In your electric oven, it’s cooking power comes as a result of two heating elements – one heating element at the top of the oven and another hidden away at the bottom of the oven. If one element is faulty, then the cooking power of your oven drops significantly. Either element could go bad, and typically, this is diagnosed visually. After about ten minutes of preheating, the element in your electric oven should be orange, glowing with heat. In order to see the bottom hidden element, you will need to remove the cover before turning on your oven. If you wait and the element is not orange, it could be faulty and needs to be replaced.
Replacing the Heating Element in Your Oven
If your oven utilizes a hidden-bake element feature, the replacement process will not match up with this and typically requires an appliance service professional to conduct the repair.
Before beginning this repair, you need to disconnect your electric oven from the power. Electric ovens typically have two house fuses that will both need to be shut off. If you skip this step, you risk injury as well as potential damage to the control board in your oven.
Once done, you need to remove the bottom panel inside the oven tub. If you were diagnosing which heating element was broken, then this step is likely already completed. Now you will need to remove the screws that connect the heating oven to the base of the oven. Next, remove the mounting screws at the back wall connecting the heating element to the wall.
Now you can gently pull the heating element forward which will pull out the connecting wires. Gently tug the wires from the heating element, careful not to let them slip back inside the holes. You can now fully remove the old heating element.
Installing the replacement heating element is simple. Before positioning it, you want to connect the wires first. Once done, you can slide the wires back into the hole and position the heating element correctly. Once you have secured all the mounting screws, you can replace the panel that hides the element and fully reassemble your oven. To test if it is working, you can leave the bottom panel off to do a visual inspection or use a thermometer to test for accurate temperatures.