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jeff_wisnia[_2_] jeff_wisnia[_2_] is offline
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Default shock from electric stove

TimR wrote:

Kids complained they got a shock from the stove.

I put a meter on it, a pan on the burner while turned on is 40 volts
above ground. The rest of the stove metal seems to be at ground.

The burners look in good shape but it's an old stove. Burners
normally have ceramic insulation, right? Is it time to replace them?


I just looked at our 20 year old GE electric stove and the element
casings are grounded through the strip of metal bridging the two ends of
the element. You can see that strip in this image:

http://midwestapplianceparts.com/images/WB30M1.jpg

On our stove that strip slides firmly inside a metal guide screwed to
the stove top, thus "grounding" the elemend casing. The other end of
that guide holds a ceramic "socket" connecting the elements ends to
their power source.

So, it's unlikely that the element surface would be at a potential other
than that of the rest of the stove's metal parts.....Unless maybe
someone installed an incorrect element which didn't have the right "fit"
to make the grounding system described above work as it should.

I'm no electric stove mavinn, but I think it very unlikely that any
electric stoves would be manufactured without SOME means of grounding
the element casings, for obvious reasons.

So, if the OP is measuring a voltage on the element casing with respect
to the rest of the stove metal SOMETHING isn't right and he'd better
start looking harder to find out what that is.

I'd start by unplugging the stove from its power source and using an
ohmmeter to check whether the element casings show a very low resistance
between them and the rest of the stove metal. If one or more don't,
figure out what's supposed to be connecting them to the stove metal and
fix whatever's wrong.

Jeff

--
Jeffry Wisnia
(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)
The speed of light is 1.8*10^12 furlongs per fortnight.