Quick heatstick question

Hi all,

I have a quick question about building heatsticks. I have a ceramic top stove that can't handle a pot large enough for full boils. I'm considering building 2 110V heatsticks. My stove has two appliance outlets, each with it's own 15A circuit breaker.

Anyone foresee issues running the two 1500W heatsticks, one off of each appliance outlet on the stove?

Will I achieve a full boil in a reasonable amount of time? Insulating the kettle is always an option too.

Interested in your thoughts!

Love this place BTW.

Brian

lackluster said:

Anyone foresee issues running the two 1500W heatsticks, one off of each appliance outlet on the stove?

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1500W/120V will pull 12.5A. With two of them going, you're pulling 25A. I know you said that they are each on their own breakers, but they are still pulling their power from the outlet where the stove is plugged in.

If you are planning to use the sticks at the same time as the actual stove, you might trip the breaker that is powering the whole appliance.

Also, you will want to make sure that the breaker providing power to your stove is GFCI (unless the outlets that are on the stove are GFCI themselves...)

I use two 1500 Watt sticks, and have no issues. My kettle is insulated with two layers of reflectix.

Walker said:

1500W/120V will pull 12.5A. With two of them going, you're pulling 25A. I know you said that they are each on their own breakers, but they are still pulling their power from the outlet where the stove is plugged in.

If you are planning to use the sticks at the same time as the actual stove, you might trip the breaker that is powering the whole appliance.

Also, you will want to make sure that the breaker providing power to your stove is GFCI (unless the outlets that are on the stove are GFCI themselves...)

Click to expand...

I've never seen outlets built into a stove, but you can be certain they wouldn't put them in and allow the stove to exceed its circuit capacity.

lackluster - check out this episode of Basic Brewing where James and I cover some tips on building heatsticks and electric brewing in general.

lackluster said:

Hi all,

I have a quick question about building heatsticks. I have a ceramic top stove that can't handle a pot large enough for full boils. I'm considering building 2 110V heatsticks. My stove has two appliance outlets, each with it's own 15A circuit breaker.

Anyone foresee issues running the two 1500W heatsticks, one off of each appliance outlet on the stove?

Will I achieve a full boil in a reasonable amount of time? Insulating the kettle is always an option too.

Interested in your thoughts!

Love this place BTW.

Brian

Click to expand...

You should be fine as long as the sticks are on separate circuits as you said. If they were tied back to the same breaker as the stove then you would most likely have some issues. That's not a setup I am familiar with so I can't say for sure.

Personally I would prefer to have them both on their own dedicated 20A circuit, but that's just because I don't like running a breaker that close to it's max rating for very long.

I just brewed a batch and boiled 7 gallons using my ceramic electric stove and a single 1500w heat stick. The range alone with just barely boil that much water but using the heat stick along with the burner does a great job. If you were using the burner and 2 elements you should get to a boil very quickly, in fact you could boil that much water using just the heat sticks if you wanted to.

jkarp said:

I've never seen outlets built into a stove, but you can be certain they wouldn't put them in and allow the stove to exceed its circuit capacity.

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I'm going to have to disagree with you.

My mother had an electric range with standard receptacles on it when I was younger. That range plugged into a receptacle capable of handling 50A. That's the standard for ranges. I have never seen or heard of one (outside of commercial/restaurant equipment) that plugs into something capable of more than 50A.

Now, I'm sure that the range would not trip it's 50A breaker if you plugged your basic household toaster or coffee maker into it while using the range. The average person doesn't have a single appliance in their kitchen that pulls more than a few amps, let alone two appliances capable of pulling a combined 25A.

He's leaving only 25A available to the rest of the appliance. If you fire up the oven and all of the burners on top while running those heaters, I'm willing to bet that the circuit breaker trips easily.

Nothing will catch on fire (that's what all the breakers are for), but the combined load coming through the range recptacle will exceed the circuits capability.

Thanks for all the comments guys. I guess I really won't know what the outcome will be until I try. I hadn't planned on using the stove while boiling, but after thinking a while on it, I suppose it's a possibility. I'm due for a kitchen reno within the next year though. I'll be sure to have additional 20A outlets pulled. In the meantime I think I'll build a couple of these and just see how it goes.

Thanks again.
Brian

lackluster said:

I hadn't planned on using the stove while boiling, but after thinking a while on it, I suppose it's a possibility.

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You'll probably be fine using the heatsticks and a single burner on your stove at the same time. Just don't try to fry bacon, boil eggs, fry pancakes, and bake biscuits at the same time as brewing.

I am willing to bet that those range receptacles are NOT GFCI- protected. If you are going to use them, build yourself a couple extension cords with GFCIs in them.

Bernie Brewer said:

I am willing to bet that those range receptacles are NOT GFCI- protected. If you are going to use them, build yourself a couple extension cords with GFCIs in them.

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+1

The GFCI extension cords are very easy to put together.