Massive oven stolen from Melbourne factory

Thieves who stole a four-metre tall industrial oven from a Melbourne factory must have had the plan cooking for a while.

Police believe they would have needed a crane or similar heavy lifting equipment to steal the $50,000 cooker, of which they have just released images in case anyone's seen it.

The powder-coating oven was last seen in a Thomastown factory car park on April 1 - the owner returned the next day to find it had gone missing.