Hunting a propane leak

Sometime back in the fall, I shut the household propane tank off. There was an unidentified propane leak. Only now have I gotten around to finding the problem. The only things I’ve got left that run on propane are two stove burners and a dryer.

During the cool weather, my kitchen woodstove worked just fine for my cooking needs. Now that’s it’s warm and sunny most days, I’ve done a lot of cooking with electricity. The solar panels handle most of that.

I still have a fair amount of propane in the tank, so I decided to find and fix the leak. Now it was a small leak, so I had plenty of time to find it before the gas could build to a dangerous level. Just to be safe, the doors were left open to allow plenty of fresh air to circulate.

A good way to locate the leak is with a spray bottle filled with soapy water. I sprayed all the joints and fittings until I found one blowing bubbles. Then I turned the gas off and tightened the loose fitting. After turning the gas back on, the fitting was checked for leaks once more. While I was at it, I checked every fitting and joint. Just because I found one leak doesn’t mean there couldn’t be others.

Hanging cloths on a clothes line has worked out fine. During bad weather, I’ve a place to hang clothes inside. The dryer still works. I suppose I could use it if I really wanted to. However, those times are so rare I’ll most likely sell the dryer when the propane runs out.

The last time I bought propane was about 3 years ago. Since then, the propane company has gone bankrupt. It’s a good thing I don’t rely on them to fix my problems.

-Sixbears