My next question.
Once I've fixed the lights I need to look at the gas cooker. The hob part works fine but the oven will not heat up beyond a very weak initial setting.
I haven't used a gas oven in years, but wasn't surprised that at first switch-on the jets were very weak. I sort of expected to allow a minute or two for a thermocouple or some such device to warm up and then the flames to roar into business on max power. But sadly no -they just stay pathetically weak. A Gas Safe chap has sorted the boiler and given it a clean bill of health but unfortunately he wasn't asked about the oven.
It won't be too long before the kitchen gets completely re-done with an electric oven, but fixing the existing gas one will be of great help.
PS After this, it's the shower then the extractor fan and the heated towel rail.
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Old gas appliances get gunged up. The places to look are in the main switch/knob and perhaps the jets - not the thing with the holes that the flames come out of, the small jets the gas comes out of. If that all seems OK, perhaps the thermocouple.
Old-fashioned gas appliances take to pieces nicely. But you have to put them back together right.
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We have a similar problem with our LPG cooker; LPG is apparently worse for this than natural gas. The telltale is when Mrs HM's cakes fail to rise. My own solution, though I appreciate it wouldn't work for everyone, is to wheel the compressor from the garage to the back door, then give the area around the jets and thermocouple a good blow through with the air duster. I usually do the jets on top whilst I'm at it.
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While staying with our daughter last week, I did quite a bit of cooking for all the family.
As they live in married quarters, they have no choice of appliances and, regrettably, there is a gas cooker supplied.
What vile contraptions these things are. My wife, who used to be a home service adviser, working for the gas industry, agrees that modern electric equivalents are far better. (I don't mean horrid solid electric hobs!).
We have an electric fan oven and an induction hob, both of which work far more efficiently than the rotten gas job I used last week.
Slow to heat oven, slow to heat up gas hobs made for extreme difficulty in producing decent results; my roast spuds - famously good in the family, took forever to get anywhere near cooked properly and vegetables being boiled were so slow to come to the boil that they were half cooked during the heating up process!.
My advice is to sling the gas cooker and replace with an electrically driven one!
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Mrs HM would say similar things about electric cookers Roger, although to be fair these new hobs do look much better than the old types.
When you live out in the swamps like us, though, power cuts tend to be more frequent. Added to that,memories of living in an all-electric home when I was young, during the three-day week, cured me of putting all my eggs in one basket.
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I can't see how a gas hob can possible be slower than an electric one Roger. The rule I have heard re root vegetables is that they should be cooked by being brought to the boil from cold. Waitrose info says " To evenly cook potatoes and other starchy roots, such as parsnips and carrots, place in cold water and boil them gently to allow the heat to diffuse through the vegetables."
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Sounds like low pressure to the appliances. We have an induction hob, and although it's good, a gas hob would be faster, and I could get a wok burner! If existing hob has an expensive electrical failure though, we might well revert to gas.
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I grew up with the exact opposite. Heat the water up to vigorous boiling first, plunge the vegetables in. It seals in the "goodness", apparently, and stops it diffusing out into the water and being lost.
As AC says, find the jet. Usually the cast iron bit with the holes just lifts out, and then at the inlet end of the thing it sits on there will be a small brass jet looking like a carburettor idle jet with a fine hole in it. You can poke it out gently with a primus pricker, put a bit of rubber tube over it and suck, or unscrew it and hold it up to the light to see if it seems blocked, then use a toothbrush bristle.
At least that's how our 1935 Radiation New World works.
www.gracesguide.co.uk/Radiation
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I have a fantastic gas hob that beats anything electric comprehensively. Chefs almost exclusively use them for the responsiveness and fine control.
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I bet it doesn't bring stuff to the boil faster than an induction hob. Marginally less control than gas overall, but not significant enough in the domestic setting to make any real difference. I'd always had gas until 2 years back, switched to induction and will never look back.
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>> switched to induction and
>> will never look back.
>>
Same here.
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>> but not significant enough in the domestic setting to make
>> any real difference.
depends if you can cook or not.
Used Electric plates, rings, ceramic, halogen, and induction.
Gas is always better.
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>> depends if you can cook or not.
True. If you're skilled enough, you can use any type of hob successfully.
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>> I have a fantastic gas hob that beats anything electric comprehensively. Chefs almost exclusively use
>> them for the responsiveness and fine control.
>>
I miss the fine control that we had on one of our gas rings.
It was thermostatic so I could, if I wished, leave a pan of milk on hot the ring and it would not boil over.
I have enquired about this feature on current cookers and I get the usual suck cheeks.
When I say "I bought it in 1965 and it was converted to natural gas and it still worked!"
Greeted with a pregnant silence.
Progress ?
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>> While staying with our daughter last week, I did quite a bit of cooking for
>> all the family.
>> As they live in married quarters, they have no choice of appliances and, regrettably, there
>> is a gas cooker supplied.
>> What vile contraptions these things are. My wife, who used to be a home service
>> adviser, working for the gas industry, agrees that modern electric equivalents are far better. (I
>> don't mean horrid solid electric hobs!).
>> We have an electric fan oven and an induction hob, both of which work far
>> more efficiently than the rotten gas job I used last week.
>> Slow to heat oven, slow to heat up gas hobs made for extreme difficulty in
>> producing decent results; my roast spuds - famously good in the family, took forever to
>> get anywhere near cooked properly and vegetables being boiled were so slow to come to
>> the boil that they were half cooked during the heating up process!.
>> My advice is to sling the gas cooker and replace with an electrically driven one!
>>
I wonder if it depends on what you are used to. I know a couple of people that are real dab hands in the kitchen and wouldn't have anything other than gas.
'My advice is to sling the gas cooker and replace with an electrically driven one!'
That was their thoughts on having to use an electric cooker!
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We occasionally - usually in winter - have power cuts lasting hours. (I suspect EON are testing us for a real blackout in 2015).
No way are we going to cook by electricity.
Been there in 1973.. never again.
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Wait till the Russians turn off the gas. Have you seen the HIGNFY credits?
;-)
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>> Wait till the Russians turn off the gas. Have you seen the HIGNFY credits?
>>
>> ;-)
Why don't YOU ask 'em? :-)
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Messrs Google tell me that as well as gummed up jets it could be the flame failure device. It's a thermocouple type valve that heats up with the very low power gas jets and then lets rip with max power. When it cools down, i.e. the heat has stopped, it wisely shuts off the gas.
I will fiddle about, but if the flame failure has itself failed and the diagnosis is correct it might be £60 for the valve and fitting may not be a DIY job, so say around £100+. You can buy an all singing microwave / conventional oven / grill combo for that sort of money so a repair seems unlikely.
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In pedant mode......
If you watch the credits closely the valve is being turned the wrong way so the gas is being turned on ........
Most of UK gas imports now come from Qatar......very interesting analysis of the market here
www.naturalgaseurope.com/natural-gas-competition-part-1-qatar-and-russia-in-the-uk
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Don't all electric only cooker / hob people have a camping stove / barbeque / half a dozen disposable barbeques stashed away in the shed / garage ?
Last edited by: Old Navy on Tue 22 Oct 13 at 20:39
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Don't use disposable BBQs indoors, children - lots of carbon monoxide produced ;-)
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>> Don't use disposable BBQs indoors, children - lots of carbon monoxide produced ;-)
>>
Sorry doc, I credited our readers with a bit of common sense. Silly me! :-)
Last edited by: Old Navy on Tue 22 Oct 13 at 21:32
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>> Don't use disposable BBQs indoors, children - lots of carbon monoxide produced ;-)
>>
IIRC they are at their most dangerous after you have finished cooking.
You just assume they will burn themselves out as you settle down for a smug postprandial snooze, knowing that the neighbours are without electricity and cooking facilites. It can become a very long snooze!
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When we used to live somewhere where the snow would most years cut us off from the outside world from time to time and there was no gas and the electricity supply failed regularly we used to keep camping kit to hand for cooking etc.
However, the winter of 2000/2001 was pretty severe and we were snowed in ( as in snow up to the first floor windows ) for ten days once. The camping gas ran out too eventually.
If you make a tripod out of twigs and string, place a saucepan on top and light 3 candles underneath ( taking care to position the flames between the "arms" of the twigs ) that will heat a pan of soup or just boil some water for a cuppa reasonably quickly...
That Ray Mears isn't the only one who knows stuff !
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>> Don't all electric only cooker / hob people have a camping stove / barbeque /
>> half a dozen disposable barbeques stashed away in the shed / garage ?
>>
Or half a dozen boxes of MREs ;)
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>> Or half a dozen boxes of MREs ;)
>>
That would be plan "D". :-)
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Don't knock it ON, the jambalaya is ok. Beggers can't be choosers ;)
Last edited by: sooty123 on Tue 22 Oct 13 at 21:44
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A guy I know, ( he's been single a very long time ) when he's not eating at the pub fairly much lives on bread, Pot Noodle and Heinz Big Soup.
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Gas oven will not heat up - stays on low. - Armel Coussine
