In article >,
sf > wrote:

> On Sat, 19 Feb 2005 20:47:43 -0800, Isaac Wingfield
> > wrote:
>
> > According to my measurements, my nearly 30
> > year old model still delivers just as much power as it did when new, and
> > the timer still works just fine;
>
> That's absolutely unbelievable.

Which part do you find "unbelievable"?

The power? You can check the power for yourself, just by heating a batch
of water and seeing how much the temperature rises in a certain amount
of time. Google around; you can find the pertinent equations lots of
places. I checked mine within the past year, and found it still very
close to the nameplate rating.

The timer? If the oven runs for the number of minutes you set it to and
then stops, it's pretty certain that the timer is working just fine.

Magnetrons generally do not "wear out" in the sense of getting weaker
and weaker over time. Mostly, they work fine until they stop due to a
broken filament. But even so, it's usually not the maggie that goes bad
in a nuker -- it's either the interlock switches (very common IME), the
power supply or the timer.

Isaac