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Stove tops can be a post-apocalyptic battlefield when it comes time to clean them. The more you scratch up the surface, scraping off an old mess, the more susceptible you are to building up bacterium and more of a mess the next time.

As a man, I have been scolded on cleaning more times than I'd like to admit. Well, here's proof I was listening to something I was told.

The best measure to take when you want a clean stove top, is to prevent the mess in the first place. A thin coat of car wax rubbed on occasionally will make any dried on spills easier to wipe off. Look for a caranuba wax without any chemical additives. Caranuba comes from a seed and is all natural. The wax will dry to a hard protective finish, making it easier to wipe off any messes.

Tin foil under the burners allows you to just roll up and toss out the mess, and for the heating coils, you can spray on a high heat (rated about 450 degrees Fahrenheit) enamel coating, some engine spray paint or clear coat rated to appropriate temperature works as well. This coating makes the burners so simple to wipe up. The high heat enamel sprays are designed so that all the chemicals evaporate leaving only an enamel finish that will stand up to dirt and heat. Once dry, these sprays can be heated without any chemical fumes being emitted.

Once you have a mess on your stove top, you need something to clean it without damaging the surface. Plastic abrasive scrub pads work very well. The traditional cleaner here would be some baking soda and water, but i have an alternative. At the local auto parts store or Wal-Mart, you can pick up GoJo or Goop hand cleaner usually for getting automotive grease off of your hands, it has microabbrasives in it and a lubricant, so it hardly damages the stove top surface, while being the best product thats also relatively non-toxic to clean grease or stuck on messes.

If your mess is too dried on to scrub off, apply a thick coat of GoJo to it and leave overnight, it will rehydrate the mess and make it easy to wipe off.

If you have already damaged your stove top beyond the reaches of cleaning, you can buy some paint stripper spray and steel wool and after removing the stove top and placing it on newspaper, spray it down and scrub off any paint until you reach raw metal. Dry thoroughly and spray on some high heat primer paint, let dry, and apply second coat, then once dry, smooth out with 000 grade steel wool, wipe clean and spray with your choice of colored high heat spray enamel or high heat engine paint, once dry, apply enamel clear coat, and you're done.

Learn more about this author, christopher beard.
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