Blue Flames Explained –

​We often receive calls from homeowners asking “Why are there blue flames or the flames are hard to see when we first light our fire pit?”

There are a couple of factors that cause your flames to look like this for a short period upon start-up.

One is that blue flames indicate complete combustion of the gas. There is a high oxygen ratio mix. The amount of oxygen is controlled by an air mixer on your fire pit. When you first start up your fire pit, there is a lot of air (oxygen) in the gas lines. The fire will burn a blue color until all the air is purged from the gas lines. Blue flames burn almost twice as hot as yellow flames.

The second is the media used in your fire pit. As the flames go through the media and reflect off of logs and embers, soot and other small particles mix with the flame, affecting how the oxygen mixes with the burned gas. As the embers and logs heat up, they take on a glow. The flame height will also differ depending on what type of media you use.

Heat naturally causes things to glow. If you heat up a piece of iron hot enough, it will glow red. Heat it more and it glows orange or yellow. The temperature controls the color.  In the yellow part of a candle flame, you are seeing tiny particles of soot that are hot enough to glow yellow.