Howdy all,

My wife and I are considering purchasing one of these models. Anyone
have one?

We are considering the white oven, and the best price we can find is
around 1200 or so.

Was wondering how the oven performs and if anyone has any feedback.
This is our first gas range.

Thanks,

Deeman

On Sun, 30 Jan 2005 03:13:21 GMT, dereman > wrote:

>Howdy all,
>
>My wife and I are considering purchasing one of these models. Anyone
>have one?
>

We've had ours for about a year now. It's a dream compared to the
bottom-line Sunray that it replaced.


Cook top:

The need to place the burner controls along the right-hand side of the
cook top presents the biggest compromise of this design as it limits
the actual burner grid width to 22.5 inches with a burner center to
center dimension of 12.25 inches. With a 12 inch cast iron skillet on
the power boost burner (16000 BTU) getting white hot for some dry-aged
rib eyes it is crowded sauteing mushrooms and onions in a 10 inch pan
on the burner next door but it does work. The back burners are
basically out of commission in this case unless you are using a 1
quart saucepan. But for this meal, a baked potato in the small oven
with the large oven at 500 deg. F waiting to finish the steaks I don't
need the back burners anyway. It is a limitation to consider however.

The low-power simmer burner is a dream. I actually need to keep the
burner control above the minimum setting to maintain a simmer in every
pot I have used on it. For something like rice, I usually start it on
a different burner to get the water (or usually stock) boiling in a
reasonable amount of time.

Our range is white with the gray grids. If you are a clean freak this
may present problems as the burners and grids are impossible to keep
spotless but if you don't mind your tools looking like they actually
get used the sealed burners make the cook top reasonably easy to keep
presentable.


Top oven:

The top oven triples as a full temperature range oven, a broiler or a
warming drawer.

It is small (height wise). From the floor of the oven to the broiler
grid is 6 inches. With the wire shelf in place there is only 4.5
inches of clearance which will obviously limit what you can do with it
(no turkeys). It will maintain an even temperature anywhere between
140 deg. F and 550 deg. F.

As a broiler, it is similar to the gas stoves with the broiler on the
bottom but you don't have to get down on your hands and knees to use
it. When you start the broiler, there is a 12-minute delay before the
broiler burner starts. Apparently, there were problems with starting
the broiler in a cold oven; if the door was opened just as the broiler
element was firing, one could be greeted by a fireball so they now
preheat the oven before activating the broiler.

My primary use is as a warming drawer but the times I have needed a
second oven temperature (500F is to hot to bake a potato) it has been
a godsend.


Bottom oven:

Full size: 16 inches high, 18 inches deep, 23 inches wide. Maintains
temperature extremely well. I've never seen it even 10 degrees from
set point when monitoring with an oven thermometer. My old oven
required the thermometer for every use. After the first 6 months with
the Gemini I haven't bothered to use it anymore.


Summary:

I like everything about this range despite the cook top size
limitations. Having said that, if I had a larger kitchen with the
possibility of separate cook top and dual wall ovens, I would not even
consider it a possibility.

MK