Built-in cooker versus separate hob & oven

[John Stumbles]

Just been and ordered them myself (they weren't in stock) and they came up at £230!

[John Stumbles]

Hmmmn, I'm the last person anyone would accuse of being fashionable (OK, after you Mary :-) but it seems to me selling and fashion aren't necessarily the same thing. The main fashions I can think of in my lifetime e.g. mods, rockers & teds, hippy, punk, grunge (& chav?) came out of popular culture and were picked up and commercialised and became stuff to sell. Even things intended for sale which became fashionable (VW beetle, Mini (car & skirt), Walkman, gameboy, Dyson...) did so almost by accident (inasmuch as plenty of other stuff was meing marketed but didn't become fashionable).

I persevere: can't drink my tea without milk :-)

I know what you mean [shudder!] - cheap rubbish sold by diy sheds. Even know of one the bottom fell out of! However there are plastic baths which would stop a tank, but they cost multos wonga. When I fit bathrooms I insist that if they want a cheap bath they have an enamelled steel one: cheaper than even diy shed plastic but tough and hardwearing.

[S Viemeister]

have a Baby Belling to supplement the Rayburn, but would much prefer a gas hob.

Sheila

[Mary Fisher]

...

I disagree. Market research and advertising work. Replacement kitchens and other sillinesses prove it. They persuade us that we like the things they design.

I can't drink it with milk ... if ayone else wants it they can do the treasure hunt themselves.

But if the old one isn't leaking why change it?

I wouldn't have either but understand. Even with the now matt and stained surface of our bath I prefer it to any new one, I hope it sees us out. But I've just been cleaning our ss double drainer sink and saw pitting in the bottom and wondered if that will see us out. I think it will, it's a thick section. We bought it second hand in the 70s. But I did wonder how many people would have removed it for something more 'modern'. It replaced our 'Bristol' sink with rotten wooden drainer, both dated from when the house was built in the 1930s. There are about nine such sinks in the garden, I understand they sell for lots now, newly fashionable. A cabinet making daughter made an elm drainer for one, to order, the customer was happy to pay mega bucks.

It works, that's all I want. What's more, it's not 'set in' to another surface which means that I don't get a bad back by leaning further over it than I need to.

I tell you, if the economy depended on the Fishers there wouldn't be an economy.

Mary

Mary

[Harvey Van Sickle]

On 12 Mar 2005, John Stumbles wrote

That's what I went for when I fitted ours about 10 years ago; I found it to be a good compromise between the cost (and weight) of cast iron and useability as a bath. (I really hated the el-cheapo feel of the plastic bath we had in one of our previous houses.)

[John Stumbles]

Mind you I've just looked at my receipt to check when they said it'd be in (couldn't remember if they'd said 23rd or 25th) and it's shown as

25/12/05!

[John]

Try and get one that doesn't melt the knobs when you use the grill.

I like our Electrolux double oven - the controls and timer are to one side which allows th etop oven to come right up to the top.

Example:

[Ed Sirett]

Ebay is your friend. I've won a hob for £66 and the oven for £75 both including the carriage charges. Both items new.

You can't guarantee to get things in a certain time scale but if time is not of the essence then there are big savings to be had.

S/fix used to do a triple pack (including extractor) for £199. Now they only do baumatic.

[Ed Sirett]

Agreed. If you spend over a hundred on the bath you get one whose enamel is fairly tough (I suspect the enamel is just a tough but the steel is thicker and that makes the difference).

[S Viemeister]

I've used ebay for some things - but somehow never thought of looking for cookers there.

Sheila

[S Viemeister]

Hmm.....

Do you know if the hob can be adapted for bottled gas? I'm at least 50 miles from the nearest mains gas.

Sheila

[John Stumbles]

Make/model? All the steel baths I've fitted (and it hasn't been that many: B&Q, Twyfords & Bette, perhaps 2-3 of each) have felt about the same weight.

[Holly, in France]

Not sure about the UK but all the gas hobs in France seem to come with two sets of injectors so can be used with either mains or bottled gas.

-- ^-- $ Holly just testing a wierd and wonderful sig separator

[John Stumbles]

I don't recall seeing LPG injectors in the kit but the guy I was doing the job for unpacked it so he may have put them aside. Most/all the hobs I've fitted recently have had them, though.

[S Viemeister]

That's reassuring. When I first considered getting a gas hob (7-8 years ago) there didn't seem to be many available for bottled gas. Now I have to see if I can book the plumber to handle the installation. He's honest, capable, tidy, and very much in demand.

Sheila

[Owain]

Even Argos have some gas hobs they say can work on LPG

He would be!

Owain

[S Viemeister]

I've known people to wait more than a year for him to install central heating for them. He responds pretty quickly to emergency calls, though.

Sheila

[John Stumbles]

A demand increased by being qualified to do LPG, presumably? Dunno where you live but just west of here (Reading) are a lot of main-gas-less areas so I was considering doing my LPG but I haven't yet even been asked about it.

[S Viemeister]

Yes, he has all the right bits of paper. And a good mind. He works mostly in Sutherland - and there's a distinct lack of gas mains here!

Sheila