I have teflon saucepans which are in very good shape except they warp often (maybe once a week). With exact hammer hits (with medium power) and with the help of a ruler, I can straighten the bottom very accurately. But that's an annoying process involving lots of noise. So I'm wondering if there's a better way.
What happens is the bottom of the pan bulges out (downwards). I am not sure what causes that. Perhaps only cooking normally causes it. I do try to wait for some time before moving the pan into the sink which has some water droplets in the bottom, and in which some water could pour inside the pan even when it's not yet fully cooled down.
According to one source the warping is due to the pan consisting of different layers of different metals, plus coatings. So sudden cooldown would shrink certain metal quickly while the other metals would still stay expanded and hot and that would cause warping. However, I do not know exactly how this works and what metals are in the pan in which order. Also I don't know whether pans can have the metals in the opposite order, causing inverted warping. Also I don't know if the stretching happens by stretching the whole diameter or if the vertical component stretches as well.
Thinking about this, I'll just propose a theory for you to debunk (please correct my mistakes). Simplifying, I'll hypothesize that the pan consists of just one thick metal. Heating it up on the stove will cause even stretching, and essentially the diameter of the whole bottom will increase evenly. Now, pouring cold water on top will cause a thermal shock, and since hot metal reacts quickly to cold water, the top side of the bottom will react much quicker than the bottom side. So the upper side diameter shrinks while bottom side diameter cools down slower. This warps the whole bottom downwards. (Just a hypothesis.)
If this theory happens to be correct, then perhaps it's not possible to straighten the pan out of that situation with just stove heating plus water. Because as it's already substantially warped, adding cold water on the hot pan's flipside (bottom of the bottom) is not any more enough for unwarping (maybe with multiple treatments it could possibly work).
But, what if I simply end some of my cooking sessions by pouring cold water on the bottom of the bottom of a hot pan. Perhaps that would cause warping upwards, which is a wanted result since at least then the pan won't swing on the stove (in which situation an induction stove also has less effective contact on the pan).
Sorry for the long rambling, but what do you think? (I don't want to ruin my pans because they're expensive and good..)
What happens is the bottom of the pan bulges out (downwards). I am not sure what causes that. Perhaps only cooking normally causes it. I do try to wait for some time before moving the pan into the sink which has some water droplets in the bottom, and in which some water could pour inside the pan even when it's not yet fully cooled down.
According to one source the warping is due to the pan consisting of different layers of different metals, plus coatings. So sudden cooldown would shrink certain metal quickly while the other metals would still stay expanded and hot and that would cause warping. However, I do not know exactly how this works and what metals are in the pan in which order. Also I don't know whether pans can have the metals in the opposite order, causing inverted warping. Also I don't know if the stretching happens by stretching the whole diameter or if the vertical component stretches as well.
Thinking about this, I'll just propose a theory for you to debunk (please correct my mistakes). Simplifying, I'll hypothesize that the pan consists of just one thick metal. Heating it up on the stove will cause even stretching, and essentially the diameter of the whole bottom will increase evenly. Now, pouring cold water on top will cause a thermal shock, and since hot metal reacts quickly to cold water, the top side of the bottom will react much quicker than the bottom side. So the upper side diameter shrinks while bottom side diameter cools down slower. This warps the whole bottom downwards. (Just a hypothesis.)
If this theory happens to be correct, then perhaps it's not possible to straighten the pan out of that situation with just stove heating plus water. Because as it's already substantially warped, adding cold water on the hot pan's flipside (bottom of the bottom) is not any more enough for unwarping (maybe with multiple treatments it could possibly work).
But, what if I simply end some of my cooking sessions by pouring cold water on the bottom of the bottom of a hot pan. Perhaps that would cause warping upwards, which is a wanted result since at least then the pan won't swing on the stove (in which situation an induction stove also has less effective contact on the pan).
Sorry for the long rambling, but what do you think? (I don't want to ruin my pans because they're expensive and good..)
