Slow Princess Stove

[Vincentc]

The Princess stove is amazingly slow to boil water, and while the burners get hot, they never actually glow even when set on high.

Any suggestions on the cause and fix for this?

Thanks,
Vincent

 

[TROUBLE]

Vincent,

On my stove only two of the burners are designed to get really hot. Do you have this problem on all three?

Art

 

[wmassey9]

Vincent, I have only one really hot, to boil anything, others not so. Been that way with all my Princess stove tops.

 

[Bob Bradley]

Perhaps you or the PO replaced an original 110 burner with a standard 220 burner. I made that mistake on mine. It does get up to temp eventually, but very slowly.

 

[bostonhatteras]

I would argue that there is nothing wrong with the stove, except its initial design. The wiring is only #12 ga. How much power do you think can travel through those wires? The answer is...not enough! That stove will never do any real cooking so don't even try. Either upgrade to 220v or go with propane. 110v just doesn't cut it for cooking.

 

[Angela]

110v just doesn't cut it for cooking.

I totally, totally agree! Every 110v stove/cooktop I've ever used took forever to boil water.

 

[yachtsmanbill]

Look at the specs... 2 burners are 1000 watts and the big one is like 2200(?). If you use a 220 element on 110 its going to be half, and if you have 110 elements on 220 itll be double. Thats close to 30 amps of 110 when initially lit off. Just like a hot water heater..."nuthin' but amps". Then theres the oven...
Now some food for thought...Even tho my range is a 220 unit, I believe (never assume!) that each element is a single leg 110. 220 through each knob wouldnt be a good thing. ws

 

[Angela]

Willy, you got a little Princess stove in that 58' sub???? Or is that a photo from another boat. Looks like you've never used the oven.

 

[Vincentc]

I only checked two burners, neither would get hot enough to glow. I'll check the third tomorrow. I never changed the burners and don't know what the po might have done. The princess on my previous boat, Gulfstar 43 would turn red and it had a 7.5 kw generator.

 

[yachtsmanbill]

Willy, you got a little Princess stove in that 58' sub???? Or is that a photo from another boat. Looks like you've never used the oven.

Ahhh! No overnight guests for us !! Seriously Ange, thats a brand new stove that replaced the toilet maker companies' model that was OEM. That one barely boiled water too. Id like to do charters with the sub, but everyone would get a mandatory tetanus shot with a reservation confirmation! LOL...
As it stands, we have the BIG master SR with a V berth for guests. Anyone else gets the air mattress and a dog (?). Sometimes its good not to have to contribute about a list due to granite countertops vs Corian or why the duck bill valves on the vacuflush got jammed up with, uh, well, whatever wasnt supposed to get flushed in the first place! Now for some pics!! WHERS YOURS????? ;-)) ws

 

[Angela]

Well, you're not going to cook any Steak au Poivre on that little thing! LOL Charteryacht or not...I still have thresholds. Afterall, I am a foodie-type. LOL 220v or bust! Full size 4 to 5 burner cooktops, convection ovens, as big a fridge as you can cram in there, chest freezer hidden under the PH bench, small microwave, heavy duty Cuisinart food processor (and I mean it's heavy, so I keep it on my starboard side), Keurig coffee/tea, and Kitchenaid hand appliances! We may not get there fast, but we'll eat well along the way.

 

[Bob Bradley]

On my 110 stove, the one burner that I did not change glows cherry after about 2 - 3 minutes warmup time. The two that I replaced (220 household stove units) never glow and take forever to warm up. I went to an appliance store to get a replacement and they told me to go to Princess and get a 110 unit, as appliance stores only have 220 and they just don't heat up enough.

 

[rsmith]

Hatt put a 220 stove on our boat. Its a lot larger than the princess. It has a seperate 110v burner and seperate feed and breaker for the 110 burner. A lot of times in the old days there was only 110v hook ups so at least you had 1 burner. Before the microwave we used the 110v for boiling water for tea and coffee it heated up pretty fast.

 

[Vincentc]

Assuming my problem was 220 burners I searched for 120v burners at Defender, Amazon etc and was not successful. I considered buying a princess 2 burner cooktop for $350 but looked further.

A propane cooktop is probably the best solution but the conversion would be pretty expensive in time and money. The propane burners are generally 6000 btu which is equivalent to an 1800 watt electric burner according to the internet.

I stumbled across induction cooktops and found an 1800 watt single induction burner portable at amazon for less than $70. I ordered one and it came in today. Tested it against the house's 220v smoothtop. The 1800 watt induction brought a quart of water to serious boil in < 3:00 minutes. The same amount of water came to a boil in 2:10 minutes on one of the big burners of the 220v house stove.

The poor Princess took took about 30 minutes to bring 2 qts to a kind of boil.

Looks like the induction burner will take care of my needs.

 

[q240z]

It's always nice when there's an easy and cheap solution that works well.

For us, propane was the way to go. A 10# tank lasts about 3 months and we don't have to run the genny on the hook just to fry up some brekky.

But I've heard good things about those induction units. Are they really cool to the touch unless you put a certain kind of pan on them, or was that just an urban myth I heard?

 

[Vincentc]

Yes it is cool, the special kind of cookware is simply any pot with a bottom that a magnet will stick to. The pots in our house are mostly non stick aluminum, but the first stainless bottom pot I found in the drawer worked just fine.

I agree that propane would be the best, and if we cooked more, I would probably install a 2 burner propane cooktop. How involved is the tank and safety feature install? Where did you put your tank?

Regards,
Vincent

 

[q240z]

I spent a weekend installing everything. The stove slid right in, but the cutout in the backsplash was different and there was a gap between the counter at the back of the stove. The big Connies came with storage lockers under the bow seats that fit two 10# bottles perfectly AND they drain to the deck...there's no way for fumes to get inside. The tank switch and sniffer didn't take long to install. Bending the stainless backsplash with a mallet and a 2x4 took some time. lol

 

[Jaxfishgyd]

No idea how old our Princess stove is...But it does a good job. We're happy with it.

But, when "the time comes," the admiral would like to just have the 3 burner top and replace our basic microwave with a microwave/convection combo instead of having an oven...

 

[Vincentc]

Very Nice propane installaton, thanks for the photos and descripton.

We just got back from an excellent ride out to the island. Our oldest daughter used the Princess oven to bake french bread topped with tomato, crabmeat, olive oil, garlic and romano cheese. Exellent paring with a savignoun blanc, or probably any available consumable liquid. It was an very nice evening and a fine snack.

On point, we do use the oven, more than the stove top. The princess oven worked just fine for our needs. I cannot report on the stovetop/ induction burner since we did not have need to use it. The Electric oven meets our needs and I am not sure that we would need to change out the oven. The princess burners are anemic but the induction burner should fix that.

OTOH, if the stove top was used very often, I remember a take off on Eric Clapton's "Cocaine" which went, " When you are out in the sticks and your living is fixed . . . Propane. . " Actually 50 years or so ago, we called the tank on the side of the house the butane tank.