I'm in the process of re-doing our kitchen and have replaced a free standing electric cooker with a single built-in oven and ceramic hob.

The hob was a second hand purchase from Ebay (Stoves 600CTH) with a reported Fault Code 56 issue. According to forums on-line, this should be a simple Capacitor replacment/upgrade solution (it is a well known issue with this model). I removed and re-soldered the recommended capacitor to the board (1000uf 16v) and then stored in preparation to fit.

The oven plugs into a 13amp socket so thats no problem. After ensuring that the power was completely off at the consumer unit I removed the free standing cooker and cut the cable about halfway between where it leaves the wall plaster and where it attaches to the bottom of the cooker. I then re-wired this cable into a blank cooker connection unit which I'd installed on the wall. I then added the cable from the new hob to this same unit and made sure the terminals were fully tightened. I then re-fitted the oven/hob into the oven carcass/wortop and returned the power via the consumer unit. When I turned on cooker switch the breaker for the cooker tripped and I noticed a small, dull flash from under the ceramic hob plate and a bit of a thuddy sound. Is this likely to be an un-successful fix on the hob fault itself or am I wiring the hob into the mains completely the wrong way? Could I use the existing/old (pretty thick guage) cooker cable that ran from the cooker box on the wall to connect to the ceramic hob and forget wiring it into the blank cooker unit altogether?

I am bracing myself for the "get an electrician" in comments but would appreciate any help suggestions incase this is an easy fix.

Sounds very much like you put the capacitor in the wrong way around - they are polarised (did you know?)

If not, then there is a much bigger fault than just a dud capacitor - let the buyer beware!

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Hmmmm.... yep, I was aware that the + & - had to line up and got our resident soldering expert at work to do the honours with the removal & re-fit so I'm sure that would be fine, but I will double check when I get home tonight.

As for the mains wiring, does that all sound ok in theory??

Nothing wrong wiht the mains side. The system operates on a 'switched mode power supply' basis and there are a number of common faults attributed to them. Notably the main switching transistor(s) (MOSFETS) can go short circuit and the secondary side smoothing capacitors can go dud due to the high frequency ripple factor. Did you get the right type of capacitor to replace the one fitted? Low ESR?
These aren't the type of things the average person can fault-find on and fixing what can be found to be a 'common fault' may only be part of the problem. You need expert advice here and that will cost.....

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