Author Topic: the peril of settings  (Read 6905 times)

quixoticgeek

  • Mostly Harmless
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #25 on: 05 February, 2021, 11:23:28 pm »
The woodfired pizza oven cuts through all that Gordian Knot nonsense in a single swoosh.

It has no settings.
It has fire, or no fire.

You can perhaps pretend it has settings by throwing more or less wood on it, but it more or less does what it wants.
Mostly, it wants to do the Right Thing, which is good.

And Fire.

Oh dear...

Fire is much more configurable than that. You can get all sorts of temperatures and conditions of fire by carefully balancing the proportions of fuel and oxygen. A fire is a living breathing creature, and should be treated with respect. There is a true art in managing fire, esp when it comes to cooking with it. The wood you use, the moisture content of the wood, if you use charcoal, the wood the charcoal was made from. All sorts of things can change the result of your fire. It's not as simple as there being fire, or not fire.

This is a loaf of bread I baked with an open fire i the woods:





The wood was hornbeam.

J
--
Beer, bikes, and backpacking
http://b.42q.eu/

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #26 on: 05 February, 2021, 11:53:05 pm »
If it doesn’t go up to 11 it’s not worth having.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Kim

  • Timelord
    • Fediverse
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #27 on: 05 February, 2021, 11:54:11 pm »
If it doesn’t go up to 11 it’s not worth having.

For $2000 I'll build you one that goes to 12...

Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #28 on: 06 February, 2021, 12:13:26 am »
Fire is much more configurable than that. You can get all sorts of temperatures and conditions of fire by carefully balancing the proportions of fuel and oxygen. A fire is a living breathing creature, and should be treated with respect. There is a true art in managing fire, esp when it comes to cooking with it. The wood you use, the moisture content of the wood, if you use charcoal, the wood the charcoal was made from. All sorts of things can change the result of your fire. It's not as simple as there being fire, or not fire.

But, have you worked out what colour it should be yet ?
Rust never sleeps

Jaded

  • The Codfather
  • Formerly known as Jaded
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #29 on: 06 February, 2021, 12:20:23 am »
What is the setting for bears?
It is simpler than it looks.

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #30 on: 06 February, 2021, 12:25:47 am »
Fire is much more configurable than that. You can get all sorts of temperatures and conditions of fire by carefully balancing the proportions of fuel and oxygen. A fire is a living breathing creature, and should be treated with respect. There is a true art in managing fire, esp when it comes to cooking with it. The wood you use, the moisture content of the wood, if you use charcoal, the wood the charcoal was made from. All sorts of things can change the result of your fire. It's not as simple as there being fire, or not fire.

But, have you worked out what colour it should be yet ?

And do people want fire that can be nasally fitted?
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Beardy

  • Shedist
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #31 on: 06 February, 2021, 12:31:38 am »
I’ve relabelled all my appliances and replaced max with 11. It tells everyone where it should be set and saves thinking.
For every complex problem in the world, there is a simple and easily understood solution that’s wrong.

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #32 on: 06 February, 2021, 12:38:03 am »
What is the setting for bears?

3 bowls, 3 spoons and a notepad for each BEAR to record its preferred porridge serving temperature.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Pingu

  • Put away those fiery biscuits!
  • Mrs Pingu's domestique
    • the Igloo
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #33 on: 06 February, 2021, 12:51:19 am »
The woodfired pizza oven cuts through all that Gordian Knot nonsense in a single swoosh.

It has no settings.
It has fire, or no fire.

You can perhaps pretend it has settings by throwing more or less wood on it, but it more or less does what it wants.
Mostly, it wants to do the Right Thing, which is good.

And Fire.

Oh dear...

I thought that too  ;D

Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #34 on: 06 February, 2021, 12:58:16 am »
Fire is much more configurable than that. You can get all sorts of temperatures and conditions of fire by carefully balancing the proportions of fuel and oxygen. A fire is a living breathing creature, and should be treated with respect. There is a true art in managing fire, esp when it comes to cooking with it. The wood you use, the moisture content of the wood, if you use charcoal, the wood the charcoal was made from. All sorts of things can change the result of your fire. It's not as simple as there being fire, or not fire.

But, have you worked out what colour it should be yet ?

And do people want fire that can be nasally fitted?
Mr L, you clearly work in Marketing AICMFP.
Rust never sleeps

Gattopardo

  • Lord of the sith
  • Overseaing the building of the death star
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #35 on: 06 February, 2021, 03:52:23 am »
If it doesn’t go up to 11 it’s not worth having.

For $2000 I'll build you one that goes to 12...

For $1950 I'll just make 11 louder.

citoyen

  • Occasionally rides a bike
the peril of settings
« Reply #36 on: 06 February, 2021, 08:49:00 am »
I expect the pizza setting is pretty much "leave the element on 100%, and hope for the best. Perhaps it will reach an equilibrium temperature before it catches fire".
I can understand why they might want to hide that.

The bread setting is top and bottom heat, no fan, and goes up to 220C. The pizza setting is the same but goes up to 250C and adds the grill element too. I’ve not used it yet. It’s not really hidden, it’s just that each click of the dial has several sub-settings, and the pizza setting was one I hadn’t realised was there before. I don’t use most of the settings - for pizza, I’ve been using the ‘conventional’ setting, which is top and bottom heat, no fan - same as bread except it goes up to 250C. As with the washing machine, all the programs are just shortcuts to manually configurable settings.

The oven has a pyrolitic cleaning function so I expect it can handle seriously hot temperatures.

Quote
Attempting pizza in a domestic oven is a fraught business, pushing the poor thing to it's absolute limits.

One day I will get round to building a proper bread oven in the garden. One day!
"The future's all yours, you lousy bicycles."

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #37 on: 06 February, 2021, 10:53:55 am »
Our boiler has a E detent on the central heating dial but not on the hot water dial. Dunno why.

Charcoal should be served with vipers (Tim Hall should understand this).
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

T42

  • Apprentice geezer
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #38 on: 06 February, 2021, 11:46:45 am »
The woodfired pizza oven cuts through all that Gordian Knot nonsense in a single swoosh.

It has no settings.
It has fire, or no fire.

You can perhaps pretend it has settings by throwing more or less wood on it, but it more or less does what it wants.
Mostly, it wants to do the Right Thing, which is good.

And Fire.

When we were buying this house the bloke who had rebuilt it after a fire showed us a darkened bit of stone wall in the cellar and said that there had been a wood-fired bread oven there but he'd needed room for the water heater so he had knocked it apart and thrown it out.  >:(
I've dusted off all those old bottles and set them up straight

ian

Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #39 on: 06 February, 2021, 08:45:30 pm »
How the fuck do I set that with a dial labelled min and max? Give me settings that mean something. I don’t even know what a condensing boiler is and I’ve read Kant.

Ours is labelled min and max, with a detent about 2/3 of the way round labelled 'E' or something for the optimum condensing point.  That's the heating loop temperature.

There's a separate dial for the hot water temperature with a sparkly footprint sticker denoting the least-worst compromise between not scalding yourself while washing your hands under the non-mixer hot taps and a half-decent shower/bath temperature.

I checked and the dial isn't at max, it's about three-quarters max (though there's nothing to indicate why it's there). I assume a grown-up set it thus. I know there's a thermostat somewhere on the hot water cylinder set to a value I don't know to ensure we don't get Legionella. Bacteria I understand.

The oven goes from 240 to max. I don't know how hot max is. 250? Three million degrees? Stick a couple of pizza stones in there (seriously, they're quite good, the closest you'll get to decent pizza without a dedicated fiery oven) and it produces a pizza with dough that's starting to char pleasantly after six minutes.

For toast, I just twist the dial to max and manually pop it when I see the first curls of smoke. Undercooked, raw toast is horrid. But a lot better than goat.

Kim

  • Timelord
    • Fediverse
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #40 on: 06 February, 2021, 08:47:53 pm »
For toast, I just twist the dial to max and manually pop it when I see the first curls of smoke. Undercooked, raw toast is horrid.

All modern toasters are rubbish.  We just use the grill.

quixoticgeek

  • Mostly Harmless
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #41 on: 06 February, 2021, 08:50:45 pm »
All modern toasters are rubbish.  We just use the grill.

Is it wrong that I know exactly which video that goes to without clicking on the link?

What's your take on Brown?

J
--
Beer, bikes, and backpacking
http://b.42q.eu/

Beardy

  • Shedist
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #42 on: 06 February, 2021, 09:24:24 pm »
We have pleasingly retro and trendy toaster that doesn’t pop up automatically. It has a time dial and you have to remember on the second set of toast to reduce the time or rescue the bread before it becomes charred due to retained heat. As a bonus it is also repairable with parts available direct from the manufacture or pattern parts from the bay of e.
For every complex problem in the world, there is a simple and easily understood solution that’s wrong.

Mrs Pingu

  • Who ate all the pies? Me
    • Twitter
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #43 on: 06 February, 2021, 09:50:32 pm »
The woodfired pizza oven cuts through all that Gordian Knot nonsense in a single swoosh.

It has no settings.
It has fire, or no fire.

You can perhaps pretend it has settings by throwing more or less wood on it, but it more or less does what it wants.
Mostly, it wants to do the Right Thing, which is good.

And Fire.

When we were buying this house the bloke who had rebuilt it after a fire showed us a darkened bit of stone wall in the cellar and said that there had been a wood-fired bread oven there but he'd needed room for the water heater so he had knocked it apart and thrown it out.  >:(

Sacre bleu!  :'(

We've cycled past several village bread ovens and I love them.
Do not clench. It only makes it worse.

FifeingEejit

  • Not Small
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #44 on: 06 February, 2021, 10:14:34 pm »
The AGA is great - it has no settings at all

Aga's do have settings.
Fueled and unfueld.

Quote
Our condensing boiler has a digital temp setting for the circulating water temperature. It’s set to the highest value permanently. There’s a tank stat too. Why change it? I like hot water.
Why would you not want to save about 10% on your heating bills? As Kim sed. Modern boilers only work at full efficiency if return is below 55C. Our Ch rad flow is 49C and the house is a comfy 20C. Hot water is set to 55 which gives a very pleasant shower. Boiler is running at low output and no on off cycling so reduced wear. Ian's OP and the follow ups are amusing but let's not be luddites.

I've got a fancy stat hooked up to the OpenTherm terminals, (It was left lying around after Dad bought an incompatible boiler) the problem with this is I suspect the previous owner never had the decent enough boiler serviced and there's what sounds like a bearing howling somewhere at tick over.
Or in fact any of the other pretty decent stuff* she seems to have had installed (although I suspect it was the previous owners doing the place up for sale)

I've not died of CO poisoning yet and the new regulations complement of alarms were fitted before lockdown so I'm just going to have to hope until it's dodgy enough to claim to be a pressing safety need...

But what toaster dial number do you use?

What exactly do those numbers mean?
On most toasters I've come across I'm a 3 for fresh bread and about 20 for frozen.
On the toaster I've bought I seem to be a 3 on frozen bread and have to watch the discolouration as it turns from white to slightly browned in order to hit the eject button before it's beyond my preference level.



* Top end 8kg LG steam washer
top end of Zanussi scale for dishwasher and fridge/frezer
5 ring gas hob (I've almost got round to trying out the pan I have on each one, still burning water having been used to halogen)
Remote controlled living flame gas fire

For toast, I just twist the dial to max and manually pop it when I see the first curls of smoke. Undercooked, raw toast is horrid.

All modern toasters are rubbish.  We just use the grill.

1:23 it has destroyed the bread rendering it a charred mess, even the modern toaster produced borderline vileness.

Pretty cool mechanisms though

Well except for the safety mechanisms...




Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #45 on: 06 February, 2021, 10:45:29 pm »
Our boiler has a E detent on the central heating dial but not on the hot water dial. Dunno why.

Charcoal should be served with vipers (Tim Hall should understand this).

Ours has up and down buttons and a digital display. Detents you say? 
We are making a New World (Paul Nash, 1918)

andytheflyer

  • Andytheex-flyer.....
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #46 on: 07 February, 2021, 08:37:48 am »

The AGA is great - it has no settings at all

I miss having an aga to cook on. Always ready, does great tray bakes, warms your bum and dries your clothes. Fabulous things.
And warms up wet Labradors.....

TheLurker

  • Goes well with magnolia.
Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #47 on: 07 February, 2021, 09:05:53 am »
In a fearless expedition undertaken solely in the interests of science I have just returned from terra incognita (the kitchen) and I can report the following findings.

The cooker is gas.  It has valves which control the height of the flame. The natives have inscribed images of fires of various intensities on these valves.  The μwave has two rotary dials, one of which has a set of indecipherable images and whose purpose is thought to be, "ritual".  The other is a time control, quite possibly clockwork, and it chimes a rather jolly "ping!" when the timed period has expired.

What's a toaster?
Τα πιο όμορφα ταξίδια γίνονται με τις δικές μας δυνάμεις - Φίλοι του Ποδήλατου

sam

Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #48 on: 11 February, 2021, 12:49:10 pm »
I set the oven at 200 regardless. I’m not even sure 200 what, as some things are F, some C. (Mostly the latter I guess, but the British have been known to throw a curveball in the metric dept.) Celsius discombobulates me no matter how sensible it is. Gas marks are for the next life.

I don’t operate the washing machine. We have our spheres of influence. She also presides over all thermostatic controls.

The settings controlling radio/CD/mileage etc. display in the car (largely my remit) are the worst. I would set them and leave them be for all time, except occasionally a dial or button is touched the wrong way or stared at too hard and it all goes haywire, requiring a dive into the owner’s manual <shudder>.

ian

Re: the peril of settings
« Reply #49 on: 11 February, 2021, 07:03:05 pm »
There is one device to which I'm entrusted the settings, that's the timer on the driveway lights, a curiously dumb chronological concoction that also does a poor job of keeping time. It's actually by far not the worst the timer I have operated, the plug-based ones I used for lights required cryptic key combinations to do anything useful (now replaced by the internet); these came in a pack of five from Sainsbury's so I was cursed with using them as I never throw anything away. The prize goes to the growth chamber I used as a lowly student which, for reason unbeknownst to me, forsook any idle dalliance of 24-hour clock and replaced it with perky decimal time, the day neatly defined into one hundred ceaseless segments, each needless subdivided by ten because everyone needs to measure time in thousandths of a day. Setting it to be light from 6am to 8pm was a significant mathematic undertaking for the sort of boy who survived long division by hiding in a bunker.