How To Replace Your Cooker Element & Keep Your Cooker Working

How To Replace Your Cooker Element

Next to your fridge, the cooker is the one appliance which is used on a daily basis – helping you cook all those dishes your family love. But, as a result of heavy use, over time faults can develop.

One such fault is the oven element becoming faulty. Subtle signs the element in your cooker is no longer performing as it should, include:

  1. Your oven failing to heat up
  2. The fan working but your oven failing to heat up
  3. Your oven cooking unevenly

If you’re experiencing any of these, then you will need replace the oven element – and in this post, we explain how to carry out such a repair, and also why your fan oven element may fail in the first place.

Why Does a Fan Oven Element Fail?

The element in your oven is responsible for providing the heat in the appliance, with the heat then dispersed around the cooker by the fan. However, if the element is unable to reach the required temperatures due to a fault, heat cannot be dispersed and your food will not cook / will cook unevenly or will take a considerable amount of time to cook.

There are a handful of reasons why your fan oven element will develop a fault, including:

  1. General wear and tear as a result of age
  2. The thermostat failing to cycle resulting in the element overheating and failing
  3. The fan motor becoming caked in grease / dirt from cooking, causing the element to overheat and blow

And whilst there is no set expected lifespan of an oven element, should yours become faulty or damaged in either way you will be pleased to know that it is fairly easy and cheap to replace – meaning you can return your cooker back to its peak performance.

Replacing an Oven Element:

Before replacing an oven element, it’s important to remember not all cooker elements are equal and therefore not all will fit your model. But you can ensure you get the correct cooker element replacement, by making a note of your model number. The graphic below will help you locate this, if you’re not sure where to find it – and we have over 4800 cooker elements to choose from to further help you get the perfect replacement part.

When it comes to replacing the element on your cooker, there are typically two ways to do it – depending on the make and model you have – and both are outlined below.

Method One:

The first method to replace the element in your cooker is to remove the inside back panel, and this can be done by removing the screws from each corner of the panel. Once the screws have been removed and the panel lifted out the way, you should then have unrestricted access to the exposed element.

It is worth noting that the element will typically be held in place by two screws, one on either side, and these will need to be removed before you can bring the element out of place. To finally free the element from your cooker, you will also need to disconnect the wires by gently sliding the silver connectors out of place.

Once the old element is out of place, fit the new one by reversing the steps above – and you can see how easy it is to replace your cooker element following this method, in the video below.

Method Two:

The second method, which is typical for Gorenje cookers and many other models, will require you to firstly remove the door, which can be done by opening it fully, releasing the hinge locking tabs and then slowly closing and lifting the door out of place.

Once your cooker door has been removed, unscrew the screws which hold the inner fan oven element cover in place to reveal the element. You may also need to remove the back and top covers by removing the screws which hold them in place – this will then give you better access to the element.

You may also need to remove the cooker out of its cavity, if the element being held in place by bolts which will need undoing from the back to remove the element.

See how easy it is to replace the element using this method, by watching our video below.

Whichever method you’re required to follow to replace the element in your cooker,  by taking the time to repair the fault yourself, not only can you bring your appliance back to its former glory and working to its optimum level, but you can also save yourself a considerable amount of money in both the short and long term.

NB: Before carrying out such a repair, please make sure your appliance is switched off and unplugged.

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