The Saucepan Lid Mystery.....

[gness]

Last week a friend cooked a Burns Night supper for a group of us.....

We sat down to eat at 7.45.....enjoyed a fantastic meal...some chaps are really good cooks....

...then retired to the sitting room for port and cigars.... ;-)....

At about 10.45 there was a little explosion from the kitchen.....the girls went to investigate....the chaps took a long time to get up from the sofa....wimps.....

We discovered a shattered saucepan lid.....still sort of in place but the worktop and floor covered in tiny pieces of glass.....could have ruined the neeps and tatties....

Now, does any clever bod know why, after sitting on a plate at room temperature and nowhere near a heat source for about three hours, the lid would have shattered then?

The saucepans are new, Stellar pans.......never been dropped or otherwise abused.....

I could understand if there was a sudden, extreme change of temperature.... but this has us puzzled.....

Gx


http://oi64.tinypic.com/312gyn5.jpg

http://oi64.tinypic.com/wrnoyh.jpg

[shoota]

It was shattered after all that cooking.

[gness]

Look! It sat there doing flip all....then had a hissy fit.....even a man doesn't do that after an evening sitting on his bum!....x

[shoota]

I'll bet the metal rim cooled more quickly than the lass centre.

[shoota]

Or glass even

[gness]

Lass centre....honestly...you and women!

We did consider that, Shoota.....but would that happen after three hours... and doesn't it make all these saucepan lids a tad dangerous....cooling for as long as this shouldn't cause stress, should it?

[mazie]

Probably a factory fault gness.... Send it back

[EDDIE51]

Seeing the words 'saucepan lids'I assumed this was another rant by a well known AB member who insists on calling children 'Saucepans'
(Cockney rhyming slang Saucepan = Saucepan Lids = Kids)
This time it really was about kitchen equipment .

[Old_Geezer]

Must've had a manufactured flaw/weakness. In your shoes I'd complain to the manufacturer, stress the potential injury aspect (even of the grazed lid stayed in one piece) and get free replacement lids for life.

[Old_Geezer]

...even if the crazed lid...
like I ^£"&"* typed !!!!!!

[gness]

Crossed my mind, Eddie...... ;-)

The store has exchanged the lid......just hope this was a one off....my friend is reluctant to use the others .... but I'll work on him.....otherwise I'll have to start cooking...... :-(

Was just curious.....and wondered if I'd get an answer here.......x

[EDDIE51]

As to the mystery are you CERTAIN the lid was not left on a hotplate that was still hot? I have had a glass pan lid explode because I had left the lid on the hot plate and the plate was still hot. The power of the explosion can knock the lid off the hot plate and on to the floor.

[shoota]

You do have grounds for a moan as they are all said to be 'shatterproof'.

//
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[shoota]

Sorry, I didn't highlight all that, gremlins....

[Togo]

Saucepan lids are made with tempered (or toughened as we tend to call it) glass. During tempering, stresses are induced (which ensure) that the glass is hard under impact and heat, but if stressed to it's limit it breaks safely into granules. Tempering is carried out by first heating the glass, almost to melting point, and then rapidly cooling under controlled conditions. Unfortunately the glass is forever thereafter under duress. Now a sharp bang particularly on an edge will cause the inherent stresses to shatter the glass. Not always immediately. Rapid cooling will have the same effect.

[thelewisgang]

Some years ago I had a glass "work saver" board in my kitchen. I suddenly heard a sort of explosion & went to investigate. It had shattered into 1000's of pieces. Like you, it was nowhere near a source of heat & had hardly been used. Pretty frightening at the time & days later still found teeny pieces of glass. Mysterious.

[gness]

Eddie.....that would have been an explanation....but we know the lid went from the pan to the dinner plate and stayed there for three hours.....it really didn't go onto anything hot or very cold....just the plate....x

Thanks, Shoota....probably leprechauns....but they are supposed to be shatter proof....lids not leprechauns...those little devils are indestructible.....♣

We did question whether the lid had been knocked, Togo....they're new and hardly used.....but maybe a fault in manufacture or a slight imperfection?........but it was the delay of three hours in a kitchen with a stable temperature and no rapid change which puzzled us.....x

[gness]

Thelewisgang.....although the glass mainly stayed within the rim tiny shards scattered all over the kitchen, don't they go a long way.......luckily there was no left over food or I'd perhaps have been serving ground glass the next day......☺

[tonyav]

gness, was the lid anywhere near an open window after it was removed from the saucepan ?.
Could have caused the metal rim / metal rimmed steam release thing to contract faster than the glass.

[gness]

No, Tony.....there is no window to the outside in the kitchen at all.....x

[tonyav]

Ohhhhhhh, spooky then gness !.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-b5aW08ivHU