My gas tumble drier lights and burns for some 4 minutes and rotates normally. It then continues for a few minutes and tries to relight but doesn't catch, I smelt a small amount of gas at this point. The machine then runs cold. If you open and close the door it repeats this cycle. However sometimes it runs normally.
Any ideas

Fran, December 2005

I had a similar problem with my gas dryer, or so I thought.
The problem turned out to be a faulty gas pressure governor (which is located beside your gas meter). It is imperative that the gas pressure is within spec. for the tumble drier to operate otherwise it will keep cutting out. (our gas boiler was not so sensitive and seemed to function ok)

This was diagnosed by a CORGI registered engineer who noticed the gas pressure fluctuating abnormally. He promptly shutdown the gas supply for the house and contacted TRANSCO who replaced the faulty governor within an hour at no charge. Problem solved.

I would recommend that the gas pressure is confirmed to be within spec. prior to diagnosing the dryer - this needs a special type of pressure gauge and I would contact a gas engineer to check this for you to be safe.

David, January 2006