DO NOT USE picnic coolers for solar ovens!

I just watched a new video someone put up endorsing the use of a PLASTIC ice chest as a solar oven, THIS IS DANGEROUS! The plastic used for coolers is NOT suitable for the intense heat of solar cooking! This kind of plastic can gas off and HURT YOU. This is NOT a safe way to make a solar oven and should NEVER EVER be considered!

Please use natural items like wood that is NOT treated with any chemicals, plain cardboard boxes, even sheet metal with NO chemicals on it can be used.

Certain plastics are used for certain things. Stick with SAFE solar cooking materials and you will have SAFE solar cooking.

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[dionysusdevotee]

Thanks for that as I came up with the idea on my own and built one. I was wondering, what if you foil lined the inside to reflect the heat away from the plastic?

[solarcookingnut]

Honestly, heat will still build up, move its way outward, and trust me, the sides will start oozing. I kept trying to stress this to someone several years back.....they didn't listen....it melted.

Best to go with what works and what is safe.

Coolers are made with a different kind of plastic, made for keeping things cool.

Best to not mess with it for cooking, or you will be breathing vapors, and possibly have a nasty oozing glob one day.

[guitarrarl]

The Sun Oven from Global has fiber glass insulation and an a metal interior oven box. The fiberglass outer shell does not even get warm! The flavor comes from the fresh black paint in the interior and will go away after preparing the oven as the instructions recommend. Rust Oleum for ovens will not leave the odor or flavor after it dries well. I have used it for my Global Sun Oven.

[solarcookingnut]

LOL, I yell that all the time around here especially when something on the news comes up and either I or my husband will yell, WE'RE ALL GONNA DIEEEEEE!!!!!! Yeah, we don't buy organic, they have found stuff in some of that too, lol. Not worth the extra money. Glad you can cook today, its been rainy and cloudy, grrrrrrrr.

[achsofromm]

WE"RE ALL GONNA DIE! At least if the sun is implicated in any way, I'll feel a little better about it. I don't buy organic, but I heard on TV that potatoes especially soak up lots of bad stuff from the soil. I had that all wrong I guess cause I figured they sprayed the plant, but since we don't eat the green part, it wouldn't matter. I still won't buy organic. The extra cost is like a slow eating toxin to my wallet. Got to go solar cook...red beans n brown rice, boiling eggs ala solarcookingnut.

[solarcookingnut]

Another problem is, no matter how hard you try, even our food is tainted in some way or another with some chemicals unless we grow it all ourselves, and not too many of us have that option. No matter how much you try to avoid toxins, it just can't be done completely, so, we make do with what we know works and hope it all goes well.

[achsofromm]

That's true, and the instructions say to heat the new Sun Oven but not cook anything in it the first time. That black on the inside is paint...nontoxic paint when dry. STill some kind of porcelain or ceramic would be better where the coating is baked on at very high temps. The Sun Ovens are made for cooking, so presumably all the materials are safe when used as recommended. Probably cardboard is safe too, but I'm less sure since it is not made for cooking in. I have used it though.

[solarcookingnut]

SunOvens are made with materials also that have been processed with manmade chemicals. I have heard many complain of the chemical smell it gases off when first heated up. It's not all made with pure materials either.

In all my using of box ovens, I have never smelled any kind of odors from my ovens, but I have heard many complain how much chemical smell they got from their sun ovens first heatings and when the temps got up into the 400's.

[achsofromm]

Alas,I have a feeling that even cardboard has some toxic chemicals if you've ever been around a pulp mill and smelled it. I'm thinking the paper might be ok even though they use toxic chemicals. The glue is supposed to be cardboard, but who knows. I doubt it is ever tested by heating except to study flammability. I prefer to use my commercial Sun Oven hot box and use the cardboard for the panel ovens only since there, the cardboard never gets hot. dkw