THE OIL RANGE
What makes it possible to live in gasless, electricless, coal-less,
transportationless places in gustatorial ease and digestive comfort? The
oil range. Not the old-time messy oil stove, but the efficient,
capacious oil range. In districts unopened to modern improvements
cooking is made a pleasure rather than a drudgery, with this highly
effective medium, so effective that nothing that can be done on any
other type of stove need be omitted in the daily routine. It has the
maximum comfort and the minimum cost and trouble. This range too need
never be lighted until wanted and can be “put to bed,” immediately upon
finishing the meal. So now there need be no place where man can not have
his puddings, his breads, or his flap-jacks with speed and finish.
The two most important types of oil stoves with which it is worth your
while to become acquainted are the wick and the wickless (kindler type).
It is quite evident from their descriptive titles that the former
employs a wick as heat carrier to the vessel in which is the food; and
the wickless has the kindler by which the heat is carried to the food in
a different way.
The wick oil range is a development born directly of the lamp. It
employs the round wick and with it in its best form a long chimney is
used. This long draught chimney has proven in the case of the lamp to
make for perfect combustion of the oil. Hence after many years of trial
and proof the wick stove is developed to a delightful point of comfort
and utility. Speed, lack of odor and perfect work, three necessities of
any stove, are here exemplified, to say nothing of longevity and ease of
upkeep.
You have probably used the heat from a lamp chimney to light a cigarette
or a match or even to heat a curling iron? Well, this is really the
principle of the wick stove. This heat has been harnessed and petted
into cooking usefulness by expert heat and stove engineers.
The parts of the wick stove with which you must be acquainted are few
but important:
1. The burner
2. The wick
3. Flame spreader
4. Brass wick tube (a fine feature, in that it is of brass)
5. Clamp set screw
6. Hand wheel to adjust screw
7. Little mica door which opens in chimney instead of having to pull
off the chimney as you do in lighting a lamp.
All you have to do is apply the match and touch off the wick at several
places. Then lower the wick until the flame is even.
To extinguish the flame, turn the little wheel to the left. _Never blow
it out._ This blowing out of the flame causes all sorts of
irregularities and the real troubles.
The oil range is supplied in the best types by gravity conduit. That is
to say that the oil flows from a reservoir into the burner, and as the
oil is consumed the fresh oil flows down and takes its place, so there
can never be overflow to cause fires or odors. These reservoirs are of
glass and in one case the manufacturer has a service of reservoirs
which supplies the consumer with a rack of three filled reservoirs,
which in turn replaces the emptied one. This obviates entirely the need
of the cook to pour oil in the reservoir or in fact know she is using
oil! Reservoirs of course are delivered and called for, if you are in
reach of a dealer. Where this service is impossible to be had the
pouring of the oil into the tank is simpler than simple. It is no more
difficult than pouring milk into a glass. In truth the reservoir is
mechanically adjusted and filled with oil--the human being but its guide
and beneficiary.
The heat wanted in the wick stove depends on your culinary need and
consequently on how high or how low you turn the wick. Very often it
means when the flame burns low when it should burn high that the wick
needs a cleaning. Don’t blame the mechanism. It is difficult to say how
often you need to buy a wick or how often it should be cleaned, as it
depends very much on the quality of the oil that you have to use. Some
kerosene is charry and some more free from impurities than other kinds
of kerosene.
Here are some points to observe if you want good results.
1. If there is a gap in the flame, the wick needs cleaning. There
should be a continuous round fence enclosing the burner around the
flame spreader. Or it may mean the wick is up against the flame
spreader.
2. Be sure that the wick is not up against the flame spreader after
lighting, because it will prevent the air from passing through the
center of the brass wick tube and cause over-heating of burner and a
murky flame.
3. The flame when high should show white points above the blue body of
the flame. These white points should be about 1¹⁄₄″ for perfect
combustion. That means that there will be no odor and that you will
get all the heat you need and no waste of fuel.
4. The flame has lost its usefulness when the line of demarcation
between the white and the blue is gone. The flame will begin to smoke,
the burner will be over-heated, the cookery under-heated, and odors
and smudge will be the result. Here again the human equation comes in.
Use your eyes effectively.
5. Cleaning wicks is done by removing the chimney even as you do in
cleaning a lamp wick. Nothing new in this.
6. Watch your reservoir; never allow it to run dry or your range to
burn dry. Form a habit of watching it daily and you will never regret
it.
7. Under usual circumstances one wick should last several months.
8. Clean wicks daily for best service.
9. Correct unevenness of the wick with a pair of scissors.
10. For re-wicking, arresting any other troubles, consult the “guide
book,” which gives directions simply.
11. But remember when you get any kind of range you must set it up
solidly and level before filling with oil or cooking upon it. Put it
in a part of the kitchen away from draughts and where you would put
any other stove.
12. Every range has special directions for inverting reservoir and
refilling, but in the best types it is always very easy and simple,
needing no strength or skill.
And so in the best type of the wick range we have the possibility of
cooking everything that any family or its guests need.
Wicks are easily bought all over the world. The stoves heat rapidly; the
oil reservoir is easy to fill; your hands need never be oily, unless
through crass carelessness. There is a basin shaped stove base to
collect char and dirt and the feed pipe is so placed as to make cleaning
easy.
All the parts should be easily removable for cleaning and all should be
simple and visible in every part. This grown up lamp should have all
these modern twists.
In the best of the wick type you should have the best vitreous enamel,
where it is enameled, baked in at least three times; solid brass wick
tubes; best grade of steel tubing and heavily tinned plate pipes where
necessary.
In the long chimney-wick type the flame never touches the vessel. In the
short drum type the flame does touch. One wick type manufacturer makes a
perfect long chimney type yet also makes a short drum type to give all
consumers their heart’s desire.
WICKLESS RANGES
The wickless, as its name implies, has no wick but carries the heat
directly to the cooking vessel and therefore shortens the cooking time a
little as the heat reaches the spot more quickly than it can in the
long, non-flame touching type of range.
In this type of range a kindler is employed. This kindler is a round
asbestos ring (costs about 10 cents to replace) which lies in the burner
bowl and is slightly corrugated at the top and stiffened by a metal
band. Its function is not that of a wick at all. It is rather the
self-starter of the stove and its business is to light the oil and start
the cooking. The stove is lighted by applying the match to the kindler
which is saturated by oil (from its very position) and this ignition of
the kindler furnishes sufficient heat to the surface of the oil to turn
it into a gas. After the burner is started the heat automatically keeps
the gas forming (vaporizing) as long as there is oil in the burner. So
you can see that all the kindler does is start the gas ball rolling.
The wickless type of range is equipped with a 12″ seamless burner, which
will last several years. The regulation of the heat is managed by
lowering or elevating the oil in the burner bowl. The greater the area
of oil exposed on which the heat from the kindler ring can act the
greater the amount of gas formed and released, and inversely the smaller
the area of oil surface exposed, etc.
This range, in its best forms, employs a lever with a dial, which when
turned by the cook to the point in the dial she knows by experience she
needs, automatically and mechanically adjusts the heat from simmering
point to the most intense heat through a heat scale from “no heat” to
300° Fahrenheit.
With the dial there is taken out of oil cookery the guess-work which
resides in most cookers.
Here is used the short chimney, with very concentrated heat focused
where it is most needed.
In lighting, you turn the lever to the word “light” on the dial. After
the kindler is saturated, generally a few seconds after switching the
lever, the chimney must be raised and the match applied in a few spots
to the kindler. In a few moments your blue flame is going full blast or
any blast you desire depending on your lever setting.
Gravity supplies the oil here too, as in the wick type. The reservoir
with its glass bull’s-eye to detect oil quantity holds a gallon of
kerosene sufficient to last sixteen to eighteen hours for one burner, or
at the rate of about one cent per hour. Refilling these reservoirs is
very simple, and when you go to buy an oil range this is one of the
things you must insist upon. Unscrew the cap in this case and pour in
your oil, that is all. There are a feed pipe and release which gather
any sediment that may be in the oil.
FLAME REGULATION
Experience is the best teacher in the way of knowing where you must set
the lever to get the hottest flame. Sometimes dependent on varying
conditions, the flame may be highest when the lever is over the 12th
division of the dial; sometimes it may be at 6 or 7 on your range. This
sort of thing you learn by knowing your range. Some oil will, of course,
be left in the burner after the light is turned off. Therefore you must
expect it to burn a little while after you have turned your lever to
“out.”
The blue flame to be just right must touch the vessel with its uttermost
tip.
On some of the most modern of this type is a match scratcher plate which
makes it easy to light the match without using your shoe, a good white
wall, or the seat of your pants.
Every stove in this class is made of the finest pressed steel, and where
the enamel is used it is of vitreous variety with three bakings. There
is an all white stove, too, to fit in with the bridal effect of the
newer kitchens.
The good points of the wickless stove are many:
1. No wicks to clean.
2. Unleakable.
3. More powerful burner than anywhere else, being 12″.
4. Burner 100% odorless.
5. Delivers heat where it does the most good.
6. Acts a little quicker than any other types.
7. More economical in upkeep.
Either one of the stoves herein outlined is the best on the market as to
type and manufacture. If you have to buy a stove try and get the most
for your expenditure by a collection of the best traits in the stove.
No mechanical device is perfect without perfect handling. If you do not
put in the wick correctly, or if you do not light your kindler
sufficiently you will have trouble. If you put a tire on your car in the
wrong way you would not blame the car, yet the tendency is always to
blame the oil range and immediately call up your dealer and say that
your stove is smelly or that the wick won’t burn or that the kindler
won’t start, etc.
The best firms give every consumer a little text book to consult when in
difficulty.
These stoves even in electric and gas regions are used in summer because
they are cool cookers.
The advantage over coal is evident, as there is no fire to clean out, no
kindling wood necessary, no ashes to carry and no coal to lug about, to
say nothing about wondering about dampers, flues and the like.
In all ranges burning oil of the best makes, you can have all the heat
you want and as little as you want as well.
On all well proportioned ranges you can put some of the excellently
constructed ovens.
The ranges come with from one burner to five burners. Some are built in
cabinet style, with shelves, etc. Some just plain style. As yet none of
the cooking surfaces is quite high enough; a few inches added to their
stature would make cookery easier on the human back. The cabinet size
usually stands about 54¹⁄₂″ high, 64″ wide.
The spaces between the burners is ample for comfortable placing of
utensils. Watch this when purchasing a stove, for you can be very
uncomfortable with a jammed surface.
It is pretty much a matter of what you can get in the way of either of
these two specific stoves. They are both so good. The wick type is
convenient because the wick is sold all over the world. The wickless is
convenient because it is easy to clean and is a bit more rapid in
heating. The kindler is only 10 cents and can be had at all dealers and
when you buy the stove you can get a supply.
You must demand:
No odor whatever
Speedy cooking
Steady flame
Cleanliness and easy to clean
Easily replaceable parts
No smut and dirt
Easy flame control
Oil visible in reservoir
Best materials on the market
Perfect combustion, making for the minimum amount of residue carbon.
With the oil range as well as with the gas, electric and coal range
there can be bought water-heating boilers, ovens, etc.; and with one
stove, special broilers and toasters.
There are two very good ovens on the market to be used with these stoves
and with other kinds as well, each one with its special selling points.
Each is large enough in some size for a 12 pound turkey, each small
enough for the smallest uses (sizes range from 21¹⁄₂″ × 18¹⁄₂″ × 13″ to
13″ × 18¹⁄₂″ × 13″). They weigh from about 12 to 18 pounds. You place
the oven over the surface burner.
One oven maker claims:
Asbestos lining for insulation
Shelves set for 5 different altitudes
Curved top to oven like bakers’ oven to pass off gas and prevent air
pockets
Shelf support growing out of lining
Strap hinges
One motion to handle to open oven door
Door closes only if it locks
Special asbestos lining porcelain enameled heat spreader, triangular
in shape, to deflect heat and prevent burning
Another says of itself:
Special heat resisting lining
Mica windows below to watch flame
Unbreakable glass and unstreamable
Three point locking device on door
All glass door.
The oil range is not cheap. Yet it is a godsend at certain times. We are
not advocating it for general use where pipes and wires and coal are at
our convenient disposal, but we do recommend it forcibly and sincerely
where you want a simple, efficient cooking medium beyond the reach of
the popular sources of heat.
Unless you buy the very best, not merely the best, oil cooker you will
be saddened, and with the best you will sign yourself Pollyanna without
reservations.
Just about now, a new oil range is being advertised. It is a cross
between the wick and the wickless, because it uses an asbestos and brass
thread wick which is almost immortal, for it can be reversed when
charred and when both sides are charred it is burnt off in the stove and
ready to begin its double life again.
Like the wickless stove the flame touches the vessel with the short drum
construction, and like the wick it uses a wick even though quite
different.
The stove is of japanned tin, and is made in cabinet type and in the
ordinary style. It is also in the “best” class.