I have an entirely different reaction. I do not see why GE's response should be surprising. The manual for the induction ranges clearly says that minimum pan size for the six-inch burner is 4.75" and the minimum pan size for the two 8 inch burners is 5.75." If they put that in the manual, why should a customer service rep say something different in what will be a public posting on their web-site? And look at it from the perspective of the GE customer service reps. My4thGarden is looking at spending $2900 for a GE Profile slide-in induction range or $2600 for the freestanding one. A decent and serviceable smoothop electric range can be had for half of that from GE or, for that matter, from LG which is the subject of My4thGarden's other thread. No issues with using small pans on those stoves, although there certainly will be waste heat around the edges of the small pans. When someone says that they cannot afford to replace the present battery of small diameter cookware and doesn't want to, it makes a lot of sense to say to them: "why don't you consider a different stove that seems better suited to what and how you like to cook?" Plus, you may buy the induction stove and find that your particular small pans don't work. That leads to hassles with returns and refunds. If you work for a company, would you want to start that process? Now, it may very well be possible to use pans with slightly smaller diameters if they have enough ferrous mass in the base. Induction burners have sensors to identify pan size and ferrous mass -- too little of either and the burner will not activate. Trouble is, there is no way to find out how GE engineers programmed the sensors. All we know is that GE engineers have identified minimum pan sizes that can reasonably be expected to work. GE customer services reps are is not going to tell you, "don't pay any attention to the manual, you can do X____ instead." berner43's post shows that pans with diameters 10% less than minimum specified diameters work, at least on the mid and large burners and assuming that My4thGarden's pans have similar ferrous bases. Timdeb's post shows about the same for the 6-inch burner. If that relationship holds for the smallest diameter burner, as well, then even My4thGarden's 4.25" pans might work on the GE's smallest (6") burner. Or might not. Again, we do not know how GE programmed the sensors for the burner. Maybe the bases of My4thGarden's smallest pans won't have sufficient ferrous material in the base to be recognized. Also , bear in mind that a smaller pan is using smaller amounts of energy. If you cover, say, 70% of the burner, you will be only getting 70% of the power. (That is not exact but it will do for this dicussion.) Depending on what you are cooking in those little pans, that may or may no be considered optimum. If I'm manufacturing and selling stoves, and I'm training customer representatives, m I going to have them telling customers that they should use my stove for less than optimum conditions and then want to deal with warranty complaints from customers who may or may not understand what "less than optimum" means? What if the customer is using pans with "less than optimum" ferrous content and the pans don't work? Do I really want to have my engineers testing every possible line of cookware and then publish advice on less than optimum use? If I have to manage that kind of situation, I will be thinking I don't want that expense or headache. The unfortunate reality is that the only way to know is to run a test with the particular pans on an actual GE induction stove as berner43 and timdeb did. Can't find a GE to test your pans on? Then, it seems to me to make a good deal of sense for GE to recommend options other than induction for My4thGarden. "Buying and trying" is an option, of course, but only if you can buy from a vendor like Costco which has an absolute satisfaction guarantee: "I don't like it" is enough for Costco to take it back after a month or so. No restocking fee, either. Those kinds of guarantees are hard to find these days. The only induction range that Costco sells is the Maytag freestanding range and it only carries them in the online sales department. The Maytag is far less costly than the GE (about $1500, delivered). It has twin 6" burners in front with a 9" and an 11" burner in the back. Maytag/Whirlpool has not published minimum recommended pan sizes but apparently have marked them on the cooktop. My recollection from the one I saw last fall when I was stove shopping was that the six inch burners would take pans down to at least 4.75" and the nine-inch burner would handle a 7" pan. (But that was months ago and the memory is faulty on such details.) Virtually every brand of induction on the market will operate pans slightly smaller than the minimum recommended diameter. (Heck, I recall a post from a year ago where somebody here reported using a 5.5" diamter pan on the 11" burner of a Samsung induction range.) Anyway, the Maytag/Whirlpool burner arrangement, with twin 6" burners in front, seems well suited to My4thGarden's cooking preferences. Of course, there is the apparently lame "Aqualift" oven self-cleaning method which may be an issue. (This issue will not matter if you are somebody who avoids running self-cleaning cycles and, if you do, at least you don't need to worry about the self cleaning cycle toasting the control boards.) I noticed a Maytag on display recently when helping a friend shop for a stove. Might have been our local Lowe's or Home Depot that had one on display and mIght have been the identical Whirlpool model. I live in a very rural state, so maybe one of the big box stores in My4thGarden's area might have one, too. Worth looking at. This post was edited by JWVideo on Thu, May 23, 13 at 16:06

She could fly a repair person in (and did fly the reno crew in when the home was restored a number of years ago, in fact), but wouldn't want to have to do it on a regular basis. This is a down to earth, practical person. She's wealthy, but she's not irrational. If a La Cornue crew had to come in and build an oven, that's doable. If maintenance persons need to come a regular intervals, that's doable. If repeated breakdowns of equipment that ought to be reliable occur, that won't be desirable. If random helicopter arrangements need to be made on an emergency basis, that would be a pita. I'm sure she'd rather avoid it. Just being able to afford something doesn't necessarily make it desirable. I am finding the various perspectives here intriguing. While I'm not a pro, I have cooked a lot, and even had a bit of real training, and from my modest perspective, it's much nicer to produce a meal on reliable equipment than not. Nicer still to be able to do it on downright lovely equipment. I haven't always lived luxuriously, but I guess I've always had pretty good cooking tools. I inadvertently tested this hypothesis at a dear relative's recently. It's her and her DH's first home, took every last sou to buy in the neighborhood they wanted, and I'm fairly convinced that Goodwill would reject the appliances they cook on every night. I produced a rather lovely meal, I'm told, but was exhausted nearly to the point of coma by the time I served it because I had to nurse every bit of it through faulty burners, irregular temperatures, etc., and did it all with downright crappy (sorry, no other description is as accurate) cookware. She gets knives and cookware for every gift now, BTW, regardless of what she requests. It's called enlightened self-interest. Anyway, the point is that it's difficult to imagine, after all the heated and enlightened debate on these threads, some from professional chefs, some from electrical engineers, some from people who routinely cook for huge families, some who entertain for huge groups, some who write cookbooks, et al, that when push comes to shove one ought to order the Sears package for reliability. I know the line is overused, but "I am shocked. Shocked." One young couple I know waited so long for Sears service, in Los Angeles yet (hardly rural), that by the time the repairman showed up, the wife was near her due date. The repairman wanted to leave because he said he needed help moving her refrigerator to get to the part he needed to repair. She put her hugely pregnant body in front of the door and refused to let him leave because she had waited so long for Sears to respond. He threatened to call the police and she said, "Fine. Go ahead. And while you're waiting for them to get here, repair my refrigerator." Made by GE by the way. Nevertheless, I do appreciate all the responses here. I have learned that there is a generator in the picture and it will have to be upgraded. Not a problem. Solar panels are out. The roof cannot be modified. A ground array would necessitate cutting down trees. Not going to happen. And fire ants are attracted to electrical current (something to think about as I, too, have looked into this for my place). The necessary KW, etc. I'll leave to the KD, engineer, and crew. Interestingly, to me anyway, even though she has natural gas available, and there is a propane tank on the grounds, the current generator is diesel. While some of what I'm reading confirms what I've already told my friend, e.g., redundancy, both gas and electric, the desirability of commercial and residential components, there are definitely things that never occurred to me, e.g. ovens with greater computer complexity like Mieles and Gaggs, which I always conceive of as big city ovens. I'll pass those ideas on, as well as this thread. Any and all suggestions welcome. Even the stuff about Sears. ;)

The old line set (copper tubing) can be reused assuming it is the correct size of the new system. If not then it needs to be replaced. It is not the preferred method, but it is done where replacing the line set is difficult. The new refrigerant will be R410. The old refrigerant (R22) must be flushed out of the old line set otherwise you have a contamination problem. This is another reason why it is good practice to replace the line set. FYI - we can talk about prices all day long on this forum. Be warned the lowest bid usually comes with the highest risk. Finally this has been beaten to death, but let's make sure you understand the concept. You can use a 3.5 ton air handler with a 3 ton condenser. The important thing is the air flow is adjusted to the correct speed. The 3.5 ton rating is the maximum air flow, not the minimum. In turns out in this case the 3.5 ton air handler has better efficiency numbers than the 3 ton air handler. If the bigger handler can physically fit in the space, then you can use it. You have to then decide if the extra efficiency is worth the extra upfront cost of the equipment.

bama dude, I had the outside unit of our current central air system equipped as you described. Basically the outside fan only runs when the head pressure reaches a certain point. But this is really so it can be run in cooler weather I thought. I wouldn't think an a/c should freeze up when its 75 outside even when you are trying to get the inside temp to 60. Perhaps they put the limit of 64 on their unit because they have an inferior product that they are trying to protect. Most of the other brands I've seen go down to at least 61. It appears the thermostat is in the air handler and not in the remote. So I guess the air will blow out, be immediately sucked back in and when the immediate area is 64 it will shut off. It will probably be even warmer over on the bed where we are. Or, I'm hoping that the cool air will sink and the warmer air will be detected by the unit, which is about 8 feet off the floor, and maybe it can actually be cooler than 64 at bed level. Can I wrap something around the temp sensor to make it less sensitive to the cool air coming in around it?