First stove, favourite stove?

[toggleswitch]

Here on Long Island many homes have electric dryers even if their homes have gas. Same logic. Increase the winter load. Little did they realize mechanical dryers would become a rear round *event* that now overburden the electrical grid in summer, too. This is a gas market in terms of (lesser) running expense.

It is also cheaper and more convenient for the builder to throw in an electric dryer line. Worse for the environment, IMHO. Once the house is delivered, the builders dont have to worry about connecting a gas dryer. Just have your appliance co. add a flex cord and plug it in.

Lack of long-term thinking, I believe, hurts us all.

 

[polkanut]

My parents next door neighbors were an older couple that had sold their farm and moved to town when they retired. When they moved they brought their appliances with them, of which one was a Caloric combination wood/gas range. The wood side had been used while they were on the farm, but not in town, as it was an insurance issue. It was a very unique stove, I would love to find one for myself now. Oh well.

 

[dalangdon]

Here in Seattle, Seattle City Light really pushed electric EVERYTHING, so you don't see that many gas stoves. It wasn't until the early 90's or so that they finally got rid of their very cheap (and very good) appliance repair service, so there was no point in having gas anything up to that time.

What you were seeing there for a while was City Light basically giving customers money to shed themselves of the electric furnaces they had been selling just a few years earlier. I suppose they thought that Seattle wouldn't grow as much as it did, and they thought the dams could supply power even for those huge power draws.

Since CL is owned by the City of Seattle, we still enjoy very low rates and pretty good service. I've only had the power go out a few times in 20 years I've lived here. And the nice thing about converting our stove and hot water over to gas is that it will put us in the lower rate tier, which makes for even lower bills. Once we get rid of the electric dryer (one of these years) we'll really be living cheap.

BTW, while I love the old stoves, if they would come out with a dual fuel variation on the Flair/400, (gas burners/electic ovens) I would be on that thing in a hot second. I like gas burners (preferably without standing pilots) and electric ovens, and I really like the two oven setup. I think I'd go with the Tappan swing out doors though - the Flair gull wings are cool looking but they are a pain if you are tring to access the control panel while the oven is open (which is the sort of frenzied, unorganized cooking I end up doing)

 

[toggleswitch]

Funny. Here you get a discount on electricity if your home is ALL ELECTRIC. At that level of KWH usage, you'd go broke at std. rates after one good winter.

IIRC:

Hawaii
Long Island, NY
NYC, NY
LA, California

Order of electric rates in this country highest at top.

Newsflash:

Everyone having A/C is a relatively recent thing here (30 years). Central air is now *hot* and *on-fire*. The trend began about 30 years ago too. Oddly, window units (window rattlers or shakers) are now foreign-made and cheap [$80 and up] and you can't GIVE then away anymore.

 

[jasonl]

Window AC

I know some people won't like this. While the vintage Window AC's are nice and they can extract heat more efficiently, they were expensive, noisy, and was expensive to repair.

The new units are cheap, made in China, but they do work well, they're more energy efficient and they use digital thermostats instead of the analog "Take a guess" models. Now you can AC the living room and the bedrooms for alot less money now.

I actually like window AC's. I like the fan noise and the hum on the compressor.

 

[mrtide]

I don't know about that toggleswitch

Of course no stove is safe completely. What I have seen down here in the south are a lot of people who like to deep-fry on the stove and don't pay attention before its too late. Happens every day in some part of the city no doubt. I use a presto fryer with its thermostatic heat control, but not everyone does. I remember hearing of one particularly nasty fire where the fire got under the coils, burned the wires and shorted the stove. Arcing took place at the fuse box.

Actually, its not the stove but the operator and cooking oil, shortening, etc. Ever pour hot oil on a campfire while cleaning up camp? It goes up like gasoline. Never saw anything like it. And to think, people are allowed to use that stuff.

 

[appnut]

I know where there's a turqoise Caloric Ultramatic built-in gas wall oven and cooktop.

 

[skip]

MY all time favorite stove is the Chambers as I have had 2 of them boy do I miss them

Skip...

 

[mrtide]

Calorics

I have seen quite a few of those around here back in the 50s' and 60s', built-ins and freestanding. I think that the gas company pushed them hard as they sponsored the 10pm newscast. But what really seemed big in my old neighborhood as a child was modern-maids, gas and electric. Some homes had Frigidaire built-ins, some including ours had Whirlpools. Seldom saw Tappans, some Okeefe&Merritts in the better hoods. Lotsa GEs, seemed to be the builders' favorite throughout the city. Never Hotpoints for some reason.

 

[toggleswitch]

Methinks the biggest danger with electric is people can energize the wrong coil/element,without realizing it.

IMHO, they users also tend to use a higher heat than is necessary in that electric does not send heat up the side of the pan to *warn* you that it is on *full-blast*.

I leave this one in your hands. We stopped frying so much in this part of the country way over 20 yeas ago, and perhaps never did to the extent found in other regions.

 

[mrtide]

If only they would here

Of course fried food tastes great, but it ain't good for ya. I do watch my intake of it and actually I seldom ever fry anything. Many of us southerners have adopted healthier diets, but some just eat and do whatever probably like many other places. Well you get my drift-have a good one. Oh and I like that smoothtop Frigidaire with SS I see at Best-buy and Lowes. It really is a beauty. Actually I can do electric or gas either way.

 

[dalangdon]

Of course, with electric stoves, there is always the spectre of "hidden heat": Putting your hand on a electric coil when it's on, but not orange.

This is mostly just a problem for children and drunks. I was a victim once (as a drunk). I was having a party, leaning against the stove and put my hand right on a burner that had accidently been turned on low. Had a big coil mark on my hand for a few weeks.

After that, for several years, I would always turn the stove breaker off before any party where it wasn't going to be used.

 

[neptunebob]

I thought people in the South used more frying grease. There is an episode of "Honey Were Killing The Kids" where Dr. Hark tells a family to make a can of grease into a bird feeder and the mother says "That's Good Stuff!". The family was from New Mexico, so I guess Southwest.

Mostly, I remember Caloric ranges hard to clean. I think that's why a lot of them ended up on the curb, people just didn't have the patience to clean up the edges.

 

[jasonl]

Smart cats

When we moved into the new house here in Opelousas, I was afraid the cats would walk all over the stove and burning their paws off. Wizard is the only cat that dares it and he will extend his paw to feel if there's any heat coming from it. One time he hopped on the counter and got close to the stove right after cooking. He backed up and got away.

 

[mixfinder]

Gas vs Electric

Natural Gas and Propane are about 3 times more expensive to use in Seattle, than electric.

What good is a gas stove if the lights go out. All the newer ones require electricity to light the burners!

Tests prove over and over and over and over and over electric is faster than gas in bringing a gallon of water to a boil.

Kelly

 

[cehalstead]

when the electric is off

The burners on a new gas stove can be ignited by using a match when the electric is off, but the ignitor on the oven cannot be bypassed.

 

[polkanut]

Even with electronic ignition out of commission, you can still use the burners on a gas stove, you just have to light them with a match. Our power was out recently and that is what we did so we could make supper. The only drawback is that the oven doesn't work w/o electricity to operate the igniter.

 

[toggleswitch]

Speaking of oven-use during a power outage:

*WOW* electric less expensive than gas. That boggles my mind. YAY hydro-electric production! Boo foreign oil.

My Turkish (for shame... LOL) Avanti brand gas stove had an oven and broiler that could be used in a power outage.

Those burners had a clicker/sparker as a top burner would. You would have to hold in the control knoeb until proof-of-flame was established, then it would allow the gas to flow. Interestingly, the gas flame size would modulate, just like an old-fasihoned 1950's oven (which we here, now, consider classics).

The Avanti has a lot of features that are normally found on TOL.
Waist-high broiler (in the oven cavity).
Sealed burners
One grate covering two burners.

Drawbacks:
270*F minimum oven temp. no keep warm temps (150*f to 250*f)
When scaling back heat from say 450*f to 300*F it had a tendency to go out. [The minimum-bypass flame, i.e. the gas allowed to flow when the thermostat was satisfied may have needed adjustment]. Smaller scale-backs in temp. were OK.

I gifted it to someone (since the house is to be sold).
He got rid of a 30" stove in an apartment replacing it with this 20" one, leaving him room for a washer. I did my good deed. LOL

Here is a link to a vendor called "Compact Appliances".
Notice the 20" (50cm)smooth-top electric stoves/cookers. These are very rare to find in this small (to us) size.

I am told the washing machines on this site are fun to research.

Enjoy.

http://www.compactappliance.com/xq/JSP.jump/itemType.CATEGORY/itemID.55/qx/Ranges.htm

 

[gizmo]

I have a Modern Maid Ultima gas stove from 1987, the year MM went broke in AU. (No connection between Modern Maid in AU and USA) I had one in my last house and I have another ready for the new house, plumber should install it tomorrow, fingers crossed. The new one is TOL, the Ultima 650, which means 60cm wide and level 5 where 1 is BOL and 5 is TOL.
All models can be lit without electricity -
610 - no ignition to top burners (use a match) - piezo igniter to oven and griller (broiler).
620 - piezo igniters built into gas knobs for all functions - just turn the knob, it clunks and sparks once.
630 - electronic ignition to all burners, can light all with a match if no power, must hold in oven knob till flame is extablished.
640 - electronic ignition to all burners - same functions as 630, plus a clock.
650 - electronic ign to all functions, fully auto oven (requires power) electronic oven temp display, power failure operation - light with match, hold safety button down till flame established.
630, 640, 650 all have fan forced ovens - MM were the first fan oven in AU, they claimed to have invented the idea though I'm not too sure about that.

I will post pics of the "new" one when it is installed.
Like most Australian stoves, the griller (broiler) is above the oven, not under it or in it.

Chris.

 

[partscounterman]

Me yakking about stoves...

Back in my hanabata days (small kid time) my Mom had a huge Tappan gas range from the 1950's. I really do not remember too much about it. In 1972, my fathers job led us to move to Eau Claire, WI. The house there had no gas hookup, so my folks bought a secondhand Whirlpool electric range. It was a standard clean oven, but was all deluxe otherwise. It had a full lenght flourescent light on the control panel and our favorite feature was the burner that could be operated as a 4" or 8" by turning a dial. It also had a "griddle" setting which allowed you to run two burners off of one control. One day, as the stove got older, the pilot (indicator) light for the burners went out, so Dad goes down the basement and unearths a christmas bulb. Well, the one he grabbed was a flashing twinkle light, so from then on, the indicator light would flash on and off. I laughed at my Dad about that!

My Grandparents were in a nursing home and my folks had me move into their house, so it would be occupied for insurance purposes. My Gramma had a 1947 Crown gas range. It had these hinged covers that came down over the burners when not in use, giving the range a very clean appearance. For some odd reason, my Gramma never used the oven except to store cookies and crackers in. So I decide to bake something in that oven- I turn the knob, touch the match to the pilot opening and POOF! 30 or 40 years of accumulated dust and cookies crumbs ignight in that instant. I was ok, but had to go change my shorts if ya know what I mean. My Auntie and Uncle bought that house and still have that gorgous 36" range.

Another range I really liked was in our 25' Ideal travel trailer. It was a Chateau by Magic Chef-pretty much the camper sized version of a Flair or Tappan 400. 4 propane burners on the cooktop and an eye level oven above. Black glass oven door and a black cooktop that had to be wiped off constantly or every speck of dust would show. While it was cool looking, the eye level oven was quite small, forcing us to cut frozen pizzas in half to fit them in. We did like the little Magic Chef emblem of the cute chef guy throwing his arms in the air...

I had a Norge gas range from about '64 in one house and a coppertone Westinghouse electric in an apartment. Guess they didn't make a big impression.

When we moved into our own home in St. Paul, there was an electric GE with those crummy pushbottun burners that never seemed to give you the right heat. Also only had 1 large burner (huge drag!) It did have a flourescent light on the backslash that was shrouded with a chrome hood. The chrome hood had little pinholes in it that looked so cool when the light was on. I replaced this range with the exact same model in Avocado that we found at a garage sale. Later replaced the green one with a barely used Almond JBS27 coil top and then moved away...

When we moved in over here, all the appliances in our cottage were new except the horrid almond BOL Whirlpool range. Lived with that piece of sh*t for a few months then begged our landlord for a new stove. I gave him explict instruction that I wanted one with the high output burners coils-4 turns on the 6" burners and 5 turns on the 8 inchers. He came home with a Frigidaire that did have the burners I wanted and I was surprised with a self-cleaning oven (my first- I'm cleaning my oven right now!). The bad thing is that it is in that dated white with a black door and control panel. I would have prefered one in white on white, but since I didn't pay for it, who's complaining? Its cheap, but decent.

Went to the huge garage sale at the Kahului Union Church this weekend and got a small one burner butane stove for 5 bucks. It has never been used and the box labeling and instruction are all in japanese. There is one sheet of instructions in that funny "english" that is directly (and sometimes hilariously) tranlated from japanese. We got that so if the power goes out, we can still get a cup of coffee. They advertise these little stoves round here as "Hurricane stoves"- a chilling thought!

I prefer electric to gas and coil top to smooth top. Dennis (who is trained as a chef and has worked in 4 star restuarants) has never really gotten the hang of an electric stove-he always boils things over. I seemed to have learned to turn the burners down at just the right time-this being my only real cooking skill. I would rather bake than cook.

Toggle-Thanks for the loggarhea-now I got it!