Archive | Tips

We occasionally get inquiries about a newer Revere pressure cooker, made and sold during the 1990’s (as best we can tell).  Because there is no model number on the unit, and really no other info that might identify it properly, it is extremely hard to find any info about this pressure cooker on the internet.

We managed to find one of these new-in-box with the manual, so have gathered a bit of information on them.

This style seems to have come in 3 and 6 quart varieties that differed only in height.  Please visit our information page on that pressure cooker for all the information we have on that model, including the manual.

When I first became interested in Revere Ware and started looking for replacement parts (which led me to start this business), a guy named Charlie Anjard ran The Shine Shop, a business that restored cookware to almost new.  Charlie was extremely helpful and always willing to answer the odd question.  He has unfortunately closed his business due to health reasons, but in the time Charlie ran his business, he was very active in tracking down the history of the Revere Ware company and the geneology of their products, and he compiled all his work in what he called the Revere Info Center. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say that most of what we know about the history or Revere Ware’s products is due to Charlie’s work.

Unfortunately Charlie’s original site is offline now, but we archived a copy which you can find here.  One of the most helpful pages is the photo guide to Revere products over the years.

We’ve had a rash of emails from people looking for replacement weights for their 1970’s era Revere Ware pressure cookers that look like this:

(You can find all of our accumulated information for this model here.)

These pressure cookers use a weight similar in shape and size to a standard Revere Ware lid knob to regulate the pressure which was alternately called the “pressure control regulator” or the “pressure control knob.”  While I seem to recall that different weighted control knobs were available that were calibrated to different pressures, our manual for these pressure cookers indicates only a single weight that is calibrated for 17 1/2 lbs of pressure.

If you are unlucky enough to lose your pressure control knob, your pressure cooker is good as a doorstop, not much else, as replacements aren’t available anywhere we are aware of.  For the enterprising DIYer that might want to make or have a replacement made, here are the important dimensions of the part:

Weight: 6.1 oz

Material: Brass

The inside of the hole is a very specific shape, shown here thanks to Playdoh.

The diameter of the largest part of the weight is 1.75 in or 44 mm.

Please let us know (and send us pictures) if you’ve successfully made your own replacement.

One of the most common questions we get from customers is related to their lid not having a screw, but what appears to be a stub of some kind.

Over the years, as evidenced by the many differently constructed lid knobs we have come across, Revere Ware has used no threaded insert in the lid knobs (threads are part of the Bakelite) and threaded inserts of various types of metal, such as aluminum, brass, and possibly others.

The problem is that after years and years of use, the metal inserts often rust to the screw on the lid knob and the knob will either disintegrate when you try and take it off, will fall off leaving the insert behind, or when you try to unscrew it, the insert will stay attached to the screw. What is left looks like this:

The stub can also appear black as there might be Bakelite attached to it.

Some customers inherited a lid looking like this and others just assume that the knob is glued on to this stub and when they receive ours, with a threaded insert, think they’ve received the wrong kind of knob.

If you grab the insert with pliers and unscrew it, it will usually come right off, revealing the screw.  If the nut insert doesn’t want to budge, try squirting some WD-40 at the crack where the nut comes close to the lid and letting it sit for a while.  Heating the lid slightly at the point of the knob screw from underneath (such as placing it over a low gas flame) might also help loosen a stubborn nut and screw.

In some cases, perhaps one out of four, the rust bond will be too strong and the screw will break off.  If that happens, here are instructions for attaching your knob with a separate screw.

Update:  Reader Rick posted this helpful suggestion (below):

If the knob has already broken away from the insert, and the threads in the insert are too corroded to remove from the stud, you can to to step 2.

1) Using a hacksaw, carefully cut right down the center of the knob until you reach the insert. Do a second cut at right angles to the first. Using two flat bladed screw drivers at opposite sides of a cut line, pry the knob and it will crack and fall away from the insert. Not very much pressure is required.

2) Again with the hacksaw, carefully cut a slot in the center of the insert until you reach a void spot in the center of the insert. The void is there because the stud does not go all the way to the end of the threaded portion of the insert. Spray or drip in some penetrating oil, and let sit for a few hours. Try removing the insert with a pair of vice grips. This has worked perfectly a number of times for me.

Reader Fred posted a picture of his nut insert after using the hack saw.

When parts for your favorite piece of cookware are no longer available, sometimes a little do-it-yourself repairs are necessary.

Problem:  The first few years of the vintage Revere Ware pressure cooker had a gauge rather than a dial.  At the bottom of the gauge sits a gasket, which over decades of use and life, gets dry and brittle and stops working, allowing steam to escape, which provides a false reading on the gauge lower than it should.

Solution:  Making a new gasket from some high temperature silicone rubber.

This problem was brought to my attention by a customer who had the problem, and when I opened up my pressure gauge, sure enough, my gasket was beyond repair as well.

I was able to find some suitable material in the form of a silicone baking sheet, which sounded promising as it was specifically intended for high temperatures and was a food grade silicone.  While the original gasket measured about 3-4/100th of an inch, the silicone baking sheet came in at 6/100th of an inch, a difference I hoped wouldn’t matter.

The original gasket was pretty well attached to the metal, but I was easily able to scrape it off with 1/2 of a pair of wooden chopsticks, a soft material so as not to scratch the metal surface and create grooves that might break the seal.

To form the gasket, I pressed down on the silicone sheet with the top of the gauge, which left a nice mark and cut it out with scissors.  I used an apple corer to cut out a hole on the inside.  To create the holes, I sandwiched the gasket between the gauge and the bottom plate and marked them with a small screw driver, and then opened them up with a drill bit.

As you can see, it is crudely shaped, but a good enough fit to make a seal.

The drill bit left imperfectly small holes that were a bit hard to get the screws through, so to put on the gasket, I first laid it on the bottom plate and threaded the screws through, and then placed the top piece on and screwed them down.

While the gasket is slightly thicker than the original, the screws were easily long enough to hold tight.

A quick pressure test showed the gasket to hold without any problems.

Customer John took a slightly different approach, and went to a shop called Great Western Seal & Gasket (didn’t know places like this existed) and had them punch a suitable gasket out of appropriately sized silicone rubber and then bought a small punch from them to create the screw holes.  I’m sure his looks much prettier than mine, but they both work fine.

We started this business to help people (including us) get more use and enjoyment out of their Revere Ware cookware.  In addition to selling parts, we’ve made a point to try and collect as much vintage information, such as product manuals, and make it available for people.

But we also help out in another way, which is in answering any and all questions people send us, regardless of whether it has anything to do with our actual business.

To make these questions and answers available to a wider audience, and possibly keep us from answering the same questions over and over again, we’ve added a FAQ section (Frequently Asked Questions) to our website and will continue to add questions answers as they come up, such as where to find Revere Ware resources, fixes for common problems, where to find certain parts, and where to get Revere Ware warranty replacement.

That last question has been a bit perplexing for us, as, despite prominent statements on our home page, on our support page, our contact page, and several posts in our blog that we are not the company that makes the cookware and do not provide warranty support, people continue to ignore all that and contact us for warranty replacement for their Revere Ware cookware.

So just to clarify one more time, we are not affiliated with the Revere Ware brand or the company, World Kitchen, that makes the Revere Ware cookware.  Our name includes the words Revere Ware because we make parts for, and only for, Revere Ware cookware, a brand we have been particularly fond of out of all the brands of cookware over the last 70 years.

I came across a question recently about overheated Revere Ware:

How to remove a gray stain on interior of Revere ware Copper bottom stainless steel 7inch fry pan

The gray stain was caused by heating the pan for over 5 minutes after the boiling water in it was boiled away because I was momentarily (5+ minutes) distracted away from the cooking range.

Is there a method and a special compound/solution which I can use to restore the appearance to its nearly new shine instead of the dull gray look? Is the pan still usable in its present state? Will there be release of any metallic toxins because of the overheating of the pan in its dry state?

I’ve also had people contact me directly with the same problem and concerns about any ill health effects.

To answer her last question first, it is worth noting that it is unlikely that anything related to the stainless steel will cause health problems.  I have friends that are nervous about stainless steel because it has chromium in it, but the type of chromium used in stainless steel, chromium III, which provides the corrosion and discoloration resistance stainless steel is known for, is completely unlike the very deadly hexavalent chromium made famous by the film Erin Brockovich.  In fact, chromium III is required by the body in trace amounts for proper digestion of sugars and fats.

In terms of the health of the cookware, it is always a bad idea to heat a pan without anything in it for an extended period of time, because this will likely warp the bottom of the pan, effectively ruining it.

To determine an effective repair for any discoloration, I set out to duplicate the problem.

Heating the pan without anything in it for a good 15 minutes didn’t cause any discoloration at all, but it had a pretty harsh affect on the copper bottom.

The extreme heat caused little pieces of the copper bottom to flake off and made the bottom rough to the touch.

Next I tried the experiment with some water in the pan, let the water boil off and heat for a good 10 minutes after the water was gone.

This time there were burned on hard water stains and some iridescent discoloration.  As we don’t have particularly hard water where I live, I suspect this would be much worse where there was very hard water, and probably the cause of the discoloration in question.  I have gotten pans in such shape from thrift stores and the solution below also did wonders on them.

While any warping caused by such heating will likely be permanent, the stains and discoloration on the inside of the pan are fairly easy to correct:  simply scrub well with a Scotch Brite pad (never use steel wool or SOS pads) and then polish with some Bar Keepers Friend.  Looks much better.  It is important to note that a Scotch Brite pad should NOT be used on the outside of the pan as it will dull the finish.  The inside of any pan will become dulled anyways from use, so a Scotch Brite pad won’t hurt it any worse.

The bottom was more difficult to polish; I tried Bar Keepers Friend and copper polish, but the roughened surface due to the over heating made it more difficult to get good results.

There is one more danger to overheating pans; the Bakelite handles can break down at high enough temperatures.  This particular test resulted in some slight breaking down of the Bakelite material where it touched the metal.