The heating element break is where the 500 milliohm resistor is located.
Instead of the resistor- cut the shank of shingle nail 75% through and clean both ends of broken heater wire. Cut nail shank above to nail head off and nail shank below to nail point off. Insert ends of heater element in partly cut slot to hammer or squeeze section of nail shank connection together.
In the past, I tried shortening heater element and bolting to make connection and then I found the resistance of heater element too low and the glowing element burned out quickly.
Keeping resistance of heating element as close as possible is idea of this method.
