After thinking about it a bit and reading these posts, I think glasstops are for people who do most of their cooking at McDonald’s and with the microwave, and count easy cleanup above all else.
So why not just call a plumber and get a quote? When I wanted to convert to a gas stove it was a simple run and cost less than $100.
Since this is about cooking and appliances, I feel it’s more suited to the Cafe Society forum, so I’ll just cover this pot and carry it over there.
And welcome, prbinusa!
Flat cooktops are easy to clean if you only spill on it when it’s cold.
induction is fine - and fast. but you can only use certain metals with it. i would get a single side-unit induction burner if you really want to play with it. most of the times i used them were because of their portability (cooking somewhere that didn’t have close access to the stove), or because we needed the extra cooking space.
I found this amusing; it’s sort of like forum ping-pong.
I had an old, circa late-80s glasstop electric stove. Had. I understand that they’re worlds better now, but I hated that damn thing for cooking. It was rather a blessing when El Hubbo accidentally dropped something on the glass top and broke it. (Even then, we taped a sheet pan to the broken half and used the other two burners for about a year until we could replace it.) The only good thing I could say about it was that it did clean up easily, sorta, as long as you got to the spill right away.
I replaced it with a gas range that I love love love. Never again.
Pretty much like this one. Grease and other things would wipe off without problem, but once something gets cooked onto it, it’s a chore to remove, even with the cleaner and scrub pads that are recommended.
If you really love cooking, you should go with gas.
That be said, I’ve had both coil electric and glasstop and, of the two, I prefer the glasstop.
It is easier to keep clean, and, although the control still sucks in comparison to gas, you can at least manage the heat somewhat better by sliding pans on and off the “burner” or by putting the pan halfway on.
We have a glasstop. I don’t like it, but it is better than the electric coils that came with the house.
The gas line (for the water heater) is less than 20 feet away, so we should be able to get hooked up for gas pretty affordably, but my wife has put her foot down. She is scared of gas stoves (grew up on electric). She stays at home while I’m at work all day, so she does a lot more cooking than I do, so she got her way. It’s the same reason we don’t have a puppy. 
I’ve yet to burn anything onto mine that wouldn’t come off in a minute or so with Bar Keeper’s Friend and a nylon pot scourer. The only thing I have heard is that hot sugar syrup or caramel can etch the glass if spilt. I have a separate hob set into the worktop and it’s just a flat sheet of glass - no metal rim, no control knobs to get grime stuck underneath, nothing (it’s touch sensitive). I find it very odd that anyone could consider that harder to clean than a gas burner. I still remember the chore of removing horrible greasy black pot supports and trying to clean up spills that had gone down into the burners when I lived in a rented house with a gas cooker.
That said, I admit that gas is better to cook on, and the flame is more appealing to my primal cooking instincts. But we don’t have gas connected at home, so ceramic it is!
I wonder what happens if you do? My in-laws use LOTS of cast iron (pans and comals) and there doesn’t seem to be a problem.
It scratches the cooktop. Also:
Gas can be (and is) delivered by truck. In rural areas no one has gas lines, but plenty of people have gas.
The cost is similar to other forms of fuel.
No offense, but you are insane if you think those monstrosities are easier to clean than a normal stove. The second you spill something onto them while they are hot, it’s basically permanently etched into the surface. I have spent hours soaking and scrubbing mine, I even have a housekeeper with a super special glasstop stove cleaning solution and she can’t get them clean either. It always has a ring of shit around the burner that never really goes away.
As would I, and that’s not what I said. I was merely commenting on my experience with the one I had. My comment about preferring a gas stove was not connected to the cleaning issue.
I learned to cook on an electric coil stove, and that’s what I still prefer. Yes, there’s a lag time between how you set the temp and when it gets to be that temp, but I adjust for it automatically by now. For example, if something has to simmer for, say, 5 minutes, that once it’s hot I can simply turn off the burner and the residual heat will last long enough to finish cooking.
As indicated previously, I’d hate to give up my cast iron pans, Revere Ware copper and my vintage Corning Ware that can go between oven, stove top and freezer with no problems.
Well, she does use an actual nylon scouring pad, one of the big no-nos. And she does use bar-keepers friend, which most people don’t use in their kitchen. That’s the stuff they always tell you to use to get burnt on oil out of pans. Of course it’s easy to clean with that.
I heard about the cast iron thing, but it was not at all in the instruction manual under warnings, and I couldn’t find it on the website. We didn’t have anyone install it, as it was secondhand (actually a gift–we’d been with only one working burner and no oven for a long time).
The big problem we noticed was that all our old pans, despite not looking dirty at all, apparently had baked on grease or maybe rust or something on the bottoms, probably from the coil burners we used to use. It would never come off with any washing, so we thought they were clean, but, somehow, it all comes off of the glass-top. So the pans turned the stove black just from normal use. My dad had to eventually use the technique mentioned in the book–using a razor blade–to get the stuff off. And even that left a dark ring in the center, darker than when we got it.
I’d honestly say that the coils were much easier to clean. If gas stoves are harder than that, then I’m glad I never had a gas stove, and I wonder how my frail old grandma ever managed with the one she had. (I’d wonder about my grandpa, too, once grandma passed away, but I think he only ever used it to heat the house.)
This will vary by community - where I live, yes, you can get propane in the rural areas. But if you are within the utility service territory and want gas, you must get it from the utility. That’s where the $10K comes in. (That is, if you need to have the gas main extended. My street already had a gas main in it and extending the service only cost me the expense of the trench tax.)
I looked at the dual fuel ranges; basically have to go to $2,000 minimum price. And you can spend much more. I would love that but not in the budget. I’m trying to stay in the $1200 to $1500. range; wish I could spend more but can’t.
It appears that gas and electric ranges are roughly the same price (for similiar size and options). As much as I’d like to go to gas, to get propane set up is about an initial investment of $650. This includes 100 gallons of gas which I understand is a year’s worth.
So, gas is going to take an initial investment of stove and gas set-up for close to $2300. Which right now is a big “ouch”!
Luckily, I do 99% of all cooking in the house so my wife is letting me run with whatever I want. She recently lost her job so bucks are a driving force in the decision. My dilemna at this time is if I can get a decent range for $1500 or less, how can I justify going excess of $2,000. Sure liked the old days when I could easily write a check for $3,000 without a problem but that is past history for now!