There was a thread about this a while back. Unlike DCS and some other brands, Capital doesn't have a separate simmer ring on it's burners so to get the low simmer you need to have the burners adjusted. You should call Capital customer service and have them send someone out to do the adjustment - I believe that's what they did for the other person who posted about this.

That's what I thought. I just can't find the thread. Maybe I'll post this over in kitchens just in case. Thanks

It was my thread. I also have a major safety concern with the grates, so be careful when using pots with heavy handles and a bottom diameter of 8" or less. My smaller All Clad pots tip regularly unless I carefully align the pot handle to be above one of the longer grate supports.

What your rangetop will need is an adjustment that you can do yourself. You'll need a very narrow, long shafted screwdriver. Take off the gas control knobs and put the screwdriver down the exposed center hole and turn to adjust the flame down.

I was told that by doing this, you ONLY adjust the simmer and have no affect at all on the amount of gas released at the Hi setting.

I can't remember if it needs a phillips head or not, but a quick call to Capital will tell you that as well as the recommended length of the screwdriver.

Good luck!

It is a regular flat tip, and the one I got at Menards was about 4" long and cost me about $3. Simmers great once adjusted.

Only thing I complain about is the range of adjustment when going from high to lower flames, only about 1/4" of a turn and I go from high to low, have to eye the flame all the time to know what I have it set at.

I second that complaint, kandkwi!

I wish tiny adjustments the full range of the knob was the reality!

It'd be so nice to turn the knob to the midpoint and expect a "medium" heat flame height! Very frustrating factoid that is only apparent after you have installed the darned things!

I agree 100% smarge!

Here is the setting on high

here is the low flame setting (not sim, but low)

My GE had better adjustment range, you put it to half way, it was medium! Oh well, it didn't get as hot!

My "low" is probably closer to 4 clicks from HI, but one more click and I'm at simmer the entire rest of the dial.

Are you listening, Capital?

Wow...Doesn't seem like they're testing these things? Have you emailed the president? He was quite quick with responses when I was considering purchase...Is he as quick for those who have already spent their money?

Has anybody had this issue resolved? I'm mostly thinking about Bluestar or Wolf, but Capital is the one sealed burner range I'm considering and so I called their service department today to ask about this. I was told there was a vendor issue that has been resolved, having to do with too much grease packed into the valve causing the valve to go all the way to minimum to quickly.

As a follow-up, I went to the local distributor today to see one of these things at work. The control gave a very broad range of adjustment, so at least on current models the issue seems to be resolved.

dan_no.9

Can you please elaborate on what you mean by "very broad range of adjustment"? Were you able to see a lit flame adjusted? I'm not aware of any newer model Capital range than my own, are you sure you saw a new model?

Thanks for any more info.!

Hi,

As I posted above, first I called their service department and asked about the issues you were having. It was explained to me that the vendor from which they were buying their valves had been packing too much grease into them, and this would cause the adjustment range to get to the minimum gas flow position too fast. But according to the service man I talked to, this has been cleared up.

That same morning I coincidentally received an email from the owner of the company, Surjit Kalsi, inviting me to talk with him about the products and we had a long talk, and this issue was a small part of it. After this I was pretty convinced that I would live with a sealed burner in order to have a relationship with a nearby company that was so responsive. So I drove down to the southern California distributor to actually see one at work - this was the only place in the LA area that had one hooked up. In particular I wanted to see if they really had resolved the issue you've been dealing with.

I found that on the 48" Precision range they had there the minimum flame setting was really at the far end of the travel of the control itself, that what you've described so well wasn't a problem on this range. There really was the wide variability across the travel of the control visible in the flame itself that you would expect to see. On that range, the position on the control that you've identified in your photo as low was still quite high.

I'd hope that this can be cleared up by clearing the inside of the valve, not actually having to replace it, but you're probably still under warranty and should call the company and have this fixed. It looks repairable to me, because it appears that current ones are operating correctly. And I can't imagine why it'd be so easy for me to talk to people there about this and not for anyone else. I called the main number, asked for a technician, and got one right away.

For a number of reasons I won't be doing anything about a new range now until spring, but I'm pretty convinced I'm headed to a Capital GCR305.

Dan

Thanks for the extremely impressive clarification! Wow - and I thought I did MY homework before pulling the trigger on appliance purchases! (I bow to you...)

Dan is correct. However, when the service person came out and took the valves out we both agreed there was not excessive grease on there. It really looked liked there was no visible grease at all. But amazingly when he took a tiny screwdriver and scraped the shallow indentation and took a way a seemingly tiny amount of the grease, the simmer to full flame transition started working properly again.

Now if only they would send out new grates to owners under warranty I'd be happy as a clam.

Thank you for the kind words. Yes, I want to do this once and get it right. Also, I've used my kitchen as it is for almost 17 years so no matter how anxious I am to make a change, I can live with it as is a while longer, and the longer I wait the more I learn. But you know how it goes - once you know, its hard to not see how inadequate your situation has always been. Every time I cook I wish I'd already done it. Even my daughter agrees. I keep leaning Capital, but I may yet go BlueStar - twice now I've been almost out the door to buy one. And now I have the friend who was going to cut my counter to fit in a new range wanting to tear apart my whole kitchen and undo all this 80s damage, and that opens up all kinds of possibilities.

The grates - I think that's a tricky one for Capital. It looks like they work as they were designed to do, and plenty of people have bought the ranges as designed with no issues. I wonder how many people would be objecting to them if not for this forum? In my opinion its clearly not a warranty issue, but it'd be great PR to set a precedent of this kind of over-and-above customer service. But you can imagine how that precedent could come back to bite them. Its a bit of a fine line between being as helpful as possible and not setting yourself up for real trouble in the future, given both the litigious nature of our culture and the ability for folks to get others cranked up. I use a lot of audio equipment and its great when the manufacturer gives me a break on upgrading an existing piece of gear based on things they've learned (often from customer feedback), but I don't expect it as a warranty thing. I might hope for it, but I don't expect it. Usually there's some kind of already-having-bought-in price that covers their cost of build at least.

I don't envy them, and I don't argue for a second with Smarge's experience or thoughts about this and her sense of it being a possible safety issue, but we're not talking about Toyota here. It would be so easy for me to dump pots off my current cooktop, but I don't and never have. However, if I do buy a Capital I'm sure I'll be very grateful for Smarge having agitated for this design change.

Dan