Buying an oven

[BlackSheep]

So our current oven has given up the ghost, and my wife and I are shopping for a replacement. (Just so nobody suggests it, we're not interested in repairing it, as it's over 20 years old at least, has melted buttons, missing pieces, etc.) We're interested in a dual fuel model that combines a gas cook top with an electric convection oven. Standard 30" width. A warming/cooking drawer option would be very nice, but isn't a deal breaker. Beyond that, we're having a lot of trouble deciding on which direction to go.

We see scary issues with every model we search for, and even "throwing money at the problem" isn't working since the high end models seem to have just as many if not more issues, and frequently offer fewer features. That coupled with what seems like a disturbing lack of support from the manufacturers of those expensive appliances makes spending extra for a "pro" brand seem like a bad idea.

So, does anyone here have any recent experience with picking out an oven? Tips, trick, pitfalls? We're really don't want to make a bad choice because we do cook and bake a lot, and intend to keep whatever we buy for at least 10 years since a kitchen remodel is far off at this point.

[Nezzarth]

Oddly enough I was in this boat last month. Our oven of 16 years keeled over and we went shopping for duel fuel models to finally get away from the horrors of the electric cooktop.

The first, not unexpected, discovery is that no duel fuel unit has a top rate cooktop or a top rate oven. There are some that get to 'pretty good' in both, but its like a lot of hybrids, they can't be tweaked to the top end in without impacting the other.

The one thing our research showed us was that the latest generation of ovens almost to a one use high tech touch pad controls in some way form or fashion. And that they're all about as reliable as a Yugo. So we went in with the strong idea that we were going to consider a long warranty option as part of the cost of buying one of today's over-teched ovens. (In all the research we did, the only really reliable ovens were the absolutely bottom end ones that used non-chip related technology).

It's worth checking out the Consumer Reports reviews on duel fuel as well, their results were about in line with the dozens upon dozens of reviews we tracked down.

Pitfalls: Electrolux claims to have a 'special convection process' it's about as special as a mint flavored toothpick over a regular toothpick. Except this one costs you a few extra hundred for that hint of mint. Also be wary of main ovens that have the elements beneath the porcelain on the bottom. You've probably already come across the startling number of people that have had the porcelain crack from that configuration. And check the layout of the oven as we found a couple that claimed 'convection' cooking but didn't actually have a fan unit to make it happen.

We ended up finding a 'floor model' GE Profile at an outlet that has a good sized primary oven, the 'one pan high' drawer oven on the bottom and five burners including one with the high BTU water boiling configuration. Cooking wise it's been fantastic, the stove top gas flow control has been very precise and reliable. The oven has been good for almost everything. High temp roasting, slow roasting (190 for 16 hours), convection baking have been very temperature precise. The broiler though is a bit on the weak side, as it's not even heat over the full width of the oven.

Reliability wise... the high tech controls for the main oven have gone out twice for no discernible reason, but that was part of the 'get the warranty coverage' plan. I'd recommend against it for this reason, if only this problem seems to be industry wide, across all price points.

[BlackSheep]

Thank you so much for the reply!

We did notice a lot of reviews saying that the electronics can go bad. I also found that some ovens have internal fans whose exclusive purpose is to cool the controls, and that those fans can be quite noisy.

We looked at the Electrolux, and found at least a dozen reviews that all said exactly the same thing: the front right "power" burner is slow to light and creates a mini-fireball when it finally catches. I also noticed reviews that said that some burners are either all the way up or all the way down, and that there was no fine control in between. So we crossed that one off the list.

I think we're finally settling on the GE Cafe model. My brother-in-law has one, and his main complaint was that the knobs were cheap plastic. The model in the store had sturdy, stainless steel knobs, and the salesperson told us that GE recently upgraded the knobs. The store nearby offers a 10 year extended warranty for $300, which seems a decent deal when amortized over the life of the oven. I'll be sure to confirm exactly what is and isn't covered under that.

Beyond all that, we need to get someone in to run a 40 amp circuit to the kitchen, plus we'd like to install a new range hood that vents outside. The oven sits against an exterior wall so I'm hoping we can just vent straight through that. Judging by the patched brick on the outside of the wall, there was a vent there sometime in the past.

As long as we don't encounter any serious, show stopping issues, whatever we get will be a big step up, as the oven we've been using for the past year has given us frequent trouble. The only part that we actually liked was the internal oven, as that heated up quickly, cooked evenly and gave an accurate temperature. Now that that's broken, we're looking forward to something shiny and new.

Thanks again for the help!

EDIT- When your electronics went out, was the fix relatively simple like flipping the breaker off and on, or did it require a service visit? Were the lower ovens completely useless, or was it just that the display didn't light up?

[Nezzarth]

When the panel went out the main oven was useless, but the drawer oven was still fully functional (it works on a simple knob control). It did require a service visit as flipping the breaker did nothing. The first visit actually revealed an improperly grounded wire. The second one was more mysterious, as in they took things apart, put them together again and it worked. That visit was some weeks ago and it's been fine since then.

10 years for $300 sounds like a good deal if it's comprehensive. I got a 5 year for $250 that is the 'everything and anything' kind of coverage. Including unlimited free service calls, which was the important factor given that I live outside of most places normal 10 or 15 mile service area.