Neff 1552 Circotherm

The controls on this Neff 1552 Circotherm model have back-lit dials that consist of a strip of plastic film that is moved around a pair of sprockets in sync with the control knob. Regrettably, the plastic film is affected by heat (good grief - it's an oven, chaps!) and cracks, leaving you with no indication of selected function or temperature. This happened to the first of the four dials after about 2 years. Now, you can dismantle the little plastic boxes that the displays are mounted in - but Neff won't sell you the plastic strips (which I would guess at about £2 worth each) only the complete dial box assembly. These are about as complex as a disposable camera, but retail at £45. So, our £660 oven has bits of paper and plastic taped to the front so we have some idea of the temperature setting it is at, because I don't see that shelling out £180 for 4 plastic boxes on what is supposed to be a quality product makes any sense at all. Neff's customer service say " the 'film strip' design is tried and tested and has been used on our ovens for many, many years" and there is "no indication of any abnormally high failure rate". Poor door sealing due to lack of hinge-tension adjustment causes fan noise and heat loss, which is annoying, and the shelves have so little vertical adjustment that you constantly have to swap shelves around during cooking to try to find the right spacing for what you are putting in. Plus, if an element goes, it's a major dismantling job. Our first and last Naff - Vorsprung durch Terrible