Lowest oven setting?

[delco1946]

My circa 1950 Gibson has a notch below 200 that based on hash spacing I assume is 150, you can also see/hear it kick on at this mark. I’ll use this setting to keep plates or food warm while finishing a meal. Max temp is says 550 but who on gods green earth is cooking something at that temp . Only thing I’ve ever legit baked near that temp are biscuits (500) that need that sort of heat to rise before setting.

 

[tomturbomatic]

You don't state whether or not your Gibson is electric, but it probably is, so does it have a separate selector switch for bake or broil? Often the highest setting was to prevent the broil unit from cycling during broiling operations. A friend's GE wall oven from around 1960 had "BROIL" at the top end of the thermostat dial and it was 550F but the broil element was not activated unless the Oven Set dial was turned to BROIL. Old Wilcoltor thermostats like on my 1954 Frigidaire RT70 click into the broil setting above 575F. I think this was not only to prevent cycling during Broil, but also to accommodate the mechanics of the thermostat that allowed the switch from powering the bake elements to powering the broil elements.

 

[fan-of-fans]

That brings up a good point. Why did more MOL and TOL electric ranges tend to have a separate selector knob and thermostat knob, where more BOL ranges like 20” and 24” ranges have just the thermostat dial only?

I think most new ranges with dial oven controls and no timers have only the thermostat dial as well. At least I haven’t seen any of the basic ranges to have a selector knob anymore, even self clearing ones.

 

[ozzie908]

Neff hide and slide oven.

Will go down to 40c for proving bread and keep warm is around 95c ..

 

[circlew]

The ones I've seen with separate oven set and temperature selector knobs have almost always been a GE or Hotpoint product. This was regardless of how basic or fancy the model was.

 

[delco1946]

My Gibson is indeed electric. It’s all on one knob, the the next setting past 550 is broil. It doesn’t have any cycle issues that I’ve ever noticed. It works well.

If I don’t end up with a Glenwood SNJ in the next year or two that I have my heart set on then the second runner up would probably be a 1956 yellow GE double oven to match my 57 washer dryer and soon to arrive matching fridge. It uses the second dials like you mention, which seems unnecessary but I’m sure there were reasons for it.

 

[appnut]

Christopher, I'd love to see pics of all y9ur appliances after the fridge arrives.

 

[DADoES]

 
Granny's 1992 Whirlpool gas self-clean range had a separate selector (Off, Bake, Timed Bake, Clean, Broil) and thermostat (which also had Broil and Clean positions).

 

[appnut]

My 1985 Self-Clean Tappan Gas range had the same arrangement as Glenn's description of Granny's range.

 

[daveamkrayoguy]

Well here’s my range on that lowest setting it will allow, 175-degrees, and earlier I took shots of my oven on Keep Warm, of which I’d get better warming on a lower setting than that if it were possible…

Again, I painstakingly get either an Error Message or the Temperature Reading doesn’t stay on, along with the tedium of the oven not going on and I didn’t want to tediously turn it on and off either just to see how low it was capable of given that ovens today amongst the complex and fragile electronics don’t use a simple knob…

— Dave

 

[delco1946]

Bob - I think I can manage that! I’m trying not to get too excited as it’s a long shipping trip and won’t even get picked up until tomorrow or Wednesday due to the snow storms in PA but it’s pretty mint from the pictures. It has a long indirect route to Oregon so hopefully it’s not to much for it. I’m sure it will need a cleaning. Feels like I’m reuniting a long lost appliance family lol.

I just finishing detailing the silver metallic lettering on the dryer. Need to let that dry and paint the white backing, and should have it reassembled completely in the next couple days!

 

[daveamkrayoguy]

The latest pics (forgot)…

— Dave

 

[kb0nes]

Mine is 170F also.

John's hunch about food safety temp makes sense.

Pity seeing that modern electronic controls could easily be set for ANY temp over room temp. I'd love for my oven to be able to set to 100F for yogurt culturing and dehydrating things.

 

[Marky_Mark]

Reply #9

Hi John

 

Having read the manual and played around with the controls, there does not seem to be any way at all of preventing my oven from entering "hold mode" when timed bake ends.  It simply will not automatically shut off at all.

 

And here's the best bit: if you have the oven set to a temperature LOWER than the hold mode temp of 150 ºF, guess what happens at the end of timed bake.  Yep, your suspicions are correct, when the cooking time is up, the oven transitions to hold mode and the temperature INCREASES to 150 ºF.  Go figure LOL.  

 

[Marky_Mark]

Just out of curiosity, I decided to put a temperature probe in my oven to see how accurately it can maintain the minimum setting of 135 ºF in convection mode and traditional bake mode.  It does a pretty acceptable job.  In my test, it did appear to wait until the thermostat was satisfied before turning off the elements, so there was some overshoot up to about 150 ºF and then it slowly cooled to about 130 ºF before turning the elements back on. 

 

[Marky_Mark]

I decided to try the same thing with the oven and microwave in the flat in Ireland.

 

The Miele oven can be set as low as you like.  Although the dial only has markings from 50 ºC onwards (122 ºF), it works at settings lower than this.  Assuming you set a temp that is higher than the current room/oven temp, it will start heating.  It does this in a smart way -- the elements do not just come on until the thermostat is satisfied.  Instead, it cycles on the elements for a few seconds at a time over the course of several minutes, so that it can accurately achieve and maintain the set temp without overshooting.  It did this in both convection and traditional bake modes.

 

[Marky_Mark]

The combo-microwave can be set as low as 30 ºC (86 ºF) and it did prove to be accurate in my test.