Life of Barbecue Sparker?

[Johnny Blast]

My barbecue Sparker isn't working very well after only a few days of use. There's a small spark, but not as good as when it was first installed. I took the sparker out and cleaned any residue off, but it didn't help. Any comments? Any better sparking device I could use? Thank you.

[carlbelcher]

BBQ sparkers aren't the best choice for reliability. You might try a lantern sparker or if you want the best go with a stun gun.

[Torch]

Heres the page for stungun ignition. Theres a page to make a ignition out of a camera from the wiki.

[Johnny Blast]

I've had a problem locating a lantern sparker. Does anyone know of a good source or a nationwide store? I've thought of running a battery through a step up transformer to see if I can produce a spark. I think the utlimate would be to mount a spark plug in your tube and fire that somehow. I thank all of you for your help. I've only been experimenting with potato guns for about 5 days and I'm sure I have a lot to learn.

[carlbelcher]

You can get lantern sparkers at Wal-Mart in the camping section. The problem with making you own electrical ignition is that you need at least 10,000 to 20,000 volts to make a decent spark. If you want to go with an electric ignition system I would get a stun gun ($10-$15 on eBay) or try the disposable camera ignition.