Air fryers are certainly quite the trendy appliance at the moment. They’ve revolutionised home-made chips and nuggets, crisping them up without frying. But one Kmart shopper was devastated when she discovered that the appliance had damaged her kitchen.

Kmart sells a range of air fryers – ranging from a compact 1.5-litre air fryer for $49 to the larger 7-litre air fryer priced at $119.

One Kmart shopper shared an air fryer warning on a facebook group after she discovered that her Kmart Air Fryer had cracked her kitchen bench top, as reported in 7News.

“Just an FYI and warning!” she wrote on the Kmart facebook group.

“Bought the big air fryer and have been loving it … till I noticed a big crack in my bench top.

“I didn’t realise the heat the air fryer made underneath and has now cracked my stone bench top!”

Air Fryer Warning: they aren’t all what they’re ‘cracked’ up to be

The woman said that the heat that was released from the bottom of the appliance had damaged her stone kitchen benchtop.

She shared a photo of the counter, showing a long crack in the stone. The woman said the damage had left her husband “quietly rocking in the corner”.

Read The Manual People!

No many of us actually thoroughly read the manual when getting a new appliance. If this shopper had, she would have seen that the instructions recommend consumers to place the air fryer on an insulated heat pad, or at least a surface that is heat resistant.

To be honest, I would have thought a stone benchtop would be heat resistant so I would have done the same thing as her. But apparently, even though most stones are heat-resistant, they can be damaged by sudden and rapid surface temperature changes.

A restoration expert explained:
“Stone countertops are susceptible to cracking under surface heat. The reason for this being that heat on the surface doesn’t spread through stone, so when the area underneath the fryer begins to expand (as all things do under heat), the rest of the counter does not, so that resulting pressure can cause fractures. It’s a natural factor of using stone or other natural material, there’s always a weak spot or a fault somewhere. Just because it hasn’t happened to you, doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.”

And laminate benchtops are just as susceptible.
“Be careful if you have laminex bench tops too. Heat on laminex will make the laminate bubble up in a big blister. Not repairable, new bench top. We used to replace quite a few where people used an electric kettle in one spot. Appliances that get hot should be placed on a heat protective mat or board, in fact you should use a board for anything on your bench top, they also get scratched or cut.”

She Got Crucified

Other air fryer users practically fried the poor woman for sharing her experience, saying that she should have read the instructions more carefully.

“It pays to read instructions, common sense really not to put something that generates that much heat directly on any kind of bench, sounds like some could have saved themselves a lot of money,” read one comment.

“It’s not a warning she needs to put out it’s called read instructions and this would not of happened in the first place that’s why things like this air fryer comes with a instruction manual!” said another.

I ALWAYS Follow Instructions

Many shared that they always place a mat below their appliances.

“It’s common sense to always put something underneath your appliances even if its a toaster a sandwich press deep fryer or air fryer.”

“With anything that generates heat that I put on the benchtop, including the slow cooker and pie maker, I ALWAYS put it on the breadboard. I had my husband make me an extra thick board for this particular purpose,” one said.

“When we bought our air fryer the instructions said to put it on a board as it generates a lot of heat and can damage stone bench tops,” another said.

Happens Regularly

However, it seems this unfortunate incident is certainly not the first to happen. In fact it seems it’s quite common for air fryers to cause major heat damage.

“My $200 air fryer cost me another $1,400 for a new Cesar stone bench top we had only been in our new house 2 years a very expensive lesson read instructions first,” shared another air fryer user.

“A friend has an acrylic back splash in her kitchen & her air fryer melted it too.”

“Our air fryer blows from the back and it heated the tile the tiles fell off and the timber behind them was burnt so we soon tossed it to the tip and went back to good old fashioned cooking in the stove.”

What are your thoughts about this air fryer warning? Did the shopper deserve to be crucified for the warning? Do you use a board underneath your appliances? Tell us in the comments below.