Can you give us the model number, and the age, of this appliance? Is it a cooktop or a stove? Induction, or electric? What sort of pan were you using?

Sure I can ! It's a Frigidaire "Gallery series" .
Model #GLEF379DSG . It's a whole stove - electric- ceramic/glass cook top with a circulating fan in the oven & I paid $686.00 for it --- 6 years ago . I was using a 10" flat ,no stick griddle that I've used dozens of times before. This just baffles me . Since posting this on the few forums that I visit on the internet - it seems like it's not common - but it does happen.
I'm a stained glass artist - so I know about how goofy glass can behave - but being professionally manufactured , there shouldn't be any flaws in the glass.

That's a ten inch square griddle? Not a double one? If so, I'm baffled too. If long over two burners, perhaps there was some issue with uneven heating?

Is there any chance there was some moisture either on the burner or the bottom of the griddle? One hears that that can create a hot enough spot to cause a crack.

Have you checked the flatness of the bottom with a straight edge to make sure it hasn't warped? And created a hot air pocket?

Is there any chance there was some kind of tiny warping tension on the glass such that it finally gave in?

Yeah, you hear of people breaking the glass, but usually it's when they've dropped a pot or created a really big thermal shock.

Baffling. Much sympathy.

I racked my brain thinking of what I could have done wrong.
Yes - I bought a brand new griddle because my old one was so uneven , it rocked on the burner . I splurged and bought a good one,too ! I never cooked on a dirty surface - I was always there with the cooktop cleaner and a razor blade ( as per the instructions) This just has me scratching my head .

I've had stained glass break like that before. It's fine and all of a sudden it cracks . It's usually from a stress fracture .... a manufactures defect ...either it's not cooled right -- or there's a microscopic air bubble or an unseen flaw. Mass produced glass stove tops ( I believe) are perfected . Pyrex had trouble with their glass exploding. I'm on a mission now ... questioning every stove mgf.. and asking why . Thanks for your interest in my post . You guys are the greatest !

In the terminology, it's vitroceramic (not tempered glass). Technically speaking.

I remember seeing that, in the descriptions of the cooktop "glass".

I haven't managed to find much information about vitroceramico. When I went web searching I came back with nothing. Not even on wikipedia. Here is
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CorningWare
"... a unique pyroceramic glass cookware resistant to thermal shock, that was first introduced in 1958 by Corning Glass Works. CorningWare is notable for the fact that it can be used directly on the stovetop."

What IS vitroceramic and what are its physical properties? File this under complaint and problem. i think there should have been some factual information at some point in time. The cooktop manufacturers could point to it.

Just like when you cut glass, you score it first and then tap it, even a lightly scratched cooktop can shatter with only a slight amount of force/energy applied. It's a testament to how well these things are manufactured that it doesn't happen more often, and is exceedingly rare indeed. That's also the reason that folks are warned away from using cast iron. It's not the cast iron, it's the possibility of burrs on that cast iron coupled with it's weight that can lead to some pretty nasty scratches. I've also seen one shatter from someone laying down a lid from a hot pot. The steam sealed it to the surface, and when the air inside cooled, it created a vacuum and that shattered a hole in the cooktop. Not to mention the usual shattering from the case of the dropsies.

I was reading somewhere that Pyrex has had problems recently because they changed the formulation of their 'glass'. The older stuff was a more-expensive 'glass' than the newer stuff and the newer stuff is more fragile.

FYI. My daughter has this same glass cooktop, 5 years old and in excellent condition. Last week she removed a pan lid, set it on the cooktop over the warming burner that was not turned on. Shortly the glass cooktop exploded under the pan lid. Glass sprayed all over the kitchen; thankfully she had her back to the cooktop at the time. She plans to contact Frigidaire..she does not plan to replace this cooktop with another glass top type.

I have heard of this in rare instances also.

After six years, I think we can be pretty sure it's not a manufacturing defect. Even if it was , I think your quest would be a fool's errand as the only one that is perfect is the almighty.

The rest of us can strive for perfection but ALWAYS fall short , especially on repetitive processes.

Now to the practical side of your situation. I'm guessing that you'll want to start shopping for a new stove. The glass for that cooktop will be at least $200 and might be closer to 300. Add one to two hours of labor and you are easily looking at close to $500 in repair cost. Then you'll have to factor in risk of the tech damaging your floor, counter, cabinets, ect... just getting the unit in and out to make the repair.

Let's say all that goes swimmingly, you'll still have 60 -80% of the original cost of the stove just in the one repair, and the rest of the unit will still be six years old.

Two posts up from yours LWO explains why that likely happened. Every appliance probably has some things that you just shouldn't do to them and/or be careful about. For example on this forum you can read plenty of warnings about getting the igniters wet on a gas burner when cleaning. Accidents happen, but if they were particularly common the problem would get a lot more press.

The exact thing happened to us. My wife was cooking food and she heard a loud horrific explosion sort of sound and the glass was in pieces and many pieces went to the kitchen floor and on the sides. We were very happy with this cooktop and could not even imagine that it will burst into pieces. My wife and daughter were in the kitchen at the time of incident and are still in shock. I need to report this incident to Frigidaire but could not find any link. If some one knows the link then please share with us

I just had the same experience. My top is over 10 years old and we were bring water to a boil when the top literally exploded. It sent glass all over the counter and the floor. I'm floored that this happened.

Call the US Product Safety Commission and Report the incident with serial number and model number. Mine blew up--Frigidaire Professional series. US PSC has had hundreds of reports and serious injuries. Add to the data. You can go to the website and file a report. Please do so, Frigidaire originally denied responsibility. When I said that USPSC noted a recall, they offered me new switches for my exploded stove. Mine was ten years old.

Yes - CPSC : http://www.cpsc.gov/en/About-CPSC/Contact-Information/

800-638-2772

Years ago they visited my house to take a report on a swing set. I took the opportunity to show them an exploding gas burner too!

Glad everyone's OK...

Actually, I had a pyrex pan explode inside the oven recently. yikes.

Same thing happened to mine. Frigidaire 8 years old

That is some serious incidence. And Fridgidair will be in the hook to replace those appliances. It has not happened yet but a very serious injury is waiting to happen.

I had a glass cooktop 2 houses back. I literally was in the other room, stove was not even on, and I heard a loud pop.. went in and it took me like 10 minutes to figure out the cooktop, which had not been on, had cracked. At that time, they wanted like $750 to replace it and the stove only cost like $950. So, we got rid of the cooktop and won't ever own another.

R

We had this happen to a Frigidaire radiant cooktop last fall. I too wasn't sure what caused the crack: the only thing I can think of was that I was cooking on high - usually I cook medium high. But we are in the process of remodeling and was planning on replacing it anyway. The cooktop was also really old. Our next cooktop will be induction.

It happened to us twice . Our whirlpool cook top exploded for no obvious reason.. The first time , it was replaced . Then 6 months later the new one exploded . I need to replace but scared it may happen again.

Just happened to me yesterday. Very bad experience I wouldn't wish on anyone. The maytag stove is not new, I grant you, and it was "busy" at the time. Two of us were in the room when out of nowhere, a huge blast, with the sound of a shotgun, went off. She was standing closer, and was slammed by the steam cloud propelled outward (she was okay, but deathly frightened.) An OPEN inexpensive metal pan o the burner was heating some kind of rice dish leftover. After the blast, I saw the cooktop had caved in, but only directly the burner surface where it happened. Spider cracks radiated out on the cooktop, but didn't reach the other half of the top, and broken glass was not spewed around the room at all. In fact, the other 3 burners still work..

But here's what's chilled us all. When I eventually looked up, I saw that the raised wall behind our stove, and the skylight above that, about 10 feet above the stove, were covered in steaming wet rice.

To sum up, a burner under a glass cook top exploded out of nowhere, wth enough force not only to blow the saucepan off, but to propel the substantial contents of the simmering pot at least 15 feet skyward. No one badly hurt, but just through dumb luck. I'm not cleaning it yet.. if even the remotest possibility that something potentially deadly like this could happen with a product with no recalls ever issued, I'm starting to think legal options are not off the table even though the guarantee had expired long ago.

My Frigidaire Gallery cracked all the way across like a windshield at about 7 years old. I had the cooktop portion replaced. Moved it to my guest house a few years later and replaced it with beautiful gas.

Our kitchenaid oven stove top just exploded and It even damaged our new jenn-air fridge. We reported it to whirlpool the maker of these and they are acting like they do not need to replace any of this. I think they should. Has anyone else argued w the maker? Did anyone get there stove tops etc replaced?

They act like they never made it.

I too had a Whirlpool glass range top explode (like a gunshot) about 6 months while using 3 of the 4 burners. It was 4 years old. We replaced it about 2 months ago and tonight the top was off and I had the lower oven (it is the model with two ovens) on 350• I had just poured cake batter into a rectangular glass baking pan and I placed it on the cooktop before even putting it in the oven- (it was room Temp) and the same thing happened! What is the deal???

That's puzzling. When people say "glass top" what they really mean is "glass ceramic". The material is much more resilient than borosilicate glass let alone mere tempered soda lime glass.

It has pretty much zero thermal expansion coefficient, and it also doesn't have the built-in stress that makes tempered glass so vulnerable to minor scratches. It also is pretty impact resistant overall.

It can get scratches though, if you regularly move heavy pots with uneven bottoms across the cooktop. This would include cast iron (but not enameled cast iron) and unglazed ceramics. And some people say that scratches will ultimately weaken the material.

I am impressed that this type of damage would happen within only 2 months though.

That is exactly what happened with my glass cooktop. I laid a lid on the side that was not turned on and a few minutes later it just exploded, broken glass all over the top!

This just happened to the control panel on my mother in laws brand new (20 days old) GE Profile range. Super disappointed. What a piece of crap

Mine did the same thing today . I had turned it on for five minutes but mine was 32 years old, so it didn’t owe me anything

very loud and scared the daylights out of me!

I have just moved into a new house that has a glass Euromaid freestanding. It is new, and I have used it about three times. I took the tray out of the oven to use it and popped it on the cooktop at the back. I went to turn on the water at the front to boil it and I have accidentally turned on the back element. The glass melted where it was touching the trayand when I have taken it off a huge chunk of glass ceramic has been taken out of the cooktop. $900 to replace the glass! I’m sitting with a decision but I’m leaning towards replacing the stove which is absolutely ridiculous giving that it’s a brand-new stove! Of course Euromaid want nothing to do with it!

Well, my GE profile induction range just exploded an hour ago. We bought it on Labor day…this year so it has only been used 4 months. I’m sick, I loved this stove. I made supper and was all done cooking at 6:00 and it exploded all over the kitchen at 8:15. I will be looking for the warranty tomorrow. I sure hope they will give me a new one and make this right. This is a $2600.00 stove!

@Mary Anderson, the oven door glass shattered? Or the cooktop glass? My GE Profile radiant range (not induction) is 18yo and neither the door glass nor the cooktop glass has broken.

What exploded is the control panel. You can still see everything through the shattered panel and oddly enough it still works!

That's a different situation than the usual breakage. Be interesting to hear how GE responds. They'll probably accuse you of having dropped something on it (or some other misusage). An impact would reasonably be indicated by the breakage pattern which doesn't appear to be the case in the area that's shown in your photo. I'd advise that you don't use the range or do anything to disturb the breakage while waiting for GE to get a service tech onsite.

We had the same experience, also with a GE range. Store where we bought ours was able to replace the panel.

To be clear: ours exploded during cook time, but otherwise unprovoked. Thankfully no one was near it when it happened. One minute chili was bubbling away. The next: BAM! Glass everywhere.