Filed
Ignition work is the biggest single share of what this van gets called out for in Clay County, and a clicking burner is a cheaper conversation than most people expect.
Three of the four causes below cost nothing to rule out from your own kitchen, and the fourth is a small part. None of them is a reason to start pricing a new cooktop, which is where this complaint sends people surprisingly often.
Turn the gas off at the appliance before you look at anything.
1. The cap is seated wrong
Most common, costs nothing, and gets missed because the cap looks fine.
A sealed burner cap has to sit flat and square on its base with the slots aligned. Lift it off, check that the base ring is clean and dry, and set it back down so it drops home rather than resting on an edge. A burner that would not light for a week can light on the first click after this.
If the cap rocks at all when you touch it, that is your answer.
2. The electrode is fouled or wet
A boil-over runs down the burner and dries into a film that conducts. The spark then tracks across the residue to the nearest metal instead of jumping the gap to the cap.
The click sounds completely healthy, because it is. The spark is simply going somewhere useless.
Dry the area thoroughly and clean the ceramic and the metal tip. Do not file the electrode, do not bend it to close the gap by eye, and do not use anything abrasive on the ceramic.
After a cleaning day, give a burner an hour before deciding it is broken. Water under a cap is a common cause of an appliance that was fine yesterday.
3. The ceramic insulator is cracked
Once the white insulator at the base of the electrode splits, the spark finds ground through the crack. There is a sound difference: a sharp snap rather than a clean tick, and often a visible spark in the wrong place if the room is dark.
This one needs a part. It is a small part.
4. The spark module or a switch
Least common of the four, and the one people guess first.
The useful tell is which burners spark. If turning one knob makes every position click at once, that is usually a shorted or wet switch reporting a demand that was never made — not a dead module. Modules that have genuinely failed tend to produce no spark anywhere.
A different fault entirely
If the burner lights normally but goes out the moment you release the knob, stop looking at the ignition system. That is flame sensing telling the gas valve it never saw a flame, and the sensing element, its position and its continuity are the things at issue. It is a separate circuit with a separate fix.
When to stop
Call if you smell gas at any point. Call if the flame is yellow and stays yellow after the burner has been cleaned and reassembled, because that is a mixture problem at the orifice or the air shutter, and on a range running the wrong fuel orifice it will never come right on its own.
Otherwise, the four checks above resolve a meaningful share of clicking-burner complaints in this county without anybody driving out. When they do not, at least the visit starts three steps in.