American Radiator & Standard Sanitary Corp. v. Fix

• Decision Date: 23 December 1952
• Docket Number: No. 14592.,14592.
• Citation: 200 F.2d 529
• Parties: AMERICAN RADIATOR & STANDARD SANITARY CORP. v. FIX.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

200 F.2d 529 (1952)

AMERICAN RADIATOR & STANDARD SANITARY CORP. v. FIX.

No. 14592.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

December 23, 1952.

Gale B. Braithwaite, Sioux Falls, S. D. (Joe W. Cadwell and Richard Braithwaite, Sioux Falls, S. D., on the brief), for appellant.

Ellsworth E. Evans, Sioux Falls, S. D. (Holton Davenport, Sioux Falls, S. D., on the brief), for appellee.

Before SANBORN, RIDDICK, and COLLET, Circuit Judges.

SANBORN, Circuit Judge.

Raymond P. Fix, a resident of Rock Rapids, Iowa, was injured by a gas explosion which occurred November 9, 1950, in the basement of the house in which he was then living. He was at the time attempting to light the pilot burner of an automatic gas water heater manufactured by the American Radiator & Standard Sanitary Corporation, a Delaware corporation, and intended for use with liquefied petroleum gas, also called bottle gas.

Fix brought this action against the corporation upon the claim that it had manufactured the heater, and that the explosion and his injuries were due to its negligence in failing to equip the heater with a proper safety control and in failing to discover that the control attached to the heater was defective and the heater dangerous.

The defendant in its answer admitted that it had manufactured the water heater and that it was designed for use with liquefied petroleum gas. The defendant stated that it had not manufactured the safety control valve referred to in the evidence as the safety valve or safety pilot, but had assembled it with other parts of the heater. The defendant admitted that the explosion had occurred and that the plaintiff had been injured, but denied that the defect in the control valve, if any existed, was due to any negligence on the part of the defendant.

The issues were tried to a jury. At the close of the evidence the defendant moved for a directed verdict upon substantially the following grounds: (1) that the plaintiff had failed to show that the safety valve or safety pilot, designed to shut off the gas from the heater if the pilot light went out, was defective at the time the heater left the defendant's factory; (2) that there was no evidence of any failure on the part of the defendant to properly inspect the device; (3) that the evidence conclusively showed that the safety pilot was operating properly after the heater was installed in the basement of the home occupied by the plaintiff; and (4) that the evidence was at least as consistent with the defendant's theory that the safety pilot had become defective after it left the defendant's factory as with the plaintiff's theory that the safety pilot was defective when it left the factory.

The court refused to direct a verdict for the defendant. The jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff. This appeal followed.

The defendant asserts that the District Court erred in denying the defendant's motion for a directed verdict, and erred with respect to certain rulings on evidence and with respect to the instructions to the jury.

Much of the evidence was undisputed. What the plaintiff endeavored to prove, and what he claims he did prove, was that at the time of the explosion the heater was in the same condition as when it left the factory; that the safety pilot or thermostatic control, the function of which was to shut off the gas from the heater automatically when the pilot flame went out, was out of adjustment and permitted gas to escape from the main burner and flow into the basement; and that the fact that the safety pilot was out of adjustment could and would have been discovered by the defendant had it used ordinary care in testing the safety pilot before it left the factory.

The evidence showed that the heater, after it was completed, was crated by the defendant at its factory. It was sold to a jobber in Sioux City, Iowa. The jobber sold the heater to Harry Rasmussen, doing business at Rock Rapids, Iowa, as Rasmussen Tin Shop. He received it on or about April 18, 1950. It was still uncrated. He sold it almost immediately to Earl Smith for installation in the house owned by him in which the plaintiff was living. The heater was taken to the house by employees of Rasmussen, uncrated there, and installed in the basement. They made the necessary water connections and ran a vent pipe from the heater to the chimney to carry off fumes from the burner.

The gas supply for the heater, consisting of two tanks or bottles of gas located at the north side of the house, was connected to the heater by Floyd Nyenhuis, who was employed by Dick DeGroot, the proprietor of the Modern Home Store in Rock Rapids, from whom the plaintiff bought the bottles or tanks of gas. There were two gas lines or pipes running from the gas supply into the house, one to the stove in the kitchen and the other to the water heater in the basement. After Nyenhuis had connected the heater with the gas supply, he lit the pilot flame according to the directions which accompanied the heater.

The heater was of the conventional type, cylindrical in shape, standing upright on legs, with the fire box in its base. It was provided with two burners: the main burner which heats the water, and a pilot burner adjacent thereto which supplies the flame which ignites the main burner if the thermostat which regulates the temperature of the water calls for heat. That occurs when the water in the water tank of the heater falls below a predetermined temperature.

The entire thermal unit attached to the heater, which regulates and controls the flow of gas to the burners, was manufactured by the Titan Valve Manufacturing Co. and furnished by it to the defendant. The defendant attached it to the heater. The unit has a hand valve with three positions indicated by a dial, namely "off", "pilot", and "on". When this valve is on the "off" position, no gas flows to either of the burners in the fire box and the heater is inoperative. When the valve is on "pilot", the gas flows to the pilot burner alone if the pilot tube is open. When the hand valve is in the "on" position, the gas will flow to the main burner provided the pilot flame is burning or if the main burner tube is open all of the way to the burner. The unit has two thermostatic controls or thermal tubes. One is inserted in the water tank. It regulates the heat of the water and is adjustable. It calls for heat and turns on the gas to the main burner when the water is below the predetermined temperature and the hand valve is in the "on" position. This thermostat turns off the gas from the main burner when the water in the tank has reached the desired temperature.

At the lower end of the unit which controls the flow of gas to the burners is another thermostat or thermal tube which extends into the fire box and which, unless heated to a high temperature by the pilot flame, will, if properly adjusted, shut off all gas from both burners. In other words, this device is intended and should be adjusted to permit no gas to flow to either burner if the pilot flame is unlighted. Thus so long as the pilot flame is burning, the gas can flow to the main burner when heat is called for, but none can flow if the pilot flame is out unless the thermostat in the fire box is defective or out of adjustment. This thermostat and its component parts constitute the safety valve or safety pilot.

In order to start the heater operating when the safety pilot is properly adjusted, it is necessary first to turn the hand valve to the "pilot" position. It is then necessary to press a push-button, one of the parts of the safety pilot, which operates a valve-set at the lower end of the gas control unit. This will open the gas tube of the pilot and permit the pilot burner to be lighted. When it is lighted, the push-button must be held in position long enough to allow the pilot flame to heat the thermal tube, which is just above the flame, to a high temperature. This may take as long as two or three minutes. When the thermal tube has reached the proper temperature, the push-button and the valve-set which it operates may be released and the flame will continue to burn. If the push-button-operated valve-set is released before the tube has been sufficiently heated, a spring will force the valve-set into its original position, and the pilot flame will go out. By the same token, if the pilot flame, for any reason, goes out while the heater is operating, and the thermal tube cools off, the safety pilot, if properly adjusted, will permit no gas to flow to either burner, even if the hand valve is in the "on" position. After the pilot flame is burning and the thermal tube in the fire box is hot, the hand valve is placed and kept in the "on" position and the thermostatic controls connected with the heater take over its operation and keep the water at a substantially uniform temperature so long as there is a supply of gas.

If the thermal tube of the safety pilot is defective or out of adjustment, so that it does not close off the gas from the burners when the pilot flame is out, then gas will flow from the main burner whenever the thermostat which regulates the heat of the water is calling for more heat and the hand valve is in the "on" position.

The fact that Nyenhuis lit the pilot burner in the conventional way after he had connected the gas to the heater did not conclusively show that the safety pilot tube was or was not in proper adjustment, because, if the safety pilot permitted gas to flow into the pilot burner without the push-button being pressed, the burner would have lighted regardless of the position of the push-button.

Only one tank which supplied gas to the heater was used at a time. When that tank became empty, it was shut off manually by a valve at the top of the tank, and the full tank was then turned on, the empty tank being replaced by the Modern Home Store. The record shows that on three occasions, May 18, 1950, July 3, 1950, and August 15, 1950, after the heater was installed, the...