Any home appliance technicians in the house?

[MudPuppy]

I know this is WAY off topic but hey this is the "off topic" forum lol and I am a bit desperate so I figured I'd ask here...

Do we have any home appliance electricians in the house?

I bought a used Magic Chef range (oven?, stove? -not sure if there is a difference, but to me they're all the same) drop-in, glasstop but the people I got it from didn't install or uninstall themselves and from the sound of it this thing was directly wired into their cabinets (*shrug* guess that's a "fancy" thing  ) and they didn't know much about what I found back there.
It does not have a pigtail and I am trying to install a 3-prong. The far left screw on the block terminal is broken off and (what I believe is) the ground strap has been cut.

My problem is the "rigging" that the installer did and what the wires from his "rigging" goes to, I assume they all came from the far left screw that was broken off at the terminal but I need verification.
Planning on taking the block terminal off my old range & ground strap and put it on this one.
I attached a picture showing what it looks like back there- there are 3 wires going into this "rigging" which is that black thing on the left with the wires just hanging there in the picture.


I can't find any information regarding this range.
I don't know what model it is or how old.

[eaglebeek]

Somewhere...usually near the power supply cord or just inside the oven door...on that range  /stove there should be a tag stating the model & serial number and the voltage that the stove requires. The tag is almost always riveted on and difficult to take off. If your range is missing its tag there's a reason for it and it can't be good. I would be very wary of that appliance

With the information you find on the tag you should be able to find just about everything you need to know on-line.

[MudPuppy]

Thank you eaglebeek I will have to look into that tomorrow since I left it in the carport tonight lol

I have been trying to look for anything online regarding ranges & their wiring but so far all I have been coming up with are ones that have less (than 3) wires on the left side. Even my old stove (though it isn't a glasstop & doesn't have any of the fancy stuff like this one - digital display, clock, etc.) only has 1 wire on that side.

[eaglebeek]

Older electric stoves like this one may be grounded through the neutral wire in the 230-volt power supply. The burners themselves use the two "hot" wires. The "hots" can be any color except white or green...black, red, blue, etc. The neutral is always white if the house was wired properly to begin with. It's an educated guess, but I would think the broken stud connected the neutral wire from the house with the ground strap that appears to be broken or cut off.

A separate wire may also connect the ground to a nearby copper water pipe and a ground established in that manner.

Try giving these guys a call: http://thebva.com/. They operate a Denver-area appliance shop that's been around for 40+ years and freely gives advice over the phone. They likely know what you have by how you describe it.

[MudPuppy]

Found the model# (thanks again eaglebeek)

Didn't find anything regarding my concerns online for it though, even the online manual for it didn't verify the number or colors of wires coming from the stove. But went ahead and emailed them at thebva.com (thanks again to eaglebeek ) that way I could send the picture as well. Haven't gotten a response from them yet.
But given that the left terminal on the terminal box is broken and that it has this "rigging" (with the 2 port tap connector) with these 3 wires coming from the stove (these wires are: 2 black & 1 orange). I went ahead and took the port tap connector off and wired up my pigtail.
Drug the heavy little thing inside and did a test connection- checking my connections in the back and also testing all components to the stove and everything is functioning as it should.
About to cook some dinner on it for another round of testing.