also I learned in another SF thread to open the tank valve pretty slowly and it keeps the flames blue instead of the flames appearing more yellow when ignited.

There is a safety valve that kicks in if there isn’t enough pressure in the line. When that happens, it lets a little gas through, enough to get a flame going, but not really enough to cook with. For that reason, I leave all the burners off (valves shut), open the valve fully, then open the burners. Shutdown is the opposite order to keep pressure in the line and avoid triggering that safety valve.

Rather than exchange tanks, I get them filled. I pay less and I get approximately 20 lbs instead of 15. However, at least with my tank, it not uncommon for the refill process to kick the safety valve on. It confused me the first time it happened, but now I just remember to keep pressure in the line.

Having said all that it’s probably likely the valve has is fully open 2-3 turns, but reaches the stop at 6 or 8 turns.

quote:

Originally posted by jigray3:


There is a safety valve that kicks in if there isn’t enough pressure in the line. When that happens

It’s a limp mode I think.

My wife inadvertently did this one day when lighting the grill ahead of me to have it preheated when I got home from work. Got home and the grill is like 200 degrees and had been going 10-15 minutes. Should have been pushing 550+ at that point, I realized she opened the valve too fast or slow and that safety kicked in.

You can reset it by shutting down for 3-5 min then opening up the valve steadily but not super slow or too fast.

Fully open. Anything I've used says to open it fully in the owners manual. Most appliances (bbq etc.) have a pressure regulator on the hose going to it.

40 years ago in my EMS training I learned to back off the valve of O² tanks half a turn after reaching the wide open stop. I've treated every valve I've dealt with the same way ever since.

Hadn’t really thought about it. I was taught when welding/cutting always open the oxygen tank fully (seals on both open & closed as described above), but only crack the acetylene valve enough to get the desired pressure at flow. The theory was to be able to shut it off quickly in an emergency.

I’ll have to pay more attention to which approach I’m using on the BBQ.

I alway shut the tank off first, then turn the valves off when the burners go out. Never have had an issue with limp mode. Maybe just lucky?

I haven’t turned off my tank in 4+ years. It only gets turned off when I take it to get filled.

If the burner valves leak, I’m buying a new grill.