1956 GE Liberator IJ408

[dld]

I recently purchased a near perfect GE oven to put to use in an old house we are restoring. I bought it from the second owner for the past 45 years and she says the stove was in the house when she bought it. She was still using it. It had two burners not working and the small oven not working other than that it is perfect even included the plug in grill.

I repaired the small oven by replacing the old thermostat with a newer vintage Robertshaw switch works great and was able to adapt the old knob.

The left rear burner just had 2 of the wire broke off I am assuming from lifting the burner up and down to clean. I repair them and it is working great.

The left front automatic burner had 2 broken wires That I repaired but when turned on the temp was not controllable so I played with the thermostat switch but I believe the hydraulic sensor has failed.. After searching this forum and others I purchased a Robertshaw 5500-202M infinite switch to replace this thermostat but I am having difficulty configuring the wiring to utilize the original 3 wire burner and the griddle option.

I have reached out to Robertshaw tech with no help yet

Thanks in advance for your input.

Dave D.

 

[tomturbomatic]

Congratulations!

It is not, however, from 1958.

 

[dld]

Sorry I should have given the complete MDL # IJ408-1N1 everything I have researched the "N" indicates 1956. Thanks for the input.

 

[dld]

I have got the new infinite switch connected and working but the heat seems to high. A pan of water is steady 210 F at the lowest setting.

There are two output terminals on the switch H1 and HC I hooked up the Red and White wires from the burner to H1 and the Black wire from the burner to HC.

I then tried it with just the Red burner wire on H1 and the black on HC and max water temp is 170F not matter where the dial is set. Same results with the White only rather the the red.

What am I missing?

Do I need to switch the burner out for a newer vintage 2 wire element?

I know someone out there has resolved this thanks for your input in advance.

 

[tomturbomatic]

I'm Sorry, I thought you typed 1958.

 

[combo52]

Infinite switch conversion

It should be wired so that you’re using both coils when you’re at the lowest setting the element should be cycling on and off. Should be on at least 5% of the time, would not be unusual at the lowest setting to still have 210° or a low simmer.

John

 

[dld]

Thanks John that's how I had it wired to begin with. I am new to electric stoves and didn't want to overheat the element.

 

[combo52]

Electric surface calrod heating elements

The surface elements like the oven elements on this ranger designed to run wide open hundred percent 240 V power, when the elements are on the high setting, they’re on 100%.

It is good in the case of the surface elements not to run them for long period of time on high unless you have a good flat pan on the element which can conduct the heat away as fast as it’s being produced, in a nutshell, the element should not be red hot when boiling water it really shortens the life of the element, but people do it all the time and that’s why the elements get warped and fail sometimes.

John