Wot cooker?

FullCircle

FullCircle

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SWMBO was much taken with the Levante range of cookers at the boat show.

We cook - a lot.

We quite like our current ENO 2 ring with grill and oven, but it has drawbacks.

The grill takes ages to warm up and only cooks a very central area.
The oven door needs to be slightly open when using the grill - a pain, as it tilts the unit forward.
No electronic ignition
No temp control on the oven
Difficult to lifght the oven as the entry hole is small
The flame failure devices need to be positioned spot on, or they just snuff it all out.

What we do like

It is easy to clean
The top rings are very good
The gimble locking and door locking is good


As we will be moving onto the boat in the future, it would be nice to know the consensus of the forum.

Whats good, whats bad, and what should we spend the money on?
 
You can get all the features you want in a Nelson Spinflo or a Plastimo Neptune at one third the price of a Levante. Also if a grill is important these have a separate grill which is much more effective if you are a toast person. You need to look at the oven capacity as those with integral grills and those with counterbalanced doors can have deceptively small ovens.

When we have looked at replacing ours, we have found it very difficult to see the advantages of the more expensive brands - even the £800-1000, never mind £1800 over the Neptune and the Spinflo - something the "tests" in the comics support.

The only two pieces of advice I can give are 1) don't buy a Techimpex (which is what we have and just about tolerate in our Bavaria) and 2) if you are really serious about spending that kind of money buy a Taylors 030L but it will take many years to appreciate why that is good advice!
 
the boat's previous owner had a Force 10 brought over from the States or Canada. It really is beautifully solid; all the controls work as they shoudl; piezo electric ignition; oven heats evenly bcs there is a 'spreader' plate above the burner; cleans easily and does not rust / discolour. ; and for a safety note, when you open the door the oven does not tilt or swing unevenly. It's the two burner model.

Would I buy one for the next boat ? yes, but I could not afford it !

UK source
http://www.calormarineshop.co.uk/acatalog/Force_10_marine_cookers.html
 
sarabande said:
the boat's previous owner had a Force 10 brought over from the States or Canada. It really is beautifully solid; all the controls work as they shoudl; piezo electric ignition; oven heats evenly bcs there is a 'spreader' plate above the burner; cleans easily and does not rust / discolour. ; and for a safety note, when you open the door the oven does not tilt or swing unevenly. It's the two burner model.

Would I buy one for the next boat ? yes, but I could not afford it !

UK source
http://www.calormarineshop.co.uk/acatalog/Force_10_marine_cookers.html
Click to expand...

Its not the cost of the Force 10 that is the problem, its the spares! We had one that had a failed oven thermostat and a broken grill. The cost of the parts (if we could have got them as Force 10 no longer supported a six year old cooker) would have been nearly as much as a Plastimo Neptune. Look on the Calor Marine Shop site for the parts costs!

We bought the Plastimo and are delighted with it :-)
 
I'm going through the same exercise. The oven on the current Plastimo doesn't get very hot. Aneamic oven chips take at least an hour from initial lighting to consumption.

Apparently, the only stove that will fit in the space is a Spinflo Nelson. As it comes from Yorkshire, it ought to be capapble of cooking its native pudding.

I looked at the Levante, but it's twice the price of the Spinflo and I'm sure my gas pipework is undersized to feed it.
 
grumpygit said:
We agree with a SMEV, the only advice we can give is that a 4 burner is a waste of time unless you are using very small pans.

_______________________________________________________________________
Click to expand...

Yep, I had worked that out. We have decided on 3 burner, just what make and model?
 
Forbsie said:
I've been thinking about buying one of them. What problems have you found?
Click to expand...

It is a mixture of painted and stainless steel. The door latching mechanism is poor. The grid on the top rusts and distorts. The burners are non-standard and difficult to source. The oven takes a long time to heat up and on mine is not thermostatically controlled. It is, however, still working so replacement has not moved up the wish list. Think I would go for a Nelson if i did replace.
 
sailorman said:
we have a 4 burner SMEV with lockable gimbals (cures door open issue & safer in Hbr) the grill is good once allowed to heat-up B 4 use. its now 12 yrs old & good as new. it was expensive when new but had a S&L account in those daze :D
Click to expand...

Ours is the 4 burner model of about the same age, obtained new burner tops last year and no problem obtaining them.

______________________________________________________________
 
We have had the 2 burner SMEV for 4 years. Heavy usage for 5 months of the year. Good oven and grill. The smaller of the two burners is OK to keep stuff simmering but it struggles to get things up to the boil. In practice not a problem.... fairly easy to work around.

Before we set off for the Med I took advice from both Calor (S'oton) and the local Corgi guy (who does much of the boat/gas work in the Solent area) about suggested spares to take with us. Both rated the SMEV and both struggled to think of any spares that were worth taking. So far they have been right!
 
The Force Ten is a really solid cooker, cooks well, oven is the best we've used, and it's easy to clean. Given the solidity of the build, one should last as long as spares are available (and your bank balance can afford to pay for them!)

But - the oven is quite small as the grill is in it - not a problem for us as there are generally only two of us, but if you regularly take out friends it might become a pain.

The grill unit is a little "eccentric" - it's a steel pressing with a plaster diffuser burner insert, and they do fail - we have just replaced ours after two years - £100!

They are fiddly to take apart - which you have to do to get to the innards.

The gimbal mounting plates supplied are inadequate for such a heavy cooker - thin stainless pressings that can be bent by hand, we had more robust mountings made.

All in all, a good cooker, but with a few faults.
 
Tranona said:
It is a mixture of painted and stainless steel. The door latching mechanism is poor. The grid on the top rusts and distorts. The burners are non-standard and difficult to source. The oven takes a long time to heat up and on mine is not thermostatically controlled. It is, however, still working so replacement has not moved up the wish list. Think I would go for a Nelson if i did replace.
Click to expand...

Thanks Tranona. I was considering the stand-alone Reef oven and didn't realise that they made other marine items until I Googled them just now.

I don't really want to go for a gimballed unit, so now I'm considering a change round in the galley (which has yet to be replaced) with a view to fitting a Cannon.
 
No one has raised the butane/propane issue.
I've got an old Plastimo which does fine in butane (burns hotter) but couldn't even make toast in the US using propane.
I'd be interested to hear how the various stoves compare using different gas.
 
Forbsie said:
Thanks Tranona. I was considering the stand-alone Reef oven and didn't realise that they made other marine items until I Googled them just now.

I don't really want to go for a gimballed unit, so now I'm considering a change round in the galley (which has yet to be replaced) with a view to fitting a Cannon.
Click to expand...

We have a cannon aboard Englander, the 50cm one, which is plenty big enough, the double oven one. Make sure its capable of using LPG (calor gas) some arent, I got caught like that and still have the natural gas one in Spain, trying to sell it!!
The cannon is great, you know how much serious cooing JB and myself get up to!
Dont get a stainless one, they are not up to salt air.
 
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