My first experiment with “LarryGrates”


 
Jon Tofte

Jon Tofte

TVWBB 1-Star Olympian
I am slowly working towards my grilling grate playoff. I haven’t been able to get my sheet metal friend to get any of my parts done:mad:. His daughter works for him, though, and she cut up my aluminum sheet into grate-size pieces to experiment with what I have nicknamed LarryGrates in honor of LMichaels who recommended the idea.

The 20 guage aluminum is too thin and started sagging. Also, with these stainless rod grates the support bars rest BELOW the bars you grill on. Since I didn’t make a step-down to accommodate that, these grates didn’t sit well on the aluminum sheets. I am actually more interested in how this will work with cast iron grates that don’t have this issue.

My quick fix is going to be to locate some firm but thin metal strips I can use to reinforce the sheet aluminum to keep it from sagging. In the meantime, here is my first attempt. Not bad, but not all that convincing,either. The shortcomings I mentioned need to be corrected first before drawing any conclusions:

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You and another have spoken of presentation in another, recent thread so I feel I can chime-in and exclaim this is a far, far cry from what I have seen from your GrillGrates. Nonetheless, I am eager to continue reading of your experiments and playoff.
 
I will be working on it. Need to wire brush one of my cast iron grate sets and use them in the next try. Hopefully I can pick up some flat steel sturdy enough to reinforce underneath the aluminum sheet. With that, I think I will be in a better post to give this idea a fair shot.
 
How was flare up controlled? This is why CharBroil and Nexgrill are going this route and what GG are trying to extol as a big advantage
 
LMichaels said:
How was flare up controlled? This is why CharBroil and Nexgrill are going this route and what GG are trying to extol as a big advantage
Click to expand...

Larry,

Yes to some extent, but the place where the aluminum sagged didn't work so well. I am going to be looking for something I can use to reinforce without raising the sheets up. I also think the cast iron grates with their flat bottom will work much better. I don't consider my first experiment very well executed and am making no judgments yet.

Jon
 
Just from the picture it needs some tweaking. Keep up the good fight sir, we are indeed interested!

I, for one, prefer cast iron grates and don't mind having "just" flavorizer bars to mitigate flare ups, but that is just me. Still reading and interested!

Tim
 
ME too because I plan on making a set of the shields once I get my custom made grates from RC (Dave). I need to re-plumb my gas line to it though and install the high flow regulator it needs but can't wait to get that bad boy going
 
I will be working on it Saturday. Hopefully, I can post a way better update. I am very interested, too, especially using cast iron. Stay tuned!
 
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