Bull anyone ever removed their seals on hood?

[chadinsc]

so when i got my grill it came with rec teq ultimate blend pellets and i was able to get to 540 to cook pizza. but i knew i wanted to seal it to hopefully get higher temps and hold in the delicious smoke. so i sealed it with lava lock xtr 1/8-1/2. and the next weekend with a sealed lid burning pit boss competition blend with a sealed lid i only got to 450. i figured it was the pellets so for my next pizza cook i switched over to kingsford signature blend and after 70min on full 380 is all i could get so i was wondering if the seal was slowing air flow enough to keep it from burning as hot so i put a 1/4in thick butter knife handle in bottom of the door and in about 5 min the temps had jumped to 440. once it hit 440 i removed the butter knife and closed the sealed lid and the temps begin to slowly drop again also. so i took my seal off. anyone else ever removed the seal? i really expected it to improve my smoker but it didn’t on mine.

 

[Uncle Bob]

This could be interesting...

 

[chadinsc]

i agree uncle bob. i was very surprised by my results on my grill. i didn’t expect it. my grill now hits 440 with kingsford and i will try full power with the pitt boss and report back. all the days had similar outside temperatures

 

[mooncusser2k]

This could be interesting...

 

[Uncle Bob]

Okay, I'm not going to go fully monty on you, just say that my point of view comes from valuing fundamental info that might be useful in evaluating all the variables to come to a (possibly) correct conclusion. Humans seem to always seek THE answer, which I contend is incomplete.

I'll attempt to dispel one notion you expressed that is very common though misguided. That being the idea that you can "hold in smoke" while having the rest of the cooking process. Smoke travels on the air flow in the box. The fire triangle defines what it takes to maintain a fire; fuel, ignition, and air. If you have sufficient air flow to maintain the desired fire, the smoke has to flow with it. IF you think you're "holding in more smoke", then it follows that you are "holding in more air", which in turn is being consumed by the fire. Which again, if you're not renewing the air supply, you're starving the fire. Your closing comments show you have an understanding of the fire starving part, I'm just adding the smoke part of the idea. There's more, so I will yield the soap box......

 

[Biggs300]

Many of you have way more experience with RecTeq grills as I'm still a novice. My 700 is fully sealed, including the outside portion of the smoke stack. Just yesterday, I smoked 2 large (1 1/2" thick) pork chops for just under an hour at 285 degrees, until the internal probe showed 130 degrees. I pulled the chops and turned up the temp to 500. It took 14 minutes to get there and I seared the chops for 4 minutes/side which brought the internal temp to 147 on the chops. I can't imagine the 700 getting to temp much faster and really like not having to scrub down the grill after cooks. I'm using Lumberjack pellets.

 

[Greg Jones]

There are many variables that can affect max temps in a pellet grill, but my experience would point to pellet choice and quality as the major factor. My RT-700 is completely sealed, including the smokebox, and back when I did max temp cooks on this grill, I never had any problems reaching 550* One day last August I was cooking in the evening and it had already cooled to 76*. The grill is in the shade, I filled the hopper with a fresh bag of the Cookinpellets blend that recteq sells, and set the temp to max. I didn’t time how long it took to reach max temp, but the RT-700 was at 596*. I didn’t seal my grills to help make them run hotter, and I would be surprised if sealing them made them run hotter or cooler than 10*-20* tops.

 

[Uncle Bob]

Okay @chadinsc , let's add another brick to the wall of thought. We need to think of the grill in a wholistic way (throw in some zen for additional seasoning). There is air in, and air out. They work together, and if the design is sound, they attempt to work at optimum by complimenting each other. If we pump in, let's say one cubic foot of air with the fan (forced draft system), then we need to exhaust that same cubic foot of used air for the system to be in balance. If the fan is too small and the exhaust too big (relatively) the exhaust could suck out (induced draft) air faster than the fan can supply it, thus starving the fire. You've already proved what one of your problems is by propping open the lid with the knife. You enlarged the exhaust system allowing the fan to push in more air as it has demonstrated it is capable of. Basically you constipated your cooker with the lid seal. At low and slow temps it probably isn't an issue, it's when you need more air to stoke the fire that the problem displays itself. Others who might say they've done the same thing you did and didn't see the same "problem" likely have something else allowing either more air in or out, perhaps a combination of both. Their barrel may leak more than they are aware, their fan may be more efficient, their exhaust ports cleaner, and on and on.

 

[chadinsc]

thats the kinda results i was fully expecting. i sealed mine mainly in hopes of higher heat for pizza every friday night. is there anything i should look at that may cause lower max temp? i have alot of ash in the bottom of barrel because ret req say that acts as insulation. i clean the fire pot every few cooks. also i did reverse seared steaks cooked at 225 until 110 internal and seared at max which was 450 that day and to my surprise at 450 the steaks instantly sizzled when they hit that grate and was fantastic. in you guys experience is 450 hot enough to cause an instant sizzle? im wondering if im really getting hotter than the display says now. i really liked my lid sealed it was clean and had a great feeling opening and closing. like a expensive car door feels. thank for all the reply’s so far

 

[Buckeye smoker]

I posted a similar thread on just removing and replacing the lavalock sorry didn't see this.
But, to answer yours, I haven't seen any temp changes using the seal. My 700 gets to 600° ..I believe 630 was the highest and that was just a test I ran when I first bought it.
I also have my probe window plugged with a rubber probe holder/seal.
As said, there's Many factors that can be involved.

 

[MonnieRock]

Chadinsc,

Do you have an accurate supplemental digital thermometer?

If I am reading your posts correctly, you are basing your temperatures off of the value shown on the controller?

 

[chadinsc]

i currently do not. mine broke this past week actually. i did test my meat probes in 32 degree water and both read perfectly. but have not checked the one that measures the air temp. if i lay a meat probe on the rack it does read higher than the set temperature.

 

[Uncle Bob]

i currently do not. mine broke this past week actually. i did test my meat probes in 32 degree water and both read perfectly. but have not checked the one that measures the air temp. if i lay a meat probe on the rack it does read higher than the set temperature.

You may not have seen the info in your experience, but it is well documented that heat in the chamber varies from point to point. The far end, toward the stack, tends to be the hottest both because the fan is pushing the hot air that direction, and the stack is drawing it as well. If you want to more accurately compare the controller sensor with an alternate device the device pickup needs to be as close to the system probe as possible.