Ranges with enclosed burners - which parts get hot?

[Stephen Tashiro]

On kitchen ranges that have enclosed burners, how much of the body of the range gets hot when the burners are used?

I recall seeing reviews of a range on the Home Depot site that complained about the top of the front face of a stainless steel oven getting hot when the front burners were on high. Is such a thing to be expected? - or are the burners supposed to be insulated from the front of the oven?

I myself have never used a range with enclosed burners. I'm wondering if well-insulated versus not-well insulated burners is a feature to consider when buying a range.

[Jim Becker]

I had to do a little Googling to figure out what you might mean relative to "enclosed" burners. If the context of your question is about burners that are covered with some kind of surface, like ceramic, to make them "easier to clean" I suppose that would result in a whole lot of heat transfer beyond the pot or pan you're using. I surely wouldn't prefer that, myself....I want the heat right on the pan bottom. My Thermodor range has "sealed" burners such that no debris can drop into the appliance, but the burners, themselves, are fully exposed, unlike with a more commercial range design with "open" burners that have to have a removable tray below to facilitate cleaning. The open style does permit more air flow which can support higher BTU, but a well engineered closed burner system like I have can have substantial BTU heat. So again, if the burners are actually covered with some surface...yea, things are likely going to get hot.

[Stephen Tashiro]

. If the context of your question is about burners that are covered with some kind of surface, like ceramic, to make them "easier to clean" .

Yes, that's what I mean by "enclosed".

Smooth tops on ranges seems to be the dominant style. For example, at the local home depot, all the ranges on display have a smooth surface on top except for 1, which has the old fashioned coiled wire burners fully exposed.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Smooth tops on ranges seems to be the dominant styleYeah - they sure do push those hard don't they?
Personally, I think they are one of the worst ideas to come down the "trend hiway" since the "open concept".....

My wife was dead set against one until I talked her into it last year. Now we're stuck with it :(...

They are quick to get filthy and next to impossible to clean.
Plus they have the added irritation(s) of needing special pots and pans. Nothing other than flat bottom, avid anything with a copper bottom and no cast iron - other sie you risk severe damage to the surface.

The only good thing I can say about them is they do seem to have a very precise temperature control.

Yes - the heat does spread somewhat, but, since it's just the two of us, we don't run the burners for any length of time & seldom more than one at a time.

[Mike Null]

There are UL standards which all appliances have to meet to be certified. The smooth surface ranges and cooktops are entirely safe. There is a "burner box" that encloses them and while the glass tops can certainly burn you there are hot surface warning lights on all brands.

The glass top was introduced as a boon to kitchen clean-up-which it was and is. If you think they are hard to clean, imagine cleaning under open burners or cleaning the burners and grates on gas cooktops.

[Jim Becker]

Yes, that's what I mean by "enclosed".

Smooth tops on ranges seems to be the dominant style. For example, at the local home depot, all the ranges on display have a smooth surface on top except for 1, which has the old fashioned coiled wire burners fully exposed.
I personally have not seen a closed top GAS range at all, but then again, I don't really look at that stuff closely in the stores. There are lots of electric flat-tops including induction (which is the only electric powered cooking I'd personally accept), however. Given the nature of gas itself, I don't know that I'd be comfortable with it under a sealed top...or perhaps I misinterpreted your use of the word "burner".

[Mike Null]

Jim

If your reference was to my comment, I am not aware of any closed surface gas cooktops. That would essentially defeat the advantage of gas cooking, ie. instant heat and controllability.

[Dan Friedrichs]

I think a few people here are thinking of "gas", while a few are thinking "electric" (and at least one person is thinking "induction").

This (https://blog.yaleappliance.com/hubfs/images/open-burner-vs-sealed-burner.png?t=1531430161461)is the difference between a "sealed" and "open" gas burner.

If the OP is talking about an electric range with a glass top (non-induction style), then I'd offer that I've had several of those without any issues related to heat going where it shouldn't. They're very common/popular, and they work well.

[Bill Dufour]

OP's use of "burner' implies gas and a gas burner can not really be sealed it has to have outlets to get the gas into the air to burn and it has to have somewhere for the burned gas to go.
Bill D.
PS did you know gas stoves are more recent then electric

[Stephen Tashiro]

OP's use of "burner' implies gas

It may imply that, but it wasn't my intent. When I was growing up, we called the coils on the electric range its "burners".

In general, I'm curious about the good and bad features of electric ranges with tops that are flat surfaces (for a kitchen with an outlet for an electric range, but no gas). In particular, I'd like to buy a model where the front and sides of the range don't get hot when only the cooktop is used.

[Jim Becker]

Stephen, if you're doing electric and doing flat top...go for the induction. You get nearly gas cooking control and only the pot gets hot. Yes, you need pots and pans that are compatible, but that's not particularly difficult these days, and does include cast iron, although you have to be careful. Enameled cast iron cures all that respect and is my preference, anyway. If you choose to go "regular" electric with a flat top, I don't really think you're going to have issue with heat leaving the top, based on my (very limited) experience with them at friends' houses.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

I actually thought that induction is what he was referring to in his post. It's important to know all pots won't necessarily work on an induction range according to a friend of mine who purchased one for his wife.

[Kev Williams]

I consider myself a bit of an expert on ranges, if only because I have either in use or in storage, about every type of range known to man!

To the OP's question, I believe he is speaking strictly of ceramic top ranges, as their burners sit beneath the ceramic cooktop. We have a Jenn-Air ceramic cooktop; the burners are coiled-type elements that sit directly below the cooktop surface, which if memory serves is somewhere between 1/8 and 3/16" thick. The heating coils get red real fast, even while cycling on lower heat settings. And even on high, they're not constantly on, they cycle off occasionally. Since it's a cooktop there's no metal nearby, however, the ceramic top from roughly 1" from the far edge of any burner outward doesn't get any more than warm. The cooktop edge is only about 2" from the edges of the burners, and the edges don't even get warm. As to them staying clean, not on your life! Virtually every time you cook on the thing requires cleaning. Eggs are the worst, the whites burn black instantly. We bought expensive ceramic top cleaner until I found out cheap liquid Bar-Keepers Friend cleanser is basically the same stuff. Using it and a green Scotchbrite cleans the burners quite easily in most cases, but it's pretty much a daily job...

Re Rich Englehart, I believe you're talking about induction cooktops, which require magnetic, and most stainless, pans to work. I have one of the 'TV' stand-alone ones, I love the thing- using a cheap thin steel frying pan you can boil a 1/4 cup of water in less than 10 seconds! I use ours a lot, but I don't think I'd like it as my only cooking source... Rather than using a burner, these things turn the pot or pan into the burner. Because of this, the cooktop itself never gets hot EXCEPT for heat transfer from the pan, so I doubt an induction cooktop could ever transfer any significant heat to nearby surfaces.

Aside from Ceramic and induction ranges, you have solid-top burners, good old calrod burners, and better gas burners (which we're using now :) )

So to that HD range getting bad reviews, I'll wager it's a ceramic, and not a well-designed one..

[Barry McFadden]

[QUOTE=Kev Williams;2830995]I consider myself a bit of an expert on ranges, if only because I have either in use or in storage, about every type of range known to man!

To As to them staying clean, not on your life! Virtually every time you cook on the thing requires cleaning. Eggs are the worst, the whites burn black instantly. We bought expensive ceramic top cleaner until I found out cheap liquid Bar-Keepers Friend cleanser is basically the same stuff. Using it and a green Scotchbrite cleans the burners quite easily in most cases, but it's pretty much a daily job...

I've had a ceramic cooktop now for about 5 years and think it's great. When we bought this house it came with a stove that had burners that stood above the surface like coiled burners but were solid. Worst idea ever!!! I think they only made them for a couple years. To go from high heat to simmer it would take about 20 minutes for the burner to cool down enough to just simmer. Love the ceramic although it does require more cleaning. I wipe it down after each use and about once a week I go over it lightly with a ceramic cleaner and a scrub pad then wipe it dry and use one of these pads https://www.vileda.ca/product/scrunge-glass-ceramic-scrub-sponge/ to get off any solid stuff.. they work better than anything else I've tried and do completely remove everything... I you haven't tried them I would strongly recommend you give them a try...

[Kev Williams]

Oh, I didn't say we didn't LIKE it! But the one we got shows the dirt a bit more than most ;)
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But, we got a screamin' deal on it! We actually talked them down another $25-- :D
Why it was so cheap? For one it was a model-end unit (no more white), for two all the salesmen kept telling would-be customers that it was missing a bunch of parts- Thing is, most of the 'missing' parts don't come with the stove: the air ductwork! Why the sales people figured it did, no clue. FWIW this replaced a perfectly good 1981 JennAir stovetop, with interchangeable burners for grill and griddle cooking- we still have it, plans are for the maybe-someday backyard kitchen center. And now we got's two of 'em!

So the only things actually missing were the 2 knobs, which I found online. And I painted the air duct grill, this was at about a year old:
389736
and if you look close, you can see the lower left burner needs cleaning :) -we really did like it, for each gray ring there's a burner element, and you can choose high thru low for each individual element via the control knobs. The big 3-coil burner was a beast! Only had like 2 pots big enough for all of it! ;)
-note how close the burners are to the top's edges, the edges never got hot...

The ONLY reason we're still not using it, is 2 Xmas's ago I couldn't think of what to get the woman who has everything except a decent oven, so I got that - and since the white JennAir didn't match the new stainless oven and this did:
389739
- The wife was heartbroken at first, but she's learned to love this one! But she won't part with the JennAir, it's in storage...

[Jim Becker]

I actually thought that induction is what he was referring to in his post. It's important to know all pots won't necessarily work on an induction range according to a friend of mine who purchased one for his wife.
Yes, that's why being compatible was mentioned. You can't do all aluminum, for example, You can do aluminum clad but it has to have steel in the base to actually heat up. Cast iron is fine as is enameled cast iron. Etc. Has to have ferrous metal in the construction.

[Mike Null]

The OP is correct, heating elements are more commonly called burners, though not correctly. We in the business, (that's what my day job was when I retired) called them burners often as well.

Having been in the business for over 30 years and that was 20 years ago my memory may not be accurate but the first smooth tops (ceramic) came out in the '60s and were produced by Corning in the US. They were popular for a while but faded when stains couldn't be easily removed. About the same time Schott in Germany began producing and exporting glass smooth tops with attractive designs and easier cleaning. Until somewhat recently Schott was the major supplier to all US mfrs. We recently bought a new smooth top range and were very disappointed that the top was not made by Schott--my guess is China but I don't know that for sure. In any event it doesn't clean as easily as the Schott tops.

That said, don't be mislead by the "gourmet cooks"; the women who make the decisions want easy to clean and the go for smooth tops in a big way.

Induction cooktops go back to the late 50's. It is a magnetic induction process and requires ferrous metal cooking utensils and it takes a little time to learn to cook again.

If I were doing the cooking we'd have a gas cooktop and an electric oven but gas is the dirtiest of all.

As far as heat around adjacent areas of the range is concerned there are industry and UL temperature standards which must be met.

[Rich Engelhardt]

I believe you're talking about induction cooktops, No - it's defiantly a ceramic (or as it's called around our parts "glass top" stove. We were told that copper can warp and it can also leave a nasty ring & that cast iron can scratch the surface.

[roger wiegand]

I've used all sorts of cooktops (from wood fired cast iron to induction) and cleaned them as well. My current open burner gas range is about the easiest to clean I've had. food either drops through to the pan beneath where it is easily wiped up or the pan can be taken to the sink for easy clean-up, or it lands on the cast iron supports that get wicked hot in use and burns off anything that lands on them. I like that ll the exposed surfaces are either cast iron or stainless and essentially bulletproof. When I use my sister's glass top range the list of rules to avoid damaging or staining the top is so long it's a wonder anything is ever cooked. Kind of like having a table saw where you're not allowed to rub wood on the surface.

[Jim Becker]

Kind of like having a table saw where you're not allowed to rub wood on the surface.

ROFLOL!! I love that statement!

[Jim Koepke]

It may imply that, but it wasn't my intent. When I was growing up, we called the coils on the electric range its "burners".

In general, I'm curious about the good and bad features of electric ranges with tops that are flat surfaces (for a kitchen with an outlet for an electric range, but no gas). In particular, I'd like to buy a model where the front and sides of the range don't get hot when only the cooktop is used.

My folks had a furniture and appliance store. We always called them burners on electric stoves.

If you need convincing, just put your hand on one that is glowing red and then tell me it didn't burn. :eek:

jtk