Had my first fire/lid pop…

I Have't been on in a while. I have had thins happen to me in September. I believe that mine was due to the incomplete combustion of the pellets. That carbon doesn't burn off and makes it's one fuel. in that smoke the fuel load get too much and it already has a spark. Boom is the end result. I haven't had that issue again. I do regular maintenance on my 590. I do a full clean every other cook. Just my 2 cents from a 30yr FF. If anyone else can explain it please let me know.
 
Had my first BOOM on my new RT-700 this afternoon. Had three hours of ash in the fire pot. Had the lid open for five minutes and then closed it for 15. Was walking to the grill with a meatloaf when I heard the BOOM and saw a puff of smoke like a pope had been elected.
I'm wondering if during shutdown, too many pellets are being fed to the pot.
 
I'm wondering if during shutdown, too many pellets are being fed to the pot.
The general consensus is that if you shut down your grill before stepping it down to 250 or lower, your firepot gets overloaded for the next use causing an overpressure condition when the burning pellets in the middle of the pot are covered by too many pellets.

Also on the 1250 make sure you have the latest firmware which was allegedly modified to address this to some degree.

I haven't had this happen to me by doing these two things.
 
I use to have a Traeger. Their instructions are also to leave the lid open until you see decent white smoke.....Usually 2 & 1/2 to 3 minutes.
 
RT590 popped off for the second time. I contacted Recteq support and here is their response:

When you turned your grill on, do you remember hearing the tell-tale noise of the blower fan running? It sounds like a mix between a hair dryer and an airplane overhead. This fan, when bound up, deprives the smoldering pellets of the oxygen needed to combust. The result is a lot of fuel-rich smoke that can ignite eventually and cause the lid pop you grill experienced. The jarring of the grill unbinds the fan and the grill then ignites.

If the issue arises again, unplug the grill and leave the lid closed until the smoke dissipates. Open the lid and empty the fire pot so it is completely clear. Turn the grill on and use a long screwdriver or butter knife to manually turn the blower fan (the bigger of the two fans underneath the grill) blades in both directions. This unbinds the fan and corrects the issue.
 
Well, just fired up my 700 and noticed the temp wasn’t rising, at all, for like 5 minutes. Then all of a sudden, 84, 121, and boom!!! Lid blown up. Just cleaned everything out with a vacuum about two smokes ago. Only thing I can think of is that it did drop very cold where I live lately, so perhaps it froze up the pellets inside the auger??? Really not sure. Couldn’t get the fire to go down inside the box for a long time, was actually afraid it was going to start the pellets in the auger on fire and go up to the hopper so I used some baking soda. So, now I’m waiting for it to cool down and will vacuum out and put a handful of pellets back in the box and try again…
Yes, this exact same thing has happened to me twice. This morning it was a huge explosion. I was in the house and thought a transformer blew up. Going to call Support tomorrow.
 

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