Iceberg
Member
I ordered this grill a week ago today and received it yesterday. I could have had it delivered the day before but would not be home for the delivery. That is some fast shipment time. I live in central Texas so Rec Tec is a few states away.
I finally got all the finishing touches put on the assembly this morning (no, I did not work on it all night.) Assembly was pretty straight forward and any glitches were "user error". For instance, I installed and tightened down all the leg bolts and then discovered I have to use the leg bolts to attach the drop-down work surface on the front of the grill. Hey - I just turned 80 and give an old guy a break!
This afternoon I put the grill through the "break-in" routine: put 1/2 cup of pellets in the firepot, put in the all the inner'ds and turned it on. I set the temp to 400 per the instructions and sat back and watched the temperature climb. It did well until it hit 215 and then it started dropping off. No, I didn't panic. I figured my 1/2 cup of pellets in the fire pot burned up and the pellets making their way down the auger hadn't reached the fire pot. So, I kicked the temp up to Full hoping the auger would get in gear and get some pellets to the fire. Afte about 5 minutes, the temp started gong up again and as soon as I saw it hit 225, I dropped the temp back to 400. Well, the temp kept going up and went on to 445. I was patient but it stayed at about 443 - 446 for about 15 minutes. I admit, I was getting concerned and thought something was going to need recalibration. After that 15 minutes or so at 445, it slowly started dropping and settled in at 400 degrees. I let it run for another hour and the temp never strayed from 399 to 405 with the bulk of the time sitting right on 400. Great controller.
Now, is this all pretty normal for the first light-off? Will I see similiar behavior if I am going to cook at 350? That is, will I see this thing jump up to 400 and then, 15 to 20 minutes later, drop down and settle in at the selected temperature? Appreciate it if one of you could let me know. Thanks to you all in advanced. I love this forum.
I finally got all the finishing touches put on the assembly this morning (no, I did not work on it all night.) Assembly was pretty straight forward and any glitches were "user error". For instance, I installed and tightened down all the leg bolts and then discovered I have to use the leg bolts to attach the drop-down work surface on the front of the grill. Hey - I just turned 80 and give an old guy a break!
This afternoon I put the grill through the "break-in" routine: put 1/2 cup of pellets in the firepot, put in the all the inner'ds and turned it on. I set the temp to 400 per the instructions and sat back and watched the temperature climb. It did well until it hit 215 and then it started dropping off. No, I didn't panic. I figured my 1/2 cup of pellets in the fire pot burned up and the pellets making their way down the auger hadn't reached the fire pot. So, I kicked the temp up to Full hoping the auger would get in gear and get some pellets to the fire. Afte about 5 minutes, the temp started gong up again and as soon as I saw it hit 225, I dropped the temp back to 400. Well, the temp kept going up and went on to 445. I was patient but it stayed at about 443 - 446 for about 15 minutes. I admit, I was getting concerned and thought something was going to need recalibration. After that 15 minutes or so at 445, it slowly started dropping and settled in at 400 degrees. I let it run for another hour and the temp never strayed from 399 to 405 with the bulk of the time sitting right on 400. Great controller.
Now, is this all pretty normal for the first light-off? Will I see similiar behavior if I am going to cook at 350? That is, will I see this thing jump up to 400 and then, 15 to 20 minutes later, drop down and settle in at the selected temperature? Appreciate it if one of you could let me know. Thanks to you all in advanced. I love this forum.