Heat Minder

[mixfinder]

A relative got a Frigidaire stove, with a Heat Minder burner, in 1965.

She hated it and swore it burned everything. That seemed to be a common lament.

I owned my first Heat Minder Range in 1979 on a Frigidaire Custom Imperial 30 inch O/U. I purchased it new, from existing inventory, after WCI bought them out.

I took me a few tries to get the hang of it The HM burner and then it was a love affair from then on.

I used retro Frigidaires from then until 2002, when we sold the last house.

I found that they heavier the pan, the better the response from the heat minder sensor.

I let go of terms like high, low etc. and simply dialed the heat, I wanted the pan to be, when the food in it was cooking.

The burner would come of full, like a raging inferno. When the bottom of the pan registered the same heat as the setting of the dial, the burner began to cycle, to maintain heat.

Voila! Set it and walk away. EVERY time, the same heat and the same setting.

So much simpler and more reliable than standing on my head trying to adjust the flame on a gas buner, "just right"

When simmering or boiling, the cycle was less intense than if deep frying or cooking something that really needed a lot of heat.

I used the burner like I would use the control on an electric frying pan.

I learned, over easy eggs were difficult, with the heat minder burner. The cycle swings where too great.

Besides myself, I haven't heard many endorsements for Heat Minders burners.

Most repairmen would recommend replacing them with an infinite heat control if there was a service call.

Kelly

 

[toggleswitch]

Heat minder.

I must try one.

P.S. I'm not one to listen to repair-men. I mean how can you take someone seriously whose @$$ hangs out? Get a shirt with a longer *tail*, yo'!

 

[panthera]

heat minder

I have found the latest incarnation of the "heat minder" system to be the best. Traditionally, the burner ran "full blast" until the desired temperature was reached + the cycle time the thermostat needed to register.
Then it cycled off and on. The swings were too high, the rise time way too long.
The newest versions permit you to chose two ranges, full or moderate and have a slew rate (sorry, rise time) which is calibrated and much much shorter. If you have only heard bad things about them, you really ought to give the new ones a try. They are a 1:1 replacement over here in Europe. so I am betting it is the same in the states...seeing as how they are made by GE and sold industry wide.
Or, before someone now corrects me, marketed by GE. Nobody builds anything more themselves...

 

[jasonl]

My parents have a flat-top Maytag stove that cycles the heat on and off rapidly and the settings seem to be consistant. Simmer=a notch or two above "low", normal cooking = medium or maybe a notch above, boiling = full throttle baby!

In fact, I have those T-fal pots that have that red bottom that tell you when it's hot enough. I put the heat on full until the red circle in the pot changes color then turn the burner down until it cycles off. There ya go, controls are set.

I've never messed with "heat minder" before :=(

 

[tomturbomatic]

Kelly, Heatminders were tempermental things. Sensitemps on GEs could be also and most manufacturers used several different systems with the early ones being mostly hydraulic thermostats and the later ones being systems that used transformers and low voltage relays and that sort of foolishness. With the thermostatic controls, I found that it is usually better to put the food in the pan and then turn on the the unit to absorb some of the overshoot that you can get when heating an empty pan. Also, for delicate things like eggs, it's better to set the heat very low, like 200 and then raise it by 25 degrees or less, especially with the Heatminder so that you don't start heating both elements in that fat Radiantube. What's supposed to happen is that both elements in the HM come on full for the intital heating or after a great temperature drop, but before the setting is reached, the second unit is taken out of the circuit to prevent too much overshoot and most cooking temperatures are maintained by cycling the single heater which is half the wattage of the whole unit. There is some adjustability with some of the systems, but you have to identify which system you have. In either case, the worst thing you can do is lift the pan off the unit without turning the unit off because that makes the sensor signal that the unit should come on full heat and that is the last thing you want when the pan is too hot already. In about 1956, Consumer Reports tested stoves and had very interesting findings about the thermostatic units of the time. Unlike electric skillets, griddles and Dutch ovens where the heating element was fused into the pan and the control and settings were made just for that pan of known weight and material, there were so many variables in cookware material and quality of the utensils used on a thermostatic element or burner of a range, that unless you were willing to become thoroughly familiar with its performance with the different pans you might use on it, you could wind up disappointed. The suggested heats were for medium weight aluminum pans, but stainless steel skillets required much lower temperatures to achieve the same results. Some stainless steel had good bases for evening out and spreading the heat and others did not. Cast iron did not send the heat sideways fast enough to tell the sensor that the pan was hot enough so you got pans that were far too hot for what you were doing. I discovered that the first time I made hash browns in one particular pan. So your relative was not alone and you are to be congratulated.

 

[panthera]

Tom,

That is a wonderful summary. I have always wondered just exactly they did that in those early units.
Certainly took me a while - even with the new stuff - to figure it all out. Burned some stuff onto my Visionware and my cast iron skillets before I got the hang of it.
'Course, my current glass-ceramic is Italian - and it was designed to keep sauces running at a very exact temperature over long periods of time - while heating water for pasta up to temperature in double-quik time.
I wonder how many great ideas just never catch on because the first attempt is not quite right.

 

[jasonl]

Whirlpool Accusimmer

Helen has a new WP range that has "Accusimmer" control on one of the burners. Is this their version of "heat minder"?

 

[toggleswitch]

That switches the element to 110v from 220v. Not thermostatic.

My near TOL WP smooth-top electric (donated to family) had that too. It really does make for a gentle heat.

 

[jasonl]

OH really. Yeah, that's really gentle heat. I guess that expands the "low" setting on a normal 220v cooktop.

 

[toggleswitch]

Y=Mx +b, where B is the *Y* intercept..........

YUP IIRC voltage switch from 220v to 110v cuts wattage to a quarter.

E =I * R

Electro-motive force (volts) = Amps * Resistance (Ohms).

Watts = Volts * Amps.

The resistance remains constant. Volts, amps and watts change. HAVE FUN!

 

[neptunebob]

If it only had a brain.....

In one of our houses, we used to have Caloric with the "Burner With A Brain". It never seemed to work. Is it the gas version of a HeatMinder?

 

[panthera]

Steve,

I thought "resistance is futile"...
(ducks and runs back across the atlantic)

 

[panthera]

Steve,

I thought "resistance is futile"...
(ducks and runs back across the atlantic)

 

[toggleswitch]

Pass the handcuffs.

Keven,

I have heard that somewhere before.. LOL

 

[jasonl]

In electronics, electricity is futile when there's a resistor. Just like in a relationship.