Most likely is that a wire has broken through its insulation and is not touching the trim.

The breaker should trip, but on old equipment all bets are sort of off since it was not made to the same level of safety we use now.

PROBABLY NEEDS A NEW HEATING ELEMENT.

Believe it or not, I'm with smithy on this one.

I'm gonna guess the stove is properly grounded, and the 'broken wire' is the heating element (burner) itself. It has worn through, making the pot, and thus the water, electrically live. You inserting metal tongs in there completed the circuit, burner -> pot -> water -> tongs -> you -> trim -> frame -> ground.

Solution? Replace burner. Problemo el-solvo.

I guess I agree with both of you. That is, it could be a frayed wire in the cooktop part, or a bad element. I think the cooktop part suffers more from heat effects than the oven(s) in that the wiring in the oven is usually buried in insulation whereas the wiring under the cooktop is not.

sometimes, with years of cleaning and being knocked around, the cooktop element sockets get loose and the wires fray at the ends.

On every open-element electric range I've ever seen, the elements rest on a steel support. I'd expect that if the range frame is grounded, so is that support. Thus a fault in the element *should* be grounded.

But things often get pretty cruddy in a range. If that element ground is now of very high resistance, some of the fault current might indeed be conducted to ground through the operator as Pharkus describes.

I'd start by lifting the element out of its support so that it's definitely isolated from the range frame, and measure the leakage current with a multimeter. A cheap neon tester to range frame should also detect leakage, though it'll glow on leakage you probably can't feel.

if the ceramic portion of the element has "worn through" on the top side where it makes contact with the bottom of the pan, the frame isn't going to ground it.

Does this range have "swing up" elements (eyes) or do they pull out of a connector? Have you lined the drip pans with foil? Was only one burner on when incident happened?

Thanks to everyone. Cuffs, only one burner was being used at the time of the incident and no, the drip pans are not lined with foil. Three burners can be pulled out easily so I can clean the pan underneath. The unit in question has six contact points in a clear plastic (I guess) housing with wiring that runs under the cooktop where I can't see it. Looking at the six contact points I see nothing broken-
Maybe I could just use the other burners but if the wiring underneath the cooktop is broken, even they could cause a shock. I have since used the unit but have been careful to not touch the metal on the cooktop- and I wasn't cooking anything in water.

Pull out the defective element and take it to the appliance store or home center and get a replacement. It won't run you $25 and the problem will be solved.

Ah yes, Pharkus. We have decided to take the advice of a few of you and replace the burner. There has been no time to do it yet. I'm hoping that Sears or another store will have the kind we need in stock so it doesn't have to be ordered. By the way, as I said, I have cooked on the unit again since the first episode but did not use water for the cooking. I am not an electrician so I didn't know if I boiled corn again or boiled a crab, whether I would get shocked again. Though it seemed to have something to do with that metal strip that I touched at the same time on the cooktop. But when we replace the unit, I don't plan to be the one to try it out. Maybe someone at the store will know how it can be tested without getting a shock again. And Pharkus, it would be safe to eat at our house- no strange ways of cooking here. Just plain old soul food. But then, that's strange to a lot of people, isn't it?

When I needed to get an oven element for my GE, I went to a neighborhood appliance store. You might want to check the yellow pages before going to Sears.

I'm with weedmeister. We've got a small family-owned appliance store in town that has always managed to have or quickly get parts for just about everything I've come across, regardless of brand or age.

I've had no such luck with Sears. Last time I called them, for an air conditioner part, I was told they HAD the part, and it was in stock. They even told me the price, but they weren't allowed to sell it to me.

Of course they offered me a brand-new air conditioner at a much higher cost.

Most likely the housing of the stove is not grounded properly . Where the wires connect the back of the stove to the power from the house, there should be a ground wire that grounds the chassis to the neutral (white wire) or ground depending if you have a three or four wire connection. Anything else should trip the breaker. But if not wired properly this will allow the chassis to become energized even if nothing is on, since it is not grounded to allow it to discharge.