Thanks for that suggestion–but would this work for a microwave that is not in operation? Again, the cooking area generates this heat even with the microwave not in use for hours–as long as it’s sitting there plugged in, it gets warm.
Odd that your skin tingled even though the device was unplugged. Possibly capacitors holding charge. But leaking.
My microwave is cold when not used for sometime. No tingle. I suspect you have current leaking from some where. Not likely that you would have actual microwave radiation happening. Not enough power to do it. But there seems to be a fault. I would not use the device. Or leave it plugged in. Possible shock / fire hazard if it deteriorates further.
It would tell you if the mag is generating microwave energy, thorugh some fault of the switches, timer and interlock. (I think they’re a good thing to have around, to check older oven seals and so forth.)
Or just toss the oven and buy a new one. They’re cheap, too.
I’ve read through all the replies here–thanks for the great suggestions/information, everyone.
This has given me some ideas for further testing, and I think a leak detector would be a good idea too. Before spending any money though I might just leave it unplugged when not using it–it is a very cheap, $50 microwave–I’m starting to think that might have something to do with it…
Microwave ovens have multiple safety switches built into the door so that it shouldn’t be possible for the magnetron to turn on unless you’ve done some serious electrical tinkering to the inside of the microwave. This is true even for the $50 el-cheapo microwaves.
If the magnetron was on, you wouldn’t feel a tingling. You’d feel a brief bit of warmth followed by HOLY FUCKING SHIT I’M BEING BURNED OW OW OW FUCK!!! And then you’d spend months recovering because microwaves tend to penetrate a few centimeters into your flesh and create rather nasty deep tissue burns.
The magnetron is basically an all the way on or all the way off thing. Unlike a conventional oven, it doesn’t have a low power heat option. When you use lower power settings on your microwave oven, it cycles the magnetron on and off. It doesn’t go into any kind of low power mode.
So I can say with a fair degree of confidence that the magnetron is not turning on and the microwave isn’t leaking radio waves when it’s powered off.
If it’s getting warm when it’s not turned on, that is most likely the power supply generating a fair amount of energy in standby mode - not good from an energy efficiency point of view (and your electric bill) but not harmful, either.
As for the tingling, my guess is that is more psychosomatic than anything else, although I suppose it might be possible that you could get some static electricity buildup on the plastic parts of the microwave. Doesn’t seem very likely to me though.
I have to second that the magnetron is not tingling you.
The 5+ Kv step up coil that runs it would have to be powered, and it is either on or off, no variations.
It is also a fairly large coil and generally makes an nice audible humming when under load
And the magnetron would not tingle, it would hurt.
Heat could be the small step down transformer and rectifier that generate DC power for the control board etc.
Tingle could simple be static, or perhaps you have a wiring short?
But i honestly do not believe it could be microwave emission.
I used to zap my food too but I stoped this because you’re basically blasting your food with EMF radiation, and supposedly it changes the molecular structure of the food. Not sure if this is true but I did notice a rise in my energy levels when I quit the microwave
You are blasting your food with radio waves. This causes certain molecules like water and fats and certain sugars, etc. to vibrate and create heat. At that point, you’ve got heat, just like you would if you were cooking the food in a conventional oven. The heat does things to the molecules, the same way heat does in a conventional oven. Like I said, it’s called cooking.
Cooking in a microwave is a bit different, because heating things in a conventional oven heats fairly evenly from the outside in. A microwave heats from the inside out from the outside in, which is a fairly confusing phrase, but what I mean by it is that the heat is generated inside the food by the vibrating molecules instead of just being transferred in via conduction and convection. Another difference is that not all of the molecules in the food vibrate and heat equally.
Calling it “EMF radiation” is technically true (it’s electromagnetic radiation around 2.4 GHz in frequency, which is in the microwave radio wave region of the electromagnetic spectrum), but using the word “radiation” to most folks implies ionizing radiation, like X-rays and gamma rays, i.e. wavelengths that are actually damaging to molecules just because of their higher frequency. The radio waves in a microwave oven are far too low in frequency to be ionizing, so there’s no “radiation” in the common sense of that word.
Heating food in a microwave doesn’t do anything weird to the molecules. That’s just common internet woo from folks who don’t understand how a microwave oven works.
