Stop Your Bakery Infrared Tubes From Burning Out
If you’ve ever worked with bakery griddles or steam ovens, you know the environment is brutal. It’s humid, it’s steamy, and the temperature swings are wild. When you’re swapping out an infrared tube, you aren’t just looking for something that gets hot. You need something that can actually survive that chaos without popping a few weeks later. The secret is in the glass. We use high-purity quartz to hold the tungsten filament. Why? Because standard glass can’t handle the “thermal shock” of a steam oven. Think about it: you’ve got a red-hot tube on the inside and condensation dripping on the outside. That temperature gap creates tiny micro-cracks in cheap glass. High-purity quartz doesn’t do that. It stays steady and keeps your wattage consistent, even when the kitchen feels like a sauna. Getting them installed These are built to be simple drop-in replacements. We stick with standard R7s or SK15 connectors because a tight fit is everything. If the connection is loose, you get arcing, and your terminals will fry. It’s that simple. Plus, we often add a special coating to the quartz. Instead of wasting energy heating up the air in the oven, this coating pushes the heat straight down onto the griddle. It makes the heat denser. The result? Your product sears faster, and you get that perfect crust without waiting around. A couple of things to watch out for Here’s the deal with wattage: higher wattage means more heat, which is great for commercial baking. But it also puts more stress on your electrical system. If you’re upgrading to a tube with more power than what the manufacturer originally installed, please check your wiring and contactors first. If the wires are too thin for the current, you’re looking at tripped breakers or, worse, melted housings. And one last tip:keep the glass clean. Bakery fats and grease love to build up on these tubes. That grease creates “hot spots” where the heat gets trapped. Those spots bake the glass and kill the filament way faster than they should. A quick clean saves you a lot of money in the long run.