SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Fire / ignition

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20200702-20E76-2147371354. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Product: Samsung NE59J785OWS (Samsung Range and Cooktop and Dual Oven). Incident: On June 30, 2020 I turned my lower oven on to cook. Within 5 minutes smoke bellowed out with a horrendous smell. Range was unplugged but for approximately 15 minutes smoke was still coming out and we could see fire in the back of the range. I immediately called Sears Home Servicing to arrange an appointment to have a repairman come. It was scheduled for July 1, 2020. He took the back panel off and yes you could see where the wires burned. He then said it was due to grease in the back even though the range was only 4 1/2 months old. I explained that very little besides pizza and bread were cooked in the lower range and no way could that account for what he said was there. He admitted that some grease is placed there by the manufacturer to assemble it. Then he proceeded to say it was wired wrong in the wall unit but I explained to him that I did wire it, Sears did when installing it. The repairman plugged it in to see what happens and sure enough the heating element started smoking and firing again. He called his boss and told him I did not want anything to do with this range as I felt even with extensive repairs I could not trust it to do it again. I was told a representative from Sears would decide whether I could get a new range. Also it would take 3-7 days to decide whether with the warranty I could receive another range. After reading reviews on the Samsung range there were numerous complaints about the heating element catching fire and if we had gone outside to do our chores the house may have burnt down and with our animals inside. I just want a new range and not a Sam