First stove, favourite stove?

[toggleswitch]

often more dangerous.

I beg to differ, sir.

There are far more electric stoves in this country than gas. Yet, as a class electric stoves report fewer accidents.

Electricity also can't explode when an idiot installs a pipe incorrectly. (There are two joints on a flexible gas connector that DO NOT take pipe sealant. They are already milled to a perfect seal. Sealant actually CAUSES leaks).

 

[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.