Ghost In The Machine - GE Cafe oven doing eerie stuff

Cooking Discussions Cookware
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I’ve got a GE Cafe gas range/gas oven that is doing weird stuff. I’m getting ready to bake bread and it turned itself off (“beep”) shortly after reaching the first period’s baking temp (400°F). Wouldn’t let me do anything with any button on the panel.

Then it beeps again, trying to reset the clock. I can push “clear” on that one. Then the oven light comes on, goes off (“beep, beep”). Then the timer shows up and wants a time input. Then it goes off again (“beep, beep”).

Then it beeps again with noting in particular going on, and I try the panel. I can start the oven again, and set it for the first temp again. Then it beeps again and I can no longer manipulate the temp for the 2nd period’s temp (350°).

I run down to the basement and kick the circuit breakers (second time, didn’t mention first above), come back up and I can now set it to 350. Then it shuts itself off again, with the panel unresponsive. Then it beeps and turns on the oven light again, and I can set it to 350 again (it had only dropped to about 335, so hopefully the bread turns out okay).

Anyone ever had anything like this happen with an oven?

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Sounds like it wants you to go low carb.

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Oven Control Board prob needs replacing. The part is around $100 plus labor.

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I’ve had one or two die before by simply dying.

Never heard of poltergeistic behavior, though.

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Just make sure the exorcist can get it scheduled pretty quick, or you’re going to be hosed for the holidays.

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“Mother board” comes to mind. That’s what I used to hear on my past appliances until I got smart and found another ‘fixer’.
Or try You Tube for a dx.

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Ayep. I guess it was 2 years ago about this time of year the igniter cracked and I had right at 3 days to get it from Amazon and get it installed before the Cooking Bonanza kicked off. That was, IIRC, the 4th igniter for this oven. The first lasted like 8 or so years but the next couple didn’t last very long. I don’t expect this one to last too long either, so I have an extra on hand (same thing for the 2 furnaces, I’ve got extra igniters for them - but the furnace igniters aren’t failing as fast as the stove igniters).

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Damme, it wasn’t a Ghost In The Machine - it was a Beetle In The Machine!

As the bake time was closing on the bread a shiny beetle ran out of a gap in the upper right corner of my stove. Not sure what it is, don’t think I’ve seen it here before, but I knocked it down with the oven mitt I was getting ready to don and stomped its but right quick. I guess he was hot-footing it around and touching contacts?

After that, no more weirdness from the oven. Guess I need to take it apart and inspect the control panel, though.

What possibly could attract a beetle to go into a control panel space?

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I have a GE Monogram. Is your model one that connects to the internet or phone? My oven stopped working 10 months after getting it. The encoder was replaced (part costs almost $450+ covered by warranty.) The repairman said that GE makes changes to the programing of the encoder and that sometimes the encoder does not update correctly. It worked correctly for one day but now it cannot be turned on manually. I can turn it on using a phone app which is better than nothing. The thing that seemed the strangest is the oven light. It was working just fine but all of the sudden the oven light button does not work. I have to push the timer button to get the oven light on. I would have preferred a total manual oven over the one I bought but none were available at the time. I knew all this unnecessary tech was going to be nothing but trouble. I hope you have better luck getting yours fixed than I have so far. Getting parts has been difficult, requiring numerous calls. If you do by chance have trouble getting parts have the rep check to make sure that an unintentional hold was not put on it. That is what happened to me. It took nearly two months to get the part. It just sat there at the warehouse apparently.

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Warmth? Maybe your control panel makes a beetle mating sound? Better than a ghost anyway.

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Bugs are attracted to light and warmth. Don’t ask me how I know this. Wouldn’t hurt to check it out. Make sure there’s not a shiny beetle family in there. Populating.

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But baked beetles are so delicious this time of year.

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Interesting thought, but mine’s not connected to the internet - too old. Nothing in my house (other than my service/router) is internet connected. Mostly too old, or in the case of the refrigerator I just bought, too cheap. The Sammy TV had some auto functionality but I killed it as soon as I learned of it (this was 5-6 years ago when news reports started coming out about “Your Smart TV Might Be Spying On You”).

I am careful with pushed updates to phone (android) and computer (windows). I keep telling them “remind me later” until a few months have gone by and I can check with CNET.com or others, to learn if a given update is causing problems.

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I am not a fan of it either. Keep yours going. It is becoming more and more difficult to avoid it. *You usually have a choice to not connect it but if my appliance technician is correct, one might end up missing important updates. FWIW, he hates it all, thinks most of the tech is unnecessary and thinks that people using their phone to control their oven are risking setting their house on fire. He has a few scenarios involving user mindlessness/stupidity in mind. One could counter argue that people have always managed to start fires doing mindless/stupid thing but I am still not a fan of controlling appliances with my phone.

*ETA: on second thought, maybe it is just a high end product issue. The best advice might be, go simple and cheap. Or simple but very expensive. If I remember correctly Viking and one other high end brand (Wolf?) makes simple, old school, manual ranges.

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E xcept cockroaches, they do not like light.
I will not enlighten you with my stories of cockrosches in food service. Horror movie worthy!

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I’ve never connected any of my Internet capable appliances to the Internet. I don’t want the security risk of someone being able to turn on my oven remotely. Or mess with my fridge.

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the GE “xxxx” ovens have a long and not-too-glorious history of their electronics going bad / failing.

if a ‘reset’ doesn’t work - either by panel button or by turning off the electricity at the panel… - it’s repair/replace time.

some manufacturers have figured out how to protect the electronics from the sorta’ basic function/effect of “oven heat” - GE seems to lag in that respect.

sad to say . . .

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Yeah. I mentioned to another member here that I was halfway seriously considering disabling the door lock so I could run it on Self Clean mode, using it as a 900°F pizza oven.

He mentioned that one like mine can only take so many self-clean cycles before I kill the brain.

So I scrapped my half-serious idea and also stopped running it so often in general (whenever my pizza stones get oil in them, I’d run it to burn them out). Now I’m trying to keep it to once a year or less. And I’ve started using parchment under my pies so I get less oil in the stone in the first place. It took me way too long to learn that parchment can handle 550 (or about 590 if I mess with calibration) for at least the 8-10 minutes needed to cook a pizza at that temp.

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I try never to run self clean - not because I knew that it also cooked electronics, but because it always scared me. I had to do it after I had a splatter filled Thanksgiving roasting spree, but that’s one time in 4 years for the new oven. There’s a steam feature on the new oven that helps loosen gunk so you can clean with elbow grease. Good enough for me. My pizza stone has stayed in my various ovens for more than 20 years. I clean it with hot water and a bench scraper It’s basically black now, at least in the middle (it’s rectangular).

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indeed. I read all about the ten-million-degree ovens that produce a pizza in 4 seconds or less, , , and have to wonder - what the heck is the big hurry?

my oven will go to 550’F - stone in, preheat 45-60 minutes, pizza on parchment onto the stone, 10-12 minutes, all done. hundreds more degrees simply not required.

no one is this house seems to be missing anything . . .

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