Ok, so I'll begin at the beggining. I was cleaning the oven the other day and there's this wire thing inside the oven on the side of the wall. I bumped this pretty hard when I was cleaning it.

Later that day I was defrosting some meat in the oven, I set it to defrost at 50 degrees. Some time later I noticed the light was still on, indicating the oven had not reached 50 degrees. I opened it up and the elements were glowing red and the meat was beggining to cook!

I tested this again today and stopped when the elements looked like they were getting hot enough to damage themselves.

-What is this wire thing?
-Did I break it?
-How do I fix it?

most likely you broke the temperature control device (which looks like a wire with a metal rod at the end). basically if it can't tell the temperature it will keep heating the oven until it's met, which is why when you saw the light it said it hasn't reached 50 degrees but it was burning hot inside.

protip: call a professional.

I have no idea if there are like professional kitchenfolk or whatever that can answer your Q with an A but you'd better get your homie repairman over for a round of fixin' shit up yo.

an oven doctor is the final step, i could have done something like JOSTLED TEMPERATURE CONTROL or A BIT OF JIF IS SHORTING OUT THE ELEMENT or something

i'm figuring it is something to do with the temperature control device, how do i fix this????

GZ is the only appliance doctor i know (certified in teflon and high-grade aluminim)

the only thing i would recommend doing before calling a PRO is making sure the oven sensor is aligned correctly. so find the sensor, and look near the top inside of the oven for rails where this would rest. basically the oven sensor should not be touching the oven walls, it should be supported by the rails inside the oven. you may have bumped it off the support and this could cause it to give false readings. then test it at a VERY low temperature to see if it is fixed. do not let it overheat like last time, because you can cause even more damage. if this doesn't work you may have simply just damaged it and will have to call a repair guy.

i can't imagine this would cost that much to repair especially if you told the guy when you bumped the sensor everything stopped working right.

you're completely right, i bumped it off the rail (it looked like there used to be two but there was only one). i tried putting it back and and snapped the hooks. Does it earth out or something if it touches the oven wall?

the hooks BROKE? what the hell man. it's not worth the risk of trying to fix it at this point because you are going to need those rails no matter what. easily you may have damaged it, and even if it did work (as in testing it at a low temperature), it may be producing faulty temperature results. also yes it doesn't work correclty if it touches the oven metal. unless you had another temperature gauge of some sort to make sure it's reading right, and free floated the metal wire (very dangerous because if it gets in a bad position again you can BURN FOOD / BURN HOUSE DOWN), it still may work, but this is a lot of effort and not worth the risk.

it broke here:



and i had it tucked behind the bit that's still there


WELL THIS SUCKS. i guess i'll call an oven repair guy or something.

how do you know all this stuff gz? you are continue to amaze.

i used to clean suites in my apartment as a job (general cleaning when someone leaves) and i cleaned many ovens as a result. my boss guy knew a lot of handy stuff and told me about these things because he did not want me to BREAK OVEN while i was cleaning.

here's some advice.

buy a new one.

 

Okay, get yourself a coat hanger and uncoil it.  Wrap it around the wire and attach it somewhere inside the oven.  Now, be careful with this next step, but turn on the oven and rub a small amount of lighter fluid on the end of the coat hanger.  This will cause it to solder into the oven.  Turn the oven off as soon as it's soldered, and then cover the bottom of the oven in aluminum foil. 

Next time you cook, keep the oven wide open for at least four hours.

This should work.

If I ever have an oven problem I'm going to PM GZ before I even think of calling out a repair man

i think this topic has served its purpose