Do you use Self-Clean on your oven?

[mark_wpduet]

I manually cleaned my oven two days ago. The sides/back/top weren't bad... mostly the bottom...I did it while I had windows open and window fan on. This is my all electric range from 2004. I think this sept it will be 20 years old. Now, it doesn't get used every day...but it does get used...I doubt it would still be working if it were used by someone who cooks a lot.

Anyway...I almost used the self-clean but I decided not to because it was almost 4 hours. I got everything OFF the bottom except one stubborn baked on stain.. then I rinsed rinsed rinsed...then I turned it on for about a half hour in case there were any chemicals left...

I then went on youtube because I've heard self-cleaning features can drastically shorten the life because of the intense 900 degree heat. That would make total sense... a lot of the videos I watched said to use it...but some said to use it frequenly to keep the oven clean.

I seriously can not remember but I think I used it ONE time a LOOONG time ago...

 

[mark_wpduet]

Ohhh. I forgot... I've heard you should NOT line the bottom with foil...I read horror stories of the foil sticking... but I actually used to do that and had no issues at all doing it... In fact, I'm not sure why I stopped doing that.. is that really a bad thing? I don't ever remember it sticking to the oven?

 

[fisherpaykel]

Foil in oven

Mark you can put aluminum foil, or a pre-moulded liner tray, in the oven ONLY if the oven has an exposed bottom element as yours does. Hidden bake element ovens lined with foil with fuse the foil to the floor, interfere with heat transfer, and probably cause some of the porcelain coating to crack and break off, basically wreck the oven. I use self-clean occasionally, so far no circuit board failure after use although I do think about that. Your oven looks almost spotless so maybe keep up with your routine if you don't really mind the work.

 

[DADoES]

 
I run self-clean on my 2003 GE range as needed, which probably averages at 1.5- to 2-year intervals ... as I've mentioned in previous related discussions.  No failures thus far.

 

[mark_wpduet]

It's really not a lot of work but again I don't cook daily or multiple times daily like some do...It would probably be a completely different story for someone who constantly cooks... like my friend Elizabeth across town told me she's gone through 4 ovens to my ONE.. She said, "Mark, I'm so hard on ovens" and she doesn't blame the oven.. she blames herself. LOL

I also learned something else. There's a blue can Easy-off vs a yellow can Easy-off... the blue can is for self-clean ovens and the yellow can is for regular non self clean ovens. Apparently you're not suppoed to use the yellow can on a self clean oven? I had no clue... that's what I've been doing with no issues... a can lasts me forever so next time I plan on making sure I get the blue can.

 

[qsd-dan]

NEVER, heat and modern sensitive electronics don't mix well. While I LOVE working vintage appliances, I do not want to spend half the cost of a new range or more to purchase a new control board. I also DO NOT want to take that damn thing apart and put it back together.

It's extremely rare I spill, overcook, or broil over a meal in the oven.

 

[parunner58]

I self clean my oven, maybe once a year. I'm very careful if I'm baking. If something I think might run over, I will make a foil drip tray and put it on the rack below the pan. I use convection a lot, so if something does run over it does not get to baked on the bottom. My convection has the element in with the fan. So I clean the spill up with Dawn Power spray and Bar Keepers Friend or Bon Ami. I never use any oven cleaner. I use the same products on my cooktop also, never liked the smooth top cleaners.

 

[petek]

I'm told self cleaning ovens have a special coating on them which are damaged when you use caustic cleaners on them. This was also true of the old continuous cleaning ovens which were never that great.

My neighbor is fastidious about her oven being clean and uses the self clean feature. A couple of years ago her mother in law set a roasting pan directly on the bottom of the oven (hidden elements) and ruined the bottom of her once pristeen oven.

 

[combo52]

Do you use self cleaning feature on your oven?

This question has been discussed here numerous other times, all of the replies seem pretty realistic and reasonable except for reply number five.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a control board fail on a self-cleaning oven because somebody was using that feature, there are thermal safety fuses in some self cleaning ovens that had a propensity to trip During the clean cycle whirlpool KitchenAid had a lot of trouble with that about 20 25 years ago.

I personally would never want to be without a self cleaning oven, and I never want to clean an oven manually again in my life done that too many times fixing up old ranges that were not self-cleaning.

Life is way too short not to take advantage of these work, saving conveniences, and I’m certainly not gonna spend my life with my head in the oven cleaning it.

Hi Mark, if you do decide to use yourself cleaning oven, you do not have to use the four hour cycle. You can turn the time down after cleaning hundreds of self cleaning ovens because we often are refurbishing old stoves. We always use the self clean cycle by the way, I have always found that the shortest time does it excellent job once it gets to the high temperature it’s really not gonna get any cleaner if you let it run three or four or five or six hours It’s all happens in the first two hours.

Self cleaning oven do not have any special coating on them. It’s the same porcelain that used on the self cleaning and non-self clean versions, and regular easy off will not hurt a self cleaning oven

But the worst thing you can do with any oven is to spray Off in all the little cracks and crevices around the convection fan etc. etc. there’s nothing worse than gunking up a perfectly nice oven with oven cleaner. If you don’t want to use the clean cycle you probably shouldn’t clean it at all just leave it dirty, just vacuum out the residue periodically there’s really no harm and having a dirty oven .

 

[qsd-dan]

No thanks, I chatted with too many techs in the field that would go around fixing ovens and control boards right before thanksgiving to necrotic owners because the owner decided to run the self cleaning feature before the holidays. Not chancing it.

There's a few members over the years that have admitted to frying their oven during the self cleaning mode. I think Whirlcool posted years ago it destroyed his oven, some cabinetry, and melted his OTR microwave.

Maybe I would chance it on an old GE from the 60's, 70's and 80s. Not on todays junk. Extremely heat + sensitive modern electronics = a strong possible disaster.

NOPE!

 

[ea56]

I use the self cleaning cycle on my GE electric stove about once every 6 months on the shortest cycle which is 3 hrs long, the first 2 hrs heating and the last hour cooling off. It does a very good job on the shortest cycle and I use my oven daily. The control panel is on the back of the stove so the heat that the control board is subjected to is minimal.

However I did once own a 2000 Maytag electric stove that was a slide in model with the control board on the front of the stove directly over the oven door. The 3rd time I ran the self cleaning cycle, again the 3 hr cycle the stove was 11 months old, 1 month out of warranty. The next morning when making some waffles for breakfast I attempted to turn on the oven to keep the first batch of waffles warm while I finished making the rest and it threw an error code and the SOB never worked again.

I paid about $600 for the 11 month old stove and I was quoted over $400 to repair/replace the control board. So that was that with the Maytag stove. I sh*t canned it and replaced it with a GE stove with a manual clean oven. For the next 21 years I used a manual clean oven until I finally got tired of cleaning it by hand and got my current self cleaning GE stove.

If using the self cleaning feature eventually burns out the control board I’ll just get another new stove and donate the old one to charity. I’m too damn old now to bother scrubbing out a dirty oven.

Eddie

 

[mattl]

I put in my new Samsung steam oven just before Thanksgiving.  I was careful and really liked it's pristine interior. Did all my holiday baking and cooking with just a few crumbs. Had a cousin staying for a few days and she wanted to make a breakfast and take it over to her brother.  Didn't think too much about it.

 

A couple days later I went to use the oven and found the racks and sides of the oven covered with brown baked on grease and a huge black spot on the bottom of the oven. Apparently she did a pound of bacon in the oven and sloshed to grease around. I was not happy.  Tried the hybrid cleaning method, the oven has a tank of water, did not do too much.  Went for a 2 hour regular self clean got 90% off.

 

Used Dawn Power Wash on the racks, had to resort to an SOS pad to get the worst off. Still upsets me when I open the oven and see some baked of stuff here and there on the racks. No issues with the control board, worried after reading horror stories here, plus a few solder joints failed on the display of my previous Electrolux oven from the heat. Pretty common failure with Elux.

 

[mark_wpduet]

that reminds me.. I need to get some SOS pads. That's one thing I always forget to buy and when I need them I don't have them..

I think if my oven were really bad... I might risk using it..but before I used it I would make sure to clean at least what I could first before running it to prevent a smokey mess...unless it's impossibly dirty....definitely wouldn't use it when the windows couldn't be opened.

I did realize you could turn the time down. Mine doesn't even have a door latch. I guess it locks on its own...the one time I used it in the past I can't remember

but as long as there are just a few drippings on the bottom that i can get pretty easily it's not worth using it.

 

[chachp]

Samsung Steam Oven

 

<span style="font-family: helvetica; font-size: 12pt;">I also have a Samsung Steam Oven that is about six years old now.  I tried the Hybrid cleaning method once with the same results.  It just left a lot of water in the bottom of the oven that I had to clean up and that was a real PIA.  I use the Self-Cleaning feature a few times a year as needed.  I use the oven a couple of times a week and I don't feel like I go out of the way to keep it from getting too dirty.  If I think something might boil over I also put some foil or something below to catch it.  But for the most part, I just use it without much thought to that.</span>

 

<span style="font-family: helvetica; font-size: 12pt;">I have always just turned the knob to clean.  I never really gave it much thought to how long it takes.  I am about to clean it again and I think I will try cutting it back to two hours to see what happens.</span>

 

[ozzie908]

On a side note...

Burnt a hot cross bun in the toaster yesterday evening and the resulting smoke was practically toxic, Although its cleared now the smell is still pretty bad, Have the windows and doors open its a pretty pleasant spring day anyone know of a sure fired way to rid the awful odour?

 

[frigilux]

In my family’s household I had to clean the oven and consequently vowed to never have to do that again. Purchased a self-cleaning range in ‘84 and never looked back. That one was a Whirlpool. After that, there was a succession of Frigidaires, followed by a double oven GE range, both self-cleaning. I’ve always run the cleaning cycle 3-4 times a year. Made the mistake of running the cleaning cycles for both ovens at the same time when the GE was a few months old in 2017. The poor thing was nearly a kiln. [this post was last edited: 3/15/2024-08:39]

 

[henene4]

The issue is that any chemicals on the coating of a self clean oven can cause severe etching if they are there during a self clean cycle.

Oven cleaners are harsh as is, but now up the temp by a factor of 9 and you can imagine the havoc that can cause to anything, even in a dry state.

Self clean ovens are somewhat new to my family.
I run my Miele about twice every year, my mums Siemens had its first run since she got the new kitchen a few weeks ago and I gave a new oven to my partner as an early birthday present, so that hasn't run a SC cycle yet.

Don't know, but haven't found any solution to cleaning that worked as well as SC for the German market.

And if my oven does last a few years less, so what, saved me a ton of time and effort for an overall better result.

 

[novum]

Yeah, we've a pair of Miele ovens and I use it when they're particularly dirty.
It works extremely well and isn't all that smoky - they seem to have a good ability to contain the odours, although I still open the roof windows and run an extractor hood.

I didn't use it at all during the really crazy energy price spike here a few months ago. Normally I'll try to run it super early in the morning / late at night if I'm up so it hits half-price power.

 

[norgeway]

I use mine

Probably twice or three times a year, its designed to cean itself, if it burns up a circuit board, Well ill go back to a old srove.