a video of it would be cool.

@deeageaux: Its really so minimal i doubt there is a different on the high end. Ie a bigger difference is noticed on the low end, with the high end and all the extra BTUs i doubt it. Not to mention i vary rarely uses high heat. If you like I can put all my burners on high and put my hand on the grates to see if i can notice a difference.

Mangiamo: Im no cook, but could you use a smaller pan to try to reduce the hot surface area? Maybe its spread out so much its drying faster. Although if you used the same pan in the past on a GE range and had no problem the CC should also be able to do it.

soibean: I'm in andover, ma. Our rice also comes out killer. Trevor was nice enough to make that rice video at the time.

Unfortunately my video equipment is in CA, we are doing some filming with Modern-Aire Hoods next week. When I get back I will do that for sure. In the mean time i am going to buy a new screw driver today so i can tell everyone what size they need, I will try to take some pictures of what needs to be done.

I think the procedure to adjust flame height is the same between BS and the CC. A Capital owner can correct this if I am wrong, but I think all you have to do to adjust the flame is remove the knob and use a skinny screwdriver to turn the setscrew in the valve down. This is the same procedure on a Bluestar burner. I think it works the same on a CC.

@deeageaux: Its really so minimal i doubt there is a different on the high end. Ie a bigger difference is noticed on the low end, with the high end and all the extra BTUs i doubt it. Not to mention i vary rarely uses high heat. If you like I can put all my burners on high and put my hand on the grates to see if i can notice a difference.

I was wondering about that. Can someone confirm whether or not adjusting the low end effects the high end at all? It's a whole new ballgame if it does.

-Stooxie

mojavean, your video looks exactly like what Trevor did on the CC.

>>>Can someone confirm whether or not adjusting the low end effects the high end at all? It's a whole new ballgame if it does.

Yeah, you might actually drop down from 22K BTU to 21.9K and you won't be able to cook properly. Oh, the horror :-)

Yeah, you might actually drop down from 22K BTU to 21.9K and you won't be able to cook properly. Oh, the horror :-)

Weissman, I appreciate that you're being light hearted but I am curious, it might not be so rosy. If I turn the dial 10% to get a 10% lower simmer am I taking the top end down by 10%? That means going from 23,000 to 20,700.

I have NO idea if that is reality but I would definitely love to know.

-Stooxie

Stooxie - I agree, I've been wondering about this as well. Good point about the percentages -- though as a guess (guess only, mind you), I imagine things are, fortunately, closer to weissman's, um, "estimate".

Truthfully, the full-on high flame actually licks up the side of most of my pots, so turning it down a tad there probably won't be all terrible. Still, I agree: it would be nice for someone to load some curves showing this. I would bet they exist already.

Everyone, thank you for taking the time to comment. All your suggestions are very much appreciated.

Trevor, thank you volunteering to help out with this video as well as all the other videos.

Mojavean I look forward to seeing your video this evening when I have a little more time. Thank you for posting.

The question from stooxi is a failed one so asked the head engineer his response was....

Trevor

Adjusting the low end has absolutely no impact on the high end.

Joey

"Yeah, you might actually drop down from 22K BTU to 21.9K and you won't be able to cook properly. Oh, the horror :-)"

was exactly my point. You wouldn't be able to turn down the simmer 10% of the 22k btu. This would make the Igniter click for sure. I think we're talking like 1% MAX, probably more like .25%. Its just enough to basically get the large burner head to have enough gas to make a flame in all the burner holes. If it does affect over all burner performance, just make the flame bigger on the other burners you dont simmer on. If its a new stove, it might just take some getting used to too. I know with rice, I have to be dead on with the timing or it will over cook. Do they make large simmer plates? I would imagine you would want one that is the size of the grate so it acts as a radiator where not under the flame.

Also someone is going to have to teach me how to wok cook with the heat on full blast. I tried it once in a seasoned wok and everything including the peanut oil basically vaporized. You can get a dam good steak and scallop sear that's for sure.

Oh, Tony -- I found that full-on heating for the wok scary too but so satisfying! For the first time in my life we have crispy stir-fried vegetables and everyone else even likes them too! I think you're allowed to turn it down once the oil vaporizes. ;)

Truthfully, the full-on high flame actually licks up the side of most of my pots, so turning it down a tad there probably won't be all terrible

That's totally fine but IF what we are saying is true (and I am being very careful not to say it is until we get a ruling on the top end) then marketing "True Simmer" and "23,000 BTU burners" at the same time is false. They would be exclusive of each other on the same burner.

-Stooxie

Adjusting the low end has absolutely no impact on the high end.

Ok, good to know!

-Stooxie

I wonder if we can turn up the high end now...

Soibean--yes, that helps. The problem is that I've done the screw driver adjustment already on one burner. I turned it down a little too far so that my lowest knob setting initiates the ignitor clicking. Obviously, I turned it down too low and need to tinker again.

BUT...even when I turn the burner up just enough to engage all the ports which makes the clicking stop, my food on that burner still boils too rapidly for what I consider acceptable!!!

Stooxie--it's true that adjusting the simmer screw has no effect on the max.

However, if they (Capital and/or service companies) are derating the burners (putting in a smaller orifice) to get them to simmer properly then, yes, they are lessening the BTUs from 23,000.

Fouramblues - I have a Precision (four years now) and the simmer is great no matter the size or content of the pot/pan. I will admit that the simmer was high on arrival and needed to be adjusted by a service call. Ever since then, no problems in that area. I did keep one of the burners at the higher simmer level just for variety.

Good luck to everyone with simmer issues on the CC.

The screwdriver has a 3/32" blade width.

1/8" is too big.

Someone said and I agree that physics sets the lower limit of the heat produced on simmer. For each gas port there is a point at which the flame goes out. Let's say that at the point which the flame stays lit it produces 100BTU (I made up this number for the example). If there are 100 gas ports then the minimum BTU is 100 x 100BTU = 10,000 BTU. If there are 50 gas ports the same size, then the minimum BTU is half that.

Based on this gas burner design and the number of ports you can see why so much heat is produced at the lowest simmer. That is why some stoves use a stacked burner -- so the smaller burner at the top of the stack can act as the simmer burner without contribution from the gas ports that generate the high BTU on full power.

Billy

Billy: your explanation is about as clear as one could illustrate. I have been trying to say that exact same thing way before the simmer became an issue on gw. As trevor said, simmer issue aside it is still a fine range. Definately the second best on the market! :). (KIDDING)

tyguy... funny you should say that, I sent Capital an email today about these simmer threads currently running on here,

One part of my very long email said....

"""""If you fill in the holes on the two outer rings you would have 22 holes which would make the CC have a lower simmer than the BS, based on the fact the BS has 35 holes, BS is your direct competition."""""

Amazing coincidence. but its true less holes less heat, pretty simple.

If Capital did this would that make it Definitely the best on the market! :). (KIDDING)

Just Joking with you of course, but that was in my email......

tvguy, I basically got this thought from your comments and decided to explain it in more detail here.

Trevor is right, it is pretty simple in terms of the number of gas ports, and if Capital adds some simmer burners BS will still be second-best on the market... Just Kidding!

Billy

Trevor,

Wouldn't it be cool if you could slide a lever and cover up some holes to switch a burner from regular to simmer? Or have an electric/solenoid control for this on the front of the stove?

Even the ability to swap the burner heads manually would be great.

This assumes the orifice still works and there is no unsafe gas leakage.

Billy

Trevor: I could probably go and count mine...but are you saying that 35 is the number of holes on the BS "simmer" burner?

It seems to me, having cooked only on BS open burner, that this is indeed a number of holes issue. Frankly I find BS 22K too high for "simmer", especially as it seems it is being defined here and without a huge pan. I find my 15K is Ok for simmer on pretty big pans, and the small burner fine for smaller. So frankly I would say unless I had the option of moving my pan from the larger 22 to the smaller burners for simmer I would be not so happy with BS either. It does seem to be a fact of life that one burner cannot be all things to everyone....and every situation. I frequently find I get my stews etc all sauteed up and going on 22k but when I want them to quietly mature and simmer I need to move them down a burner or two.

>If Capital did this would that make it Definitely the best on the market! :). (KIDDING)

Harhar!! I know are (sort of). :)

I was actually going to write in a previous thread that my prediction is that capital will introduce a simmer burner in the near future. I figured you (trevor) would be all over capital like a cheap suit and I have a feeling kalsi is less arrogant towards trevor than he is towards his customers idea's. And I am a pretty intuitive person.

tvguy, that's going a little far. Mr. Kalsi is the opposite from what you say -- he actually LISTENS very well to the market and to his customers which is why he came out with the CC in the first place. I would say it has been a huge success. No doubt he will continue to make improvements and adjustments as he always has.

I'm starting to think you have a personal vendetta against Mr. Kalsi. I hope not; Gardenweb is not the right place for that. Otherwise I enjoy hearing your perspective.

Billy

>>>It does seem to be a fact of life that one burner cannot be all things to everyone....and every situation.

Actually it can - it's called a dual stacked sealed burner - and DCS (which was started by the people who started Capital) invented it, I think. Wolf now has it as well. But it is a sealed burner which some people don't like. For me, the highs I get on the 17.5K burners are more than enough and I don't have uneven heating that some people seem to feel you get with sealed burners. But the big advantage is that I have an incredibly low simmer (as well as the high BTUs) on all the burners. No shuffling around pots for me or twiddling with screwdrivers to adjust simmers. I wouldn't be happy with a single simmer burner, by the way. And yes, I stir fry regularly and don't steam the food with the sealed burners as some people seem to think happens.

I find it somewhat ironic that the same people who poo-poo sealed burners are now wringing their hands about simmering on their open burners. To each their own.

Hey Weismann, I mentioned the stacked burner in one of my posts above as a solution to the simmer issue.

My understanding of stacked burners is the design can be used on either open or sealed burners.

So don't start an open versus sealed burner debate when it's irrelevant to simmer.

Billy

ROFLMAO! Before venturing too far to blame open burners, some people might want to familiarize themselves with the universal burner design that prevailed in 90% of the last century. Great simmer, open--and on a lot of models, stacked. Some of the O'Keefe's produced around 15-17K BTUs, too.

>If Capital did this would that make it Definitely the best on the market! :). (KIDDING)

Or one could very easily conclude that the cc will be one step closer to being as good as a bs! :)

Trevor,
I really hope with all of the discussion around this that Capital takes some kind of action. I wonder if you could comment on why some people (like you) are able to get the CC to an acceptable simmer temperature, while others seem to be unable to adjust the burners low enough without the clicking. Given the number of complaints, it seems unlikely that pots or elevation are the culprits, although it's hard to say for sure.

Because we can't possibly assume what pots everyone has, I think there might be room for marginal error on this front as well. Personally, the pots I have, once brought to a boil (doesn't matter if I move them to a dedicated simmer or not), retain so much heat that a simmer is near impossible. Maybe some of the people experiencing simmer issues can look to the craftmanship of their pots & pans as well?

If some people think the simmer is perfect on the CC and some think it needs work, I would lean towards other variables as well as challenging the design of the burners themselves.

Caveat: I do not own a CC, but have cooked on one and have seen the simmer work beautifully.

PS - Trevor posted a video yesterday comparing a simmer on the CC with and without a simmer plate. View it by clicking the link below.

Here is a link that might be useful: GQ Simmer Comparison Test

Soibean - nicely put. There is some animosity in tone around here (for which I apologize for my part in), and it's way better to back it off. I sure don't know everything (despite what I tell my kids): help us to get to where you are, Trevor! [but note that I don't think the screwdriver port-turning-down will work in my case at least since mine are Capital-technicians-set and infinitely close to clicking already -- nevertheless I'm willing to give tinkering with gas flow a shot].

Camelgirl: thanks for pointing out the link. As for pans, in my case, I use (for simmering) le cresuet of many sizes and shapes, uncoated cast iron, revereware and canning-aluminum. All of them boil, not simmer. And that after a long, long while too, so even the heavy cast iron would have had ample time to cool down were it going to.

I like your point, though, about looking for other reasons besides burner design. Anyone? over.

woops, the link I posted above should be titled GW not GQ. :)

I posted these comments about simmer plates in one of the other threads, and I am copying it here.

I've come to the conclusion that simmer plates do very little on the CC, even if they are dimpled or rippled. I also think I know why.

Simmer plates help spread the heat and they slow the transfer of heat from the burner, but they CANNOT reduce the amount of heat coming from the burner. Some types of simmer plates (especially the double-layer ones) channel the heat away from the center of the burner, but if you are using a big pot the heat will hit the bottom of the pot anyway, regardless of whether there is a simmer plate underneath it. This is why big pots with stews, beans, etc. that you want to simmer keep boiling over -- the wide bottom of the pot catches almost all the heat from the burner even if you put one or two or three simmer plates between the burner and the pot as I have tried.

I hope this helps explain why simmer plates don't work to reduce the heat from a simmer burner that is too hot. The heat is going straight up and the simmer plate slows the heat transfer at first, but once it gets hot so does the pot. The fact that the simmer plate creates an air gap with the pan doesn't do anything -- there is already an air gap between the flames and the bottom of the simmer plate or pan and that doesn't stop the heat!

Almost all simmer plates are smaller than large pots, so simmer plates flatly don't work when the pot is much wider than the simmer plate. The simmer plate just diverts the heat to the edges of the pot (LOL, just like a closed burner) and the pot gets hot anyway.

A simmer plate with a small pot might work if the bottom of the pot is smaller than the simmer plate.

For me, simmer is tougher to achieve in a big pot than in a small pot on a CC, although on other stoves the opposite is often true.

It might be possible to design a large simmer plate that diverts the heat away from the pot but (1) this would be a large and unwieldy simmer plate, and (2) this would cause the heat to be channeled toward other pots and pot handles on the stove -- which is hardly a good solution.

Billy

So I guess that's why my husband's gerry-rigged one doesn't do much either?

He worked so hard on it!

Hi everyone

I tried to simmer this evening following service call screwdriver adjustment and still found the simmer to be high. jscout posted on another thread a different adjustment (in addition to the screwdriver intervention). I will give that a try and hopefully we can get this machine working at its best.

Good morning everyone.

Some good news. We used the lodge cast iron griddles this morning. One double griddle pro logic and two single burner pro logic. I preheated on simmer for all 4 burners. The results were much better than before the screwdriver adjustment. There must have been a little taming of the heat.

I would suggest that it is a good idea to have service (or yourself) try the screwdriver adjustment. It seems to have helped a little.

Woo hoo! Now try jscout's ignitor nudges -- together these little tricks might just be enough?!

I've yet to find a screwdriver that will reach. My electronics ones have a join that precludes reaching. Two hardware stores' were duds. Turning the storeroom upside down for "precision" screwdrivers yielded, at last, the sets but none at 3/32" Frustrating! Where did y'all find yours that work? We have approximately 1.2 x 10^6 screwdrivers around here yet none is correct. Grrrrrrrrrr.

I'm still hoping that someone can walk me through Jscout's adjustment.

As for the screwdriver, DH tried Sears last night being unable to find it at a couple of other stores. Still no luck. He's going to a specialty hardware store this week.

And I will call Capital tomorrow.

Breezy -- I was literally shifting about in my car for the key to head over to Sears to look for this stupid screwdriver. Thanks for the heads-up! I'll skip that trip....

If anyone happens to find it just at Home Depot, could you please post that? Else, I'm not sure where to head to. And I live in ground zero for consumerism. Maybe an appliance service store I know of near here...?

Aliris--might call your Sears first to ask before ruling them out. Just looked at their website, and they might sell one that works. Our Sears is small so inventory differences could mean you might have better luck at your store.

I bought mine at an Ace hardware. Amazon has them. See link below.

Billy

Here is a link that might be useful: Amazon 3/32 slotted screwdriver

@billy_g - your link brings up a list with many different variations; how long does the shaft need to be?

Hi everyone. I'm sorry for not responding sooner I just came back from running some errands. My DH (I think this means dear husband) said his was purchased in a specialty store that services cameras. He is going to find the name and the link.

Please understand that I am still having an issue with the simmer for stews, sauces and the like. I just wanted to post some good news that the cast iron griddles no longer smoked when I heated them up on simmer.

However in a misguided attempt to pan sear on medium some salmon fillets before I put them in the oven I created a nice Jackson Pollock oil splatter all over my beautiful statuario backsplash. I must confess I was warned about the marble and went in with my eyes wide open. The culinarian on the other hand.....

I would like to sign off LOL which for the longest time I thought meant Lots of Love.

But the real LOL is what keeps me centered. And several glasses of wine.

Screwdriver Solution: For those of you who are having trouble finding a screwdriver just make one. When I did not have a small screwdriver long enough to reach the adjustment screw I was not going to waste the gas trying to find one.

Just take a piece of wire or coat hanger, flatten the end a little with a hammer then use a small, fine file to shape the end, then bend the other end so you can turn it. It make take a few tries to get the flattened thin enough to fit the slot inside the gas valve stem but in less than five minutes you can make one.

Hi everyone

My DH said the one used for the service call was purchased at home depot. It is their Workforce brand and is 2.5 x 50 mm slotted screwdriver (we're in Canada eh). If you find it too short DH recommends

http://www.wihatools.com/200seri/260pico.htm

Good choices would be 2 x 60 mm or 2 x 100mm, or 2.5 x 75 mm or 2.5 x 100 mm. The technician said the 50mm length was a little short.

PeterH2,

The shaft is 2-1/2 inches long and that was just enough. I wouldn't go shorter.

The one I bought from Ace Hardware is stock number 2167054.

IceMan -- great idea!!!

Billy

I bought my screwdriver at an electrical supply house. But I saw the same brand of tools in the electrical department at HD, so it should be available there.

Here is a link that might be useful: Klein Tools Mini Screwdriver