Stainless steel stove - Fiberglass RV
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Old 11-16-2005, 09:24 AM   #1
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I have a 2 burner stove top. It is stainless steel...not. I mean it looks like stainless but rusts and discolors and needs to be replaced. My question is are the drop in cooktops from suburban etc that claim to be stainless really stainless or are they the same as what I have?
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Old 11-16-2005, 09:43 AM   #2
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Maggie, the stove top in my Scamp is stainless. Remember, stainless does NOT mean rustless. There are pits and rust stains here and there around the burners. I can clean them up (ZUD is what I use) and it looks good for a while. But it, like other things is a maintenance issue. I think if I were to ever replace the stove top, I'd go with PowderCoat like Christi V did on hers...it was beautiful!
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Old 11-16-2005, 09:51 AM   #3
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Yes I admired that powder coat. I don't think that service is available here. Maybe I'll get a new enameled stove top. I'd rather have stainless but not if it's like this.
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Old 11-16-2005, 11:05 AM   #4
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We took a stainless top and painted it almond with appliance paint. It turned out well and the paint does not burn when the stove is used.

Paul
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Old 11-16-2005, 11:10 AM   #5
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I have painted and stripped and painted and stripped. Not having much luck. Your paint lasts and looks good? I swore I wouldn't do it again, but maybe...
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Old 11-16-2005, 01:27 PM   #6
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I don't know anything specifically about the Suburban cooktops, but I would hope that anything advertised as "stainless steel" really is made of some grade of stainless steel.

I agree with Donna that there are many alloys which are legitimately called "stainless steel", they vary in their corrosion resistance, and nothing is perfect. My Boler's original equipment stovetop (a range with oven and 4 burners from Brown Stove Works, who doesn't seem to make RV appliances any more) looks like brushed stainless steel, but seems more like a plated (e.g. chromed) material when I try to clean it - a brushed finish is really unusual for plated material, which is usually polished. Perhaps it is a less-than-ideal stainless steel, but I am afraid to use anything very abrasive, because if it is plated that would remove the plating.

My guess is that a good (if expensive) source of high-grade stainless steel cooktops would be the yacht suppliers.

Quote:
Originally posted by Maggie O.@Nov 16 2005, 08:51 AM
...powder coat. I don't think that service is available here...
I can't claim to know anything about Virginia, but I'm sure powder coating services are available - maybe not in every small town, but they're there. This is an industrial serivce not normally used by retail customers, so it may be hard to find. In a brief Google search (for "powdercoat Virginia"), I found Goose Creek Finishing; although I know nothing specifically about them, their web site shows the kind of powder coating service we're talking about here, and apparently they're somewhere in Virginia; they also have a nice powder coating FAQ page.
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Old 11-16-2005, 04:17 PM   #7
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Thanks Brian, that is an interesting link. The stove in my trailer is a Brown. I don't know what it is but it aint stainless. I don't know which way I'll go. I keep hoping I'll find a nice easy to clean version somewhere, maybe without the sunken handles that collect dust and crumbs. Thanks again.
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Old 11-16-2005, 05:32 PM   #8
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Can you powder coat a cleaned up, old stove??
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Old 11-16-2005, 05:34 PM   #9
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Maggie O,
From what I understand, there are 2 basic kinds of stainless steel. Ferrous based which unfortunately will rust, and nickel based which won't rust. We had a tableware set many years ago and the entire set was nickel based stainless except the actual knife blades. Apparently the nickel based stainless when used for knife blades wouldn't remain sharp, hence the use of ferrous stainless for the blades. If a knife was left in water overnight the handle would not rust but the blade would have little pitted spots of rust.
The other possibility is the stove top might actually be brushed chrome over steel and still be subject to rusting.
This won't solve your dilemma, but at least you'll understand what is probably happening.
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Old 11-16-2005, 06:47 PM   #10
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I replaced my stove with a brown pocrcelain one from Ebay for $15.00. I think its a Suburban from an old Coleman tent trailer. You really have to bang it to chip it. I'm not crazy about the color but the finish is the best-glossy and easy to clean-with a hinged cover too.
Stainless steel is an alloy of nickel, chrome and steel. Cheaper mixes may dull but not rust.
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Old 11-16-2005, 07:33 PM   #11
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Hey Shirley, that sounds great. I'd like brown. Maybe I'll get lucky and find one.
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Old 11-16-2005, 07:56 PM   #12
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If you really want to know about stainless steel (which could be one of many alloys of iron, with chromium and often with nickel as well), you could check out links like these...
Wikipedia - Stainless Steel
This one is actually quite readable, and while not authoritative seems to generally agree with the more technical and somewhat randomly selected Google matches which follow. At the bottom of the page it has a nice summary of stainless steel types.

Machine Design... Stainless Steel
Introduction to the Unified Numbering System of Ferrous Metals and Alloys

Too much metallurgy for me... I'll just keep in mind when appliance shopping that there are many variety of "stainless" steel, and none are perfect but some are better suited than others to be used in a stovetop.
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Old 11-16-2005, 08:30 PM   #13
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The difficulty is that all of these stoves are mail order. If I could see one it would be easy to decide if I liked it or thought it was worth the price. There aren't that many to choose from, in the size I want. Suburban says they make an almond color which sounds good, but nobody I've found actually sells it. No manufacturer is bragging about their alloy ratios. Stainless is readily available, cheap(ish) and chip proof, but if it is a shoddy grade I'd go for the enamel.
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Old 11-16-2005, 08:40 PM   #14
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Eastwood Corp; (eastwoodco.com) a company that sells auto restoration tools and supplies has a do it yourself powder coat system. You heat the coated piece in your oven to cure the powder after it has been sprayed on. It's a bit spendy for one stove top project, but if you have more than a couple of projects, it might be worth considering.
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Old 11-16-2005, 08:49 PM   #15
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I`m not familiar with the types of stainless steels, which I should be, but suppose that if they are attracted to a magnet they are ferrous based and if not they are nickel based.......check your top with a magnet.....in my 17' Boler, I`m sure the top is chrome plated and not stainless at all and not a good plating at that, with possibly very little nickel.....Benny
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Old 11-16-2005, 08:56 PM   #16
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A friend of mine uses a magnet to test Stainless Steel. Austentic Stainless has no magnetic responce. It also tends not to rust.

So when you are buying Stainless take a magnet.
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Old 11-16-2005, 09:52 PM   #17
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Michael's friend has it right to a point, the most expensive common stainless is what we called the 300 series such as 301, 302 303 and 304. The 303 was a free machining stainless and we would die to get a job made with that as opposed to getting one with 302 or 304. The 300 series is a nonmagnetic steel and won't rust or corrode, whether anyone is making stoves from the 300 series I don't know. Its been 30-35 years since I've had to work with any amount of stainless but this type of product used to be made from the 400 series which is magnetic and is rust & corrosion resistent but will show signs of both and will clean up as Donna mentioned. I think of the inards of backyard grills and how they rot out and yet are advertised as stainless, must be real cheap stainless. If the stoves are still functional maybe the best way to go is to paint it with appliance paint but make sure ALL the grease and finger prints etc are cleaned off before painting for a permanant bond
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Old 11-17-2005, 10:36 AM   #18
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Okay, maybe I've created a monster here by encouraging the metallurgical discussion. As everyone seems to be realizing, magnetic behaviour is some indication of alloy and performance, but not consistent enough that I would depend on it. Maybe it would help if there was one alloy (identified by those numbers such as the 300-series) that we should look for; unfortunately, the best alloy for a stamped sheet surface is different from the best choice for a wire grid, and so on.

The only thing that I think deserves one more mention is that "ferrous" generally means "of, relating to, or containing iron" (see http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/ferrous); stainless steel is obviously steel, "steel" means an alloy of iron with carbon, and therefore, all stainless steel is ferrous. I don't think that the other dictionary meaning of ferrous is applicable to stainless steel; either "ferrous" is being used to mean "magnetic", or it was an incorrect reference to ferritic stainless steel.

I had heard of Eastwood long ago when I was looking into polishing some car parts. Their powder coating alternative sounds intriguing to me. Maybe someone doing several metal parts (stove top, furnace front panel, circuit breaker panel, etc) could get a nicely coordinated set of durably finished parts in their interior that way.
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Old 11-17-2005, 10:41 AM   #19
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I was looking to purchase new wheels for my new-old tug and one of my club members had a set for sale. He'd purchased a regular stove/oven at a garage sale, had his garage wired for 220 and used the oven (and Eastwood products) to powdercoat a set of 15" tall x 10" wide steel wheels. They look fabulous. And he said if I don't like the color, automotive paint will adhere to the powercoat with some prep work. I guess he only had the wheels in the oven baking for about 20 minutes each.
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Old 11-18-2005, 07:37 PM   #20
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Maggie, if your stove is origional, it is stainless. Read this article to learn more about it the problems you are having.

http://www.howtobrew.com/appendices/appendixB-1.html

HTH,
Rich
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