First of apologies, intended taking photos of the various assembly stages, but I was battling the wet weather when I did it yesterday, so cracked on with it to get it done.

The box is very big and heavy, personally I couldn't have managed to get it round the back of my house on my own from the kerbside delivery, but broke it down and managed to get it on my sack truck to do it. There are handles built into the box if 2 people need to lift and carry it.

The assembly wasn't too difficult and the instructions were clear and concise and easy to follow, I used the BILT app. Which you can get for your Apple or Android phone from the relevant stores. You key in your model number Weber EX4 or EX6 into the search box, once downloaded and It basically displays the instruction diagrams, Weber supply, stage by stage with the same visuals, but in colour along with animated close ups of the diagrams, along with the written information in a verbal format. I found I used both at different stages of the build and they were just as easy and helpful to follow.

The box once opened up,makes a very good work surface to work on once opened to avoid any scratches or dents during the construction of it. All in all it took me about 75 minutes, from start to finish and the pieces that needed to be fitted to the body is just a one man job. The only time I asked for help was tilting it up onto its legs once they had been fitted. Although I had locked the wheels, I found they still moved when trying to tip it upright and basically I was chasing it round the patio at a 45 degree angle trying to get it fully upright on my own, so got some help.

The only thing I had to go back to, to correct was I had installed the fire pot grate back to front, but realised my mistake when I tried to fit the glow plug back in. There is a hole in the edge of the grate for it to fit through (doh) so long as that is fitted towards the back of the barrel, the glow plug will fit properly.

The weather beat me in the end yesterday, so couldn't do the burn off till today. Switching the machine on and connecting Bluetooth was easy and so long as you have the app on the phone installed correctly it is a doddle along with the firmware update needed before using (took about 20 minutes to update) the connection to the wifi wasn't difficult, once that was done, but it would be nice if the app could find Wifi network in your locallty itself, rather than have to type the network name in manually, you have to type it in along with your router password.

I filled up the hopper with a bag of Weber Grill Academy Pellets and the full bag fitted in perfectly into it with the new hopper insert. I fired it up to do the burnoff and it reached 600F within 18 minutes and during the 45 minute burnoff it did drop to 555F for 20 minutes towards the end (It is an extremely windy day today) so hoping that may have contributed to it. Although the phone was reading 555F but the display on the machine was saying 600F so not sure what was going on there. But I will monitor it over the coming weeks to see if it is a regular thing or just a one-off. The machine needs to be left to cool down for 15 minutes after a cook/burn in before switching off.

One thing I did notice when the temperature was at 600F there were a lot of embers within the machine and a few were escaping that I could see in daylight floating around (mainly from the drawer) which was fully closed. Along with a little smoke from various other joints and seals of the machine. I am not particular bothered about that as any new smoker tends to show a few leaks until properly seasoned and settled in with a few cooks. Once again something I will monitor, but hope it stops. If not I will look to add some gasket seals in any problem areas perhaps, if it is causing it to lose heat. With regards the embers as mine is on a concrete patio, not particularly concerned, but if using on a wooden deck or dry grass area, I would look to buy some grill mats to place it over, just in case.

I have a couple of accessories from my previous bullet smoker (Cast Iron Griddle and Pizza Stone) that seem to fit over the grates perfectly and for my first 2 cooks Smash burgers tonight and pizza tomorrow. I am going to try them out.

Steve