Tag Archives: oven services

Oven Repair: Oven Maintenance Tips

appliance repiar

For you to avoid undertaking constant oven repair, you need to take good care of your oven. The cool thing is that there are plenty of tips on how to go about it:

Take good care of the blower motor

The blower motor is one of the most important parts of the oven. For you to keep it in top shape, you need to keep it lubricated. If the blower motor has oil cups, lubricate it with at least five drops of non-detergent oil.

When lubricating the motors, follow the manufacturer’s manual. As a rule of thumb, avoid over-lubricating the motor as you will cause more problems than were originally there.

Keep it clean

It goes without saying. A dirty oven not only works harder than it should, it also tends to develop plenty of problems. For you to prevent this from happening you should keep your oven clean at all times.

During the cleaning, take a look at the insulation. It’s common for foreign materials to get caught here making the oven work too hard. For you to get rid of the dirt you should use a vacuum or air jet to keep the openings clean.

While you are at it, you also should keep an eye on the blower wheel and extension shaft set screws. Tighten the screws as necessary. When tightening them, take care that you don’t over tighten them as you might crush the isolation or resilient washers.

Isolation washers are located behind the mounting screws and mounting plate. If you find the washers damaged, replace them.

Inspect the heating elements

Telltale signs that you have an issue with your heating elements is a drop in the performance of the oven or the oven takes a long time to heat up. For you to inspect the elements you need to use a digital multimeter.

For safety reasons, always turn off the power to the control system. After disconnecting the power, disconnect each element from the circuit and connect the voltmeter.

A high infinity reading means that the element is burnt out while a low reading means that you have a normal or good element.

You can also inspect the oven by inspecting the amperage of the elements. This requires you to use a clip-on ammeter to check the current draw.

Replace the gas

Do you have a gas oven? You should replace the gas when you notice it dropping. If you have been having your oven for a long time, the moving and swapping of the ovens often create a lot of movement and vibrations that cause leaks in the gas line.

You don’t have any other way out other than to replace the gas line. Buy a new gas line from the company that installed the oven for you.

Pay attention to where you place the oven

Where you place the oven is crucial as it determines how well it works. As a rule of thumb, don’t place the oven in an area where airflow around the blower is blocked. You should always be cautious of where the specimen or product is placed in the oven.

You should note that by restricting air inlets and outlets you reduce airflow through the entire oven, leading to premature oven failure. The oven also tends to function poorly.

Use the correct power

How much power is getting into the oven? You need to think about this. Some people use reduced power, which isn’t good as it leads to poor performance. At the same time, if you operate with a lot of power, you end up damaging the oven.

If you notice the oven is functioning poorly due to reduced power, consider connecting it to a buck-boost transformer.

Avoid unnecessary heat losses

To prevent the oven from losing a lot of heat, avoid unnecessary heat losses. For example, if your oven has a light, use a port plug in the light socket when not using the light. The port plug in the light socket reduces heat loss and at the same time prevents the socket from malfunctioning from the heat.

It’s common for the port plug to crack or get damaged. In such a case appliance repair Springfield professionals recommend that you replace it.

Appliance Repair Tips On How To Use Your Oven

While the oven has been around for a long time and almost every household has one, most people don’t know how to properly use it. To help you out, here are tips given by appliance repair professionals on how to go about it:

Defrost the food first

What do most people do when they are cooking meat and other foods? They take the foods directly from the freezer to the oven. Don’t do this. In addition to the food not tasting good enough, it often takes longer to cook. Experts report that you also end up spending up to 30% more energy to cook frozen food than when you would cook it defrosted.

For you to save on energy and keep your food tasting good, you should always defrost the food before you put it in the oven.

Keep it clean

This is a no-brainer. You need to keep your oven clean all the time. This not only keeps it looking great, it also increases the efficiency of the unit. For you to have an easy time keeping it clean, you should get rid of any dirt as soon as you notice it.

Are there burnt-in stains in your unit that you would like to get rid of? You can easily get rid of them by using a rinsing agent. All you need to do is to pour a rinsing agent into a bowl of water and place it in the oven at 100 degrees Celsius for at least an hour.

After an hour has elapsed, you should be able to easily get rid of the stubborn stains by swiping them off with a wet piece of cloth.

You should note that the best time to clean the appliance is when it’s cool. Avoid cleaning it when hot as you will cause irreversible discoloration of the enamel.

Aim at saving as much energy as possible

When you are running the oven, you shouldn’t spend a lot of energy. In addition to ensuring that the food is properly cooked, you also should keep an eye on your electricity needs. As rule of thumb, you should strive to keep your bill as low as possible.

You can do this by doing a number of things. One of the things you can do is to turn off the appliance once you are done with your cooking. Experts also observe that you can save even more when you turn off the unit before the stipulated cooking time.

This calls for you to switch off your oven at least 10 minutes before the time that you had set elapses and let the food stand for the remaining time. By doing this, you will save 10-25 % of your electricity bill.

You will also save some energy by placing multiple items in the unit. For example, you can put baked or roasted potatoes in the oven at the same time. You can also throw in your dessert while cooking your dinner.

It’s common to want to see how your baking is coming along. You should resist the urge to open the oven door. You should note that when you open the door, you tend to lose up to 25 degrees which increases your energy bill.

The best way of going about it is sticking to your timer and oven light. If you want to know how things are going, use your nose but don’t open the unit.

Always use the right rack

Plenty of ovens have been ruined from using the wrong rack. Do you want your unit to last for a long time? You should use the right rack. Using the right rack also leads to proper cooking of the food.

The top rack is meant for food that is meant to be cooked at high temperature. You also should use this rack when you are looking to quickly cook the food.

The middle rack is best used for moderate temperature cooking while the bottom rack is ideal for slow cooking and low temperatures.

While you are at it, you should use the right baking dishes. You should note that glass and ceramic dishes tend to hold the heat much better than their metal counterparts.

Even with the best care, it’s common for the oven to develop problems. When this happens, you should contact an oven repair Alexandria professional to help you in fixing it.