Chief Longwind Of The North
Certified/Certifiable
These things have intrigued me ever since I first read about them in Popular Science back in the mid-80's But I have never known anyone who has oneor who has any experience with them. The induction principle is sound enough, but I wonder about hot-spots, what type of metal pans work best, etc.
From my physics and electronics background, I know that cast iron is a relatively poor conductor of electricity, meaning there is more resistance than in copper or aluminum, which are both great electical conductors. If you pass a current through a resistive element, it produces heat. More conductive elements just allow the current to pass through the metal, producing little if any heat.
So that would lead me to believe that the eddy currents created by the magnetic flux in an induction stove would cause cast iron or stainless steel pans to get hotter than an aluminum or copper pan. But then again, with an encapsulated bottom, or pan with sandwiched copper or aluminum (All-Clad), the steel would still have the resistance to create heat, but the aluminum or copper would help create more even heat distribution.
In any case, I have too little info to determine how well induction stoves work, and the best pans to use with them. And though I'm not in the market for a new stove any time soon, I would think that and induction stove would have similar cooking characteristics to gas stoves, with instant heat intensity changes, unlike the lead/lag time required by radient heat electrics.
Plus, induction stoves are safer than either gas or radient heat stoves in that they can be left on high and won't get any non-metalic thing hot, as electrical induction is what causes the pots to heat up. You could place your hand on a burner thats set on high, and so long as the burner surface was cool when you turned it on, not get burned. Sounds like great technology for places that don't have natural gas available to them. But saddly, how you gonna roast a hot dog on a skewer over an inductive element. I can do that on my gas range.
Seeeeeeya; Goodweed of the North
From my physics and electronics background, I know that cast iron is a relatively poor conductor of electricity, meaning there is more resistance than in copper or aluminum, which are both great electical conductors. If you pass a current through a resistive element, it produces heat. More conductive elements just allow the current to pass through the metal, producing little if any heat.
So that would lead me to believe that the eddy currents created by the magnetic flux in an induction stove would cause cast iron or stainless steel pans to get hotter than an aluminum or copper pan. But then again, with an encapsulated bottom, or pan with sandwiched copper or aluminum (All-Clad), the steel would still have the resistance to create heat, but the aluminum or copper would help create more even heat distribution.
In any case, I have too little info to determine how well induction stoves work, and the best pans to use with them. And though I'm not in the market for a new stove any time soon, I would think that and induction stove would have similar cooking characteristics to gas stoves, with instant heat intensity changes, unlike the lead/lag time required by radient heat electrics.
Plus, induction stoves are safer than either gas or radient heat stoves in that they can be left on high and won't get any non-metalic thing hot, as electrical induction is what causes the pots to heat up. You could place your hand on a burner thats set on high, and so long as the burner surface was cool when you turned it on, not get burned. Sounds like great technology for places that don't have natural gas available to them. But saddly, how you gonna roast a hot dog on a skewer over an inductive element. I can do that on my gas range.
Seeeeeeya; Goodweed of the North