Bad Toaster

I was having a toaster crisis.
 
Our toaster (besides being upside down, a temporary condition) was more of a bread dryer, than a device which would actually make toast.

The is the model number. It was cheap and I bought it a few years ago at Bi-Mart.

When I tried to unscrew the bottom I sheared off one of the screw heads. It was screwed into soft plastic. I don’t know how you could even do that.

I couldn’t find anything obvious wrong with it.

You can see that some of the resistive heating wire is pulled away from the insulating/reflecting surface. I tried to pull it all away from the surface with a dental pick but there wasn’t enough slack.

The only sections that glow are those proud of the surface. I’m guessing that the heat isn’t being reflected into the bread but absorbed by the insulation.

Such that, if I put it on the highest setting,

I get very dry and barely toasted toast with little evidence of the Maillard reaction.

As a bonus it was pulling 4W all the time it was plugged in. That’s 12 cents a year!

800W when one side is used.

 
1550W when both sides are used. It’s supposed to be 1650W, but that’s probably within tolerances.

Why not double check…

Anyway I decided to replace it. I spent some time researching and while you would think that the error was buying a cheap toaster, I replaced it with the Black & Decker TO1332SBD 4-Slice Toaster Oven, which was less expensive that the toaster it replaced, more versatile, and as a bonus? It actually will make toast. I’ve been quite happy with it for the past month.