This is for any oven.. If you leave the racks in the oven during self clean the chrome will "Blue" this is really more of a gold-ish blue tone. It's not hurting anything but the racks won't look as nice as if you took them out.

Gliding racks should never be left in during self clean because it can ruin the slides.

We have had GE ovens that stained the racks. One problem we had was a rack that became less slick when the stainless got an oxide film that was not as smooth as the original metal. That oven has ridges in the porcelin interior walls that the rack runs through, so some of the roughness may have been the walls themselves.

A few ovens have porcelain racks, my GE Profile for example, which can be run through the self-clean process without discoloring.

Thanks, all!

I ended up just washing the stupid racks separately -- no biggie. But I do think they've been "self-cleaned" already; there is a blue kind of sheen to the stuff. I just didn't want anything to happen and have my mom blame me -- a distinct possibility!

What would be really helpful is to put the nasty broiler pans in the mega-hot oven, but I'd be afraid they'd warp or the food would crust on, etc.

Basically - what is the point to the self-clean thing? I bought w/o one for all the above reasons. sigh. Plus, it gets hot in a stove anyway; it's not like gunk in there is unhealthy.... [famous last words]. For me, I skip the whole self-clean thing from the get-go. Just sayin.... ;)