Upcycling is a virtue

Most will know that I am a fan of the freecycle/upcycle mantra (even if I have sometimes been know to confuse freecycling with 'liberation'...

Anyway, several months ago we had the opportunity to acquire a commercial oven range in need of some love and attention. Jane was a little dubious, but I managed to assure her that we weren't buying into a white elephant. I wish I had photographed the before, as it was truly awful. The bloke we got the oven from had originally had every intention of putting it into his cafe kitchen but it wouldn't fit. It also wouldn't fit into his garage, so it sat out in the Brisbane weather for a couple of years. 

So far, we have hit it with a rust converter to see if there was anything that survived the weather (fortunately the important parts all have), and pulled it apart to clean. The gasfitter who is working on the technical side of the refurbishment reckons we have pulled about 12-15 kg of grease out of the frame. Needless to say, it wasn't ever cleaned very well in previous incarnations, and is now a lot lighter. 

I had to replace fixed legs with castors. In this case it meant about seven hours of cutting, grinding old welds, and trying to bolt the castors through inches of decades old grease.

We have struggled to date the range, but it is old enough for the manufacturers plate to have long since worn away, and we only know the brand because I saw one like it on a restaurant equipment auction site.

If you are interested, we are now the proud owners of a (nearly put back together) 10 burner Waldorf gas kitchen range (6 burner rings, and a 4 burner hot plate) with two ovens. Needless to say, this is a little forward planning for the house build on the farm.

We are told that we will have a better oven than most built today, as it has nothing electric in it (unlike today's ovens) to break down. It is really simple, and although a little battered and beaten about has another 30 years of effective life in it. 

I took a weeks leave last week, and spent most of it upcycling the oven - but it is definitely worth it.