Monday, January 30, 2023

Can't pull Kenmore 790.47892602 builtin oven from its cabinet?

Like the person in this doityourself.com post, I had a problem where the oven stopped heating after being put through a cleaning cycle.

If an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, the prevention is: Never let it clean for more than TWO hours. The default 3-hour cleaning cycle always engages the thermal safety device; the oven won't heat at all until you reset it. Which is a real pain.

OK, for the cure. The overall goal is to reset the safety switch, which in our oven, looks like the photo at left; I reset it by pushing on the red button. The body of the switch is about an inch in diameter (your switch might look different). You get at the switch by pulling out the oven (you will need a stepladder or something to hold it up so it doesn't fall on some body part) and removing a big piece of sheet metal.

How do you pull the oven out? The book says (figure 7, page 6) to use a certain tool (which I don't have or can't find) to release the mounting bracket; see the diagram at right. Since I don't have the tool, I inserted a common screwdriver with a 4-inch blade, ⅛” wide. Insert into one hole, keeping the blade horizontal, and pull that side of the oven out ½–1”. Pull the screwdriver out and repeat on the other side. Where exactly is the hole? In the photo below on the left, my index finger shows where to insert the screwdriver; the photo on the right (or maybe below it) shows what that looks like with the oven removed.

The photo at left shows where the mounting bracket (above) engaged with the oven body; that's what keeps the oven from falling out when you open the door (I mean, even before you try to pull it out).

BEFORE YOU PULL THE OVEN OUT MORE THAN AN INCH OR SO, get a step-ladder or some other piece of furniture sturdy and stable enough to support the oven. There is danger of severe personal injury here. The book says the cabinet must be able to support 200 pounds. Avoid a trip to the emergency room and a lot of awkward explanations! I had both a step-ladder and a sturdy wooden patio-chair, to support two corners of the oven.

Once you get the oven pulled out, you remove the sheet-metal panel on the back. There are maybe 6–7 screws that hold it on: one on top, one on the bottom, and two or three on each side. I think I lost one of the screws on an earlier operation. Two of the screws hold on little black, uh, feet, maybe 3mm thick and maybe 1cm in diameter. I don't know how important they are, but they are there.

Once you remove those screws and stow the back cover (hint: with a black magic marker, write on the inside of the cover: "INSIDE"), you'll be able to reach the thermal switch, highlighted in the photo at right in magenta.

Installation is the reverse of removal.

BE SAFE! Remove the supports only after you get the oven pushed in far enough for the mounting brackets to engage the chassis (i.e. far enough that you can't pull the oven out).

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