mdx42... Having a "wall switch" means that you have a "thermo-pile" driven system/valve... not to be confused with a thermocouple system. How this works is: The manual ignition pilot engulfs a round piece of metal called a thermo-pile. The energy generated by this device is somewhere around .750-.250 millivolts (DC). This energy does two things: one, it charges the valve to allow the pilot to stay lit. In other words, it you blow it out...you would hear a "click" which means the gas supply to the pilot just stopped. It's a safety system. If the local gas company turns the gas off in your neighborhood to fix a leak, it would go off. But when they turn it back on...it would not release gas...until you manually light the pilot. Now, back to your problem. The second function of generating that low voltage (.250-.750) is to open an close the main valve...which releases gas to your main burner. If your burner drops out after a few minutes or so...but the pilot stays lit...it is "cycling". Let me try and explain. If you check the millivolts when "just" the pilot is lit...you may get .250 or better (anything below .100 it will not stay lit). But once you flip the switch, the millivolts (power) drops in half...because now its sharing it with the pilot and burner. If it's stable, and doesn't continue to slowly drop in voltage...the burner should stay on. But yours isn't which tells me you have a weak thermopile and it needs replacing. I've seen them last 20 plus years...if you leave your pilot on "all the time"...even the off season. But if you turn it off and on at the beginning and ending of the season...I have seen them only last 2-4 years. It is designed to "get hot and stay hot". The term cycling comes from this scenario: pilot is on, you turn the main burner on (switch), it lights...but the millivolts are slowly dropping and then... burner drops out. THEN, it starts building up millivolts again and, if the switch was never turned off, it climbs high enough to open valve and then the burner kicks back on (all by it self)....but the millivolts start dropping again and then kicks off again....and will do this until the switch is turned off or the thermopile is changed. I hope this helps explain whats going on. You don't have ghosts,,,,just a "sick" thermopile. God Bless

I see from the above replies that you've probably received all the assurances and tips about cooking with gas that you need, but I can't help but add my story. We bought a house 7 yrs. ago and were given the option of purchasing the nearly new Dacor dual-fuel range from the previous owners. I had only cooked on Kenmore electric stoves for the previous 25 yrs. We bought the stove, then I proceeded to look at it for nearly a month while I somehow maneuvered to prepare all my meals in the microwave, pressure cooker, or Foreman grill. I was okay using the electric oven, but I was too embarassed to admit to anyone how terrified I was of turning on and cooking with propane gas. I finally fessed up to my sister, who has always had a gas range, and she came over and oversaw me cooking my first stovetop meal. That's all it took - well, that and reading my instruction manual cover to cover. It broke the spell and I have been singing the praises of cooking with gas since. Like many who've replied to this post, I could never go back to cooking on an electric stove. I'm a better cook with gas and it's much more fun to cook on, too. I get a kick out of DH, who has always prepared Sunday brunch. Since he began cooking over flames he has developed the flourish of a TV chef. You'll love it!

When I turn on my gas fireplace, it makes a clicking noise constantly. It does not appear to stop. I am not sure if this has always been this way as I did not use it much, but use it a lot more now. The noise is fairly annoying when trying to enjoy a nice quiet night with the fire going. I supplied a video below so you can hear the clicking sound that it is make. Any help or ideas would be greatly appreciated! https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eLlK0PDCyZNXQ4hqTbbm45VetTeMwdtSMA/view?usp=sharing Fireplace Clicking Video

I think brick + marble is such a good classic look. What is the style of your house? If you do brick and decide you don't like it, you could always paint it black. But as far as I know, you can't put a brick facade over a black liner. We just updated our 1980s fireplace and I wanted brick, but we had to stick with black. The fireplace store said you can't just pull out an old insert and put in a new one; it requires redoing the whole fireplace/chimney. So no pressure, but your choice is pretty permanent! :) Here they did herringbone marble tile and straight brick. It would also look great reversed -- herringbone brick and straight marble.