I have an oven with a self-cleaning cycle. There is currently something wrong with the oven, the top element will not turn on. My DH replaced the element, thinking it was burned out (the oven is 11 years old) but it still won't work. He has checked fuses, etc, to no avail. It is working just fine otherwise, reaches set temps (I started using a thermometer inside to be sure). It really needs to be put through the cleaning cycle but I am afraid it will not reach cleaning temperatures without the top heating element. I am wondering if anyone else has ever used spray oven cleaner inside an oven with a self cleaning cycle? I don't use oven liners and boy, am I regretting it now. Baking sweet potatoes on the rack really did a number on the floor of the oven! Lesson learned! I cleaned up the majority of the mess, but some remains.

I would still try the self-cleaning cycle. It won't make it any worse, and it may heat sufficiently with just the bottom element working.

But to answer your question, yes, I have used spray oven cleaner on a self-cleaning oven.

Mel, I asked DH who used to be in the appliance repair business. First, he gave some repair advice. If your oven has solid stste controls, it is most likely a bad relay. If your controls are mechanical, check your thermostat. In either case, look for a broken wire before buying any more parts. You are correct, the oven will not reach cleaning temp w/o the top element.

That said, you can use oven cleaner in a self cleaning oven, to a point. Only use the kind that works in a cold or preheated oven, and follow the instructions on the can exactly. No heat while the cleaner is setting. As an alternative, I've always had good luck using the foam type orange cleaner.

Hope this helps!

Traveler and Meldin, thanks for your responses!

Unfortunately, it is a moot point. I had three bananas on the counter going bad so I decided to make some banana bread this morning. After the oven preheated, I popped the pan in and 15 minutes later, I noticed that I could REALLY smell it cooking. About two minutes later it registered that I could smell it burning and then the oven started beeping. I ran to it and F2 was flashing on the digital read out along with smoke pouring out of the vent at the back of the cook top. I quickly turned the knob to off, opened the door and BOTH elements were bright RED! I grabbed the pan out of the oven and shut the door to watch to make sure the elements lost their red glow. They did NOT! Even though the knob was turned to off! I quick ran to the breaker box and threw the breaker switch. That is just a little too much excitement for a Wednesday morning!

I called the GE helpline and they said F2 flashing meant that the oven was over heating beyond the desired temp. DUH!! She told me it would be $79 for a service guy to walk through the door. Now we are faced with the decision to repair an eleven year old stove or just go buy a new one. Things are tight right now I don't feel like spending the cash either way.

Meldin, what decision would you and your DH make in this situation?

Needless to say, I am no longer worried about cleaning the oven! I am glad there was no fire, it could have been so much worse.

I'll ask him after work. Sounds like your DH can change out the parts, so that's a good thing. Personally, I wouldn't give up on an eleven year stove. It's just a baby! We'll see what DH says.

I'm glad for you that it wasn't more serious. House fires are NO fun!

Mel, DH said he thinks you need to call out the repair man. Could be a small thing, or could be big, but he'd have to see it to be able to guess. I wish we could be more help! Then decide whether you want to repair or replace.

ATTENTION ALL: DH said you are a lucky one that the pan in your oven didn't burst into flame when you opened the door, and the fact that what was in there was batter (wet) is why that didn't happen. Please, all...if this ever happens to you DO NOT, under any circumstances, open the door or you risk a fire flashing in your face. Scary!!!

Meldin, thanks so much for your responses, and please thank your DH too! You both are very kind to take the time to worry about our problem.

Good advice about opening the door, I thought of that later, just how dangerous it could have been. All I could think about was getting the source of burning away from the heat source. I was really terrified when the oven wouldn't turn off even though I had turned the knob off. I ran to that breaker box double time!

Okay, enough about the excitement. We are looking at new ovens online, still debating whether to buy or repair. They are so expensive. I use my range daily so this one has been well used. It was placed in our home by the builder. We had to replace our GE dishwasher after just six years in our house and that seemed really outrageous to have to replace it that early. We went with a Bosch and it is the best purchase ever made. Our microwave that came with the house is a GE too and the handle is broken, after 11 years. It is about $60 just to replace the handle so we rigged the old on up with a piece of wire running to the middle and attaching the ends to the plastic stubs sticking out of the door. Our kitchen is falling apart!! And since the stove is a GE Profile ceramic top, I am loosing faith in GE products in general. I am just waiting for the refrigerator to go next, it is almost 17 years old! Perhaps it has lasted because it isn't a GE, it is a Kenmore. I begin to wonder if name brands mean anything anymore since they seem to bought out and have no bearing on the original reputation. Sigh!

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Melborne, we have a GE smoothtop stove also....Ours is about 6 years old so no problem there. I saw you had trouble with the handle on your microwave (GE Profile also). Ours broke also but I went to Ace Hardware and got some epoxy glue for plastic to plastic (recommended by the clerk there). My husband put it on and so far the handle is working fine, though we pull very gently now. We had trouble with our GE dishwasheer also but was able to fix it.....I am with you, what is the matter with GE appliances?

I don't post here often, but I can say with certainty, they don't make things like they used to. I ended up throwing out a 2-year-old GE Spacemaker over the range microwave with serious sensor issues and they would not recall this product, I tried to fool the sensor by loading it with my dinner plates and FIL replaced it with a crappy GE model with less features than I had and threw out the other with all my dinner plates in there.) To this day he doesn't know my dishes were in there as DH didn't either. First time I used the new one with the metal rack in it, it arced and burned a hole in the side (still using this one). Shortly after, our less than 2 year-old ceramic-stove top with 2 dual elements ended needing a replacement because they would not turn on...it was covered because of the 2 year warranty, but I was never given any paperwork or explanation as to what or why. DH said they came, replaced the entire element and left. My washer and dryer are GE and are just OK and I'm starting to sweat as they are coming up on 5 years old! I would not recommend them. I can tell you this...I will not EVER buy another GE applicance again. I'm due for a garbage disposal and a dishwasher as I have an In-Sinkerator and I don't believe they make these anymore.

Back to Kenmore for me. JMHO based on my experience. In the meantime, my 10-year-old Kenmore refrigerator is working fine.

"Melbourne," I started reading your post as I had a suggestion on the cleaning part and now am just so grateful that you weren't seriously hurt and that you didn't have a house fire as a result! What a close call; so scary that it could have turned out so much worse.

Perhaps, it is a lesson to all of us to pay attention when something is going wrong with an appliance to not use it until we understand exactly what it is that is wrong!

And, I agree, pay to have a qualified service repairman come out to examine AND fix the oven if you decide to go that route. I understand trying to make everything last a bit longer in this economy but it isn't worth a house fire or medical expenses to do so!

As to the cleaning part, I have SAFELY used Easy-Off Fume-Free Max Lemon Scent Oven Cleaner" in my self-cleaning oven a number of times. You apply it to a cold oven and use "elbow grease" and it works great although with a particularly BAD oven (trying to brown a prime rib did me in), you may have to do it a number of times to get it clean!

PS. I know you are past the "cleaning" part at this point but I posted my experience and what I used for anyone else who finds themselves in the same situation as your initial post indicated.

I have cleaned my selfcleaning oven with a small dish of amoina set in the oven over night the next morning I just wiped the oven out without any heavy scrubing. This will work on any oven.

Oh, my, what an oven adventure you had. Simply glad you are safe and sound.

IMHO, I'd get a new oven rather than repair the old. Is it an oven and stove top in one? Electric? We recently bought a new electric oven for the house that is for sale. It has a ceramic top. It was under $500, I think even under $400. I did not need one with bells and whistles which kept the price down.

As for cleaning, I've always used the spray oven cleaner on my other six year old oven (different house) and have never used the oven's built-in clean cycle. It just seemed like a waste of money to me to heat the thing up to clean it when the spray works just fine.

Please let us know what you decide to do.

Thanks for everyone's advice and concern! We are still counting our blessings that we didn't have a big 'ol fire!

We decided that it would not be comfortable to have a "faulty" stove. It just didn't seem reassuring that a service call would fix the issue so we decided to purchase a new stove.

We bought one last night...after shopping TH, F, and Saturday. We ended up going with another GE....Hope we won't regret it! I loved the way my old one cooked...on the stove top and in the oven. I never had a cool spot in the oven, even when it was stuffed full with several dishes. The ceramic cooktop was awesome, heating quickly and evenly and was very easy to clean. So we went with a GE again...they get very high praise all over the internet too so that was reassuring.

We bought the GE Adora ceramic topped electric range, 5.3 cubic feet in the oven with "hidden" elements in the oven (have no idea if this is a good or bad feature but lots of different brands have them) and a fifth "warming" eye on the stove top. It also comes with convection cooking option and ceramic covered oven racks (3 of them!) that can be put through the self cleaning cycle.

Did I need all this? No. But we figured if we were going to make the purchase, we need to "just do it". We use our range everyday, sometimes several times a day. I will certainly use the warming eye. I love cooking on an ceramic top and have no trouble keeping it clean. I hope the interior will be easy to keep clean with no exposed elements and I am hoping the enameled racks will do better than my metal ones on the last range in the clean cycle- the old ones always dragged after cleaning and I had to oil the edges with veg oil. I hope to figure out how to use the convection oven option to make cooking quicker.

I get delivery on Wednesday! I'll post and let you know if it is the dream I hope it is!

I HAVE A SELF CLEANING OVEN AND HAVE USED THE FUME FREE OVEN CLEANER FOR SELF CLEANING OVENS ALSO. I USE IT TO SPOT CLEAN AFTER USING THE SELF CLEANING CYCLE. MY PROBLEM IS THE INNER GLASS DOOR OF THE OVEN. THINGS SPLATTER ON IT AND GET BAKED ON BEFORE I NEED TO CLEAN THE OVEN ITSELF. IF I'M SPECIALLY LAZY AND DON'T WIPE IT UP, THE STUFF JUST KEEPS BAKING ON. RIGHT NOW IT LOOKS JUST AWFUL AND I NEED AN EASY WAY TO CLEAN IT, WITHOUT HAVING TO SCRUB FOR HOURS. ANY SUGGESTIONS? THANKS.

Wouldn't the spray oven cleaner work on the glass door? You could spray it on and leave the door open for the required time frame then wipe it clean.

Melbourne, congratulations on your new purchase!!!! I am so glad you bought a new one. Looking forward to your updates!!!

"Judy from ALA," I used the Easy-Off Fume Free Oven Cleaner on the interior glass window of my oven as well as the oven itself with good results.

BUT I didn't want the cleaner to run down into the area between the glass and the other so I just laid the door down, sprayed, waited 30 minutes or so and then did the cleaning with the door in the horizontal position!

Worked for me!

THANKS TO YOU AND CHARCOAL'S MOM. I'LL GIVE IT A TRY TOMORROW. SURE WILL BE A LOT EASIER THAN STANDING THERE AND SCRUBBING!

Congratulations on the upgrade. I lived in my house 14 years before upgrading the cooktop.. we were redoing the counter so decided to get rid of the 20 year old electric cooktop for a kenmore induction cooktop. What a dream! Like going from the stone age to the space age.
Still have the old oven (wall unit). Only use it on Christmas and Thanksgiving. I'm over due for a new bbq tho.
For people who really like to search out bargains, if you pick out a few options for your new range or cooktop, and have the time, you can usually find tremendous deals on craigslist from folks who are simply remodeling and are selling perfectly good, relatively new appliances for cheap. I recently saw the exact cooktop I bought on craigslist for 2/3rds cheaper than I paid.

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Thanks, everyone, for your well wishes and congrats! I got the new range delivered today and after the delivery company left, I found it only had two racks in the oven. I called Home Depot and they checked the floor model (a stainless) and said that my cheaper, white model was supposed to only come with two racks in spite of the fact that it has the same size oven. They graciously told me to come in a pick up a third shelf (without charge) if I would like to since that wasn't clarified on the day of purchase. So I did! I figured it was my right to have what I thought I purchased, especially since I specifically asked about the third rack.

Anyway, so far so good. I baked a cake with my DD this afternoon and it baked like a dream! I am excited to figure out how to use the convection feature and all the other options too.

Off to cook my dinner....

Aww, Mel. Congratulations!!! Happy cooking and baking. Wish I lived closer...