wow400

£27.61 now...

21 hours ago, Jay123 said:

Those that have received welded auger etc are you using the ex4 or ex6? 

Yup, EX6 too

Hopefully that’ll stop the reverse pellet grinding 👍

My welded pellet chute & new auger truned up today - I'll fit them over the weekend & fire up the SF and see if it makes any difference!

Aah, that’s a good point - I’ve got an old Maverick somewhere, I’ll dig it out & try it against the FireBoard and the WSF probes.

The smokeboost kicked in around 210° for me and fluctuated +- about 20°f and if you set it to on when at a higher temp, it stops the pellet feed & fan until the temp drops low enough to enable the smokeboost.  And everything I’ve read reckons that the most smoky flavour is imparted when the food is not that hot:

Quote

It has long been known that smoke rings stop growing as the cook progresses. The point at which they stop seems to be when the myoglobin hits about 170°F depending on a number of variables. At that temp it has broken down so far that the pink color can no longer be locked in. But basting or spritzing the surface cools it and allows it to grow. So the size of the smoke ring as well as the sharpness of the edge is connected to how fast the meat heats. Yet another reason to cook low and slow.

Good to know 👍

I’ve done a couple of cooks and tests recently - the latest software / firmware updates have definitely helped although I reckon Weber have tweaked / filtered their algorithm such that when you set a temp and it gets near (say 600°f) it doesn’t really move from that unless it’s a big jump for a longer period of time.

I set up my FireBoard to measure a food-less burn from ambient to 600° then a drop to 225° for a bit then back up to 600° again.

You can see the results for yourself. Obviously way, way better than it was but I reckon you can see how they’ve accomplished it 😉

I also did a beer can chicken (second graph) with it set to 225° again then a final burn to crisp the skin - worked very well but the ‘stable’ 225° indication on the WSF isn’t what really occurs!
 

I also had some weird ‘hunting’ of the temp display when I was trying to get it up to 600° (I had used one of their probes resting on the top grill inside) and it’s a shame you can’t attach a video or you could see the rock steady SF temp of 600° yet the probe jumped up & down through 529° then 586° then 624° (just those 3 exact temps) in random order for 5 mins before I turned it off......

There’s something going on behind the scenes!

7 minutes ago, Justin said:

nothing will hold temp precisely mate, wind and sun will have an vary effect if nothing else, as long as it is in tolerance you are fine, plus or minus 20c seems fine

Yep, I certainly can’t disagree with that (although mines all in °f but I know what you mean) but it should have been able to make max temp and was very slow getting up there - no wind to hinder it and nothing on the grates!

Well yesterday, after having updated and fully cleaned out the SF (hoovered out auger etc) I thought I’d try a 600°f run then down to 225° for a St Louis cut of ribs.

turned on at 0925 and gave up 2hrs later when the max temp of 528.9°f was reached 🙄

As you can see from the graph, it never really held 225° particularly well but the majority of the time the SF was showing 225 exactly.

They’ve obviously added a filter that prevents fluctuations in temperature showing!

The ribs were nice though 👍

Shouldn’t be - brand new pellets, grill was very clean before I started and I put the ribs over the guard that covers the pellets....

5 hours ago, Jay123 said:

Just a bit of an update.... Finally got the app working. Took a factory reset and updating firmware etc again but now there are a few recipes there. Also looks like the iPhone version of the app is more advanced than the android one as I still see no graphs. 

Has anyone used this place before as I need to get a stock of pellets in. Going through my stash quickly and need to perfect the crispy chicken skin before normality resumes. 

https://shop.americanbbq.co.uk/index.asp?uid=D323F9DE-556C-40F6-A929-88A841C6D030

Yep - they were quick to dispatch the GMG pellets.

I did wonder what might have happened had the pellet flow ignited 🙄

Tried a beef short rib yesterday - all going OK until it started to lose heat - there were plenty of pellets in the hopper - so I wound the temperature up to 500 to make sure it was going and in a few minutes got a massive cloud of smoke and as you can see, the temp spiked!

I put it back to 225 and left the lid open to cool it down a bit then went off...as you can see it pretty much gave up.

I could hear pellets dropping into the BBQ but there was no smoke or heat - I pulled the meat, wrapped it & chucked it ino the oven

I then had a look in the EX6 to find....

No wonder it wouldn't work - it had smothered itself!

Needless to say a shitty email was sent to Weber....

Yep, the new welded chutes are much straighter - don’t have that kink.

i disassembled the SF yesterday afternoon and had a good inspection of the chute & auger assembly. Weber have positively sealed (with sealant) the join between the chute & the auger so you cant get any sawdust in the join area which I believe was one of the original issues and the all in one assembly solved.

I’m not sure what the different, straighter, chute design will do and I’m not sure is there are any differences with the new auger / motor of the welded assembly - only time will tell....

2 hours ago, Lleyton Mac's Backyard BBQ said:

Exact same issue apart from not being able to get to 600f i also had lots of sawdust i couldnt smoke anything less than 300f without it dropping more 100f, i bought an ash hoover to clean it all out and did a factory reset upto now its been fine and seems to be back to normal, it looks to me when its in shutdown its churning sawdust back into the auger and thats whats stopping the pellets flowing as its clogged as the dust never gets pushed out

Yeah, that sounds about right. 
I want to know if this welded chute & auger assembly would make a difference...

2 hours ago, Is it dun yet said:

Wot pellets did you use

They were about 1/5 Weber and the rest GMG

Right, I did a test burn this morning - from cold to 600°F.

Outside temp was about 19°c - it took 9:15 mins to get to 225°f and although I left it burning for 1hr25 it never reached 600 - the highest was 500° for about 5 mins before backing off.

It churned through about 2/3 a hopper of pellets and I thought I’d let it run dry to see what happened - no low fuel warning at all and at the end lots and lots and lots of sawdust just going around & around in the auger!

This was my ash bucket after a 6hr burn. Admittedly I did do a bit of a sweep of the ash inside through the holes!

13 hours ago, Is it dun yet said:

With your GMG gold pellets wot temp can you get to? I can only get around 525F with them it won't go any hotter, but my SF is not playing right getting to any temp takes way to long.

Bag pellets turned up Tuesday and controller today. I'v fitted it and now it's connected to the app, at to delete and reinstall though. The knob as a different feel to it when it's turned. It still takes over 45 mins to 600F and from 225F to 600F  was 31 mins.

Is anybody else having any temp issue ?

I read on another forum it's taking 14-16 mins to 600F with the welded chute. Is anybody else getting to temp that quick ?

I only did a lo & slow - and I give it a good clean out after every cook.

I’ll wind it up this morning and time it to get to 600°

Just threw a beef roast & pork loin on and first time out with GMG Gold pellets....

So far so good but again took quite a while to staibilse back at 225!

To start with:

When I built my EX6 the only thing I found was the enamelled ash / grease pan holder that goes between the front legs wasn’t quite long enough.

This means that when the bolts are tightened, the metal bends slightly and the enamel chips off - this is an area which will no doubt rust.

Weber contacted & they’re going to send me another.

With regards connectivity, it won’t allow you to use a Wi-Fi network which doesn’t have a password. As I live in the middle of nowhere I have no need for a PW (and it makes my Sonos system a bit more reliable) I had to set up another protected network for the SF.

And FWIW, there is both a Bluetooth icon and a WiFi icon on the SF - it took a while to get the WiFi to play but got there in the end.

Finally, my EX6 has the new hopper ramp already fitted, and came with the original auger and angled pellet chute (see a Harry Soo’s YouTube).

I’ve had no issues with the pellet feeding but I did have a few issues on my 1st long cook with the SF holding 225°f but after about 90 mins it settled down.

A good website I’m sure you’re all aware of but I found it yesterday:

https://www.weberpelletgrills.com/forums/#weber-smokefire-forum.1

My Boston Butt went well in the end - used a shit ton of pellets but apart from the initial temp fluctuations, no great dramas 

Yep, that’s just wrong. 
Deffo needs Weber to sort it ASAP. 

Quick q - when the grill is connected to Wi-Fi, is there a Wi-Fi symbol showing? 
All I’ve got is the Bluetooth symbol!

What pellets are you using?