My Summit Gold - Repair or Replace?


 
K

Kris Pfeiffer

TVWBB Member
First off, I love this thing. I bought for a song a long time ago and it’s never failed me. It’s a natural gas grill and I simply love size and heat.

The grates need replacing. The flavorizer bars are ****. The burners need to be replaced. The lid liner (not sure what that’s called) has mostly rusted out where it’s attached to the cover.

I understand parts can be difficult to find for it. But if I can find them, am I throwing good money after bad? I have the rotisserie and it still works great. I even use it to cook things on thanksgiving when I run out of oven space.

To replace it with a new grill of equal capabilities is crazy expensive….but maybe it’s time?

What are your opinions?

Thanks,
Kris

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Kris Pfeiffer said:
First off, I love this thing. I bought for a song a long time ago and it’s never failed me. It’s a natural gas grill and I simply love size and heat.

The grates need replacing. The flavorizer bars are ****. The burners need to be replaced. The lid liner (not sure what that’s called) has mostly rusted out where it’s attached to the cover.

I understand parts can be difficult to find for it. But if I can find them, am I throwing good money after bad? I have the rotisserie and it still works great. I even use it to cook things on thanksgiving when I run out of oven space.

To replace it with a new grill of equal capabilities is crazy expensive….but maybe it’s time?

What are your opinions?

Thanks,
Kris

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You are probably going to get overwhelmed with responses such as money pit, can’t get parts, don’t do it etc. All valid. I restored an 05 Summit Platinum. I got a new hood from Weber under warranty, a cookbox was discontinued and is unavailable, flavorizer bars are very pricey, as are stainless steel grates. I was fortunate to be able to fabricate cookbox pieces, my flavorizers have one or two years left, grates were in good shape as were the burners. The entire cart is stainless so rust wasn’t an issue. Good luck whatever you decide.F8049D31-5A5B-4446-8E44-B26286F39CFA.jpeg
 
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The cook box is the achilles heel of these things. Check the panel where the burners come in through the cook box. If they are in good shape, then you are probably OK. If they are corroded around the holes where the burners enter, then it is going to be a likely money pit as you can no longer find them either from weber or after market. Once those holes start expanding, you run the risk of fire backing out through the larger holes and that is a big fire hazard. No matter what, the SS solid rod cooking grates are keepers.
 
I agree 100% with Bruce. Inspect the firebox carefully. If you have evaded burn-through this long, then I think it is worth giving it another run. Like Bruce said, those stainless rod grates are keepers. I would but some elbow grease into cleaning them up. You might be surprised at the results. I would just cut out that heat shield. Your hood may pick up a little "blueing" but that won't hurt anything; rust falling on to your food will!

Burners may well need to be replaced. That shouldn't be too bad and can certainly be found. The flavorizer bars are going to set you back, but a new set will give you years of additional service.

Here's a good deal on Amazon. They are aftermarket of a brand I don't know, but that doesn't mean they won't work just fine:

 
I don't think on close inspection those are rod type grates. When I enlarge the photos they appear to be the stamped ones (I could be wrong). Bottom line Kris understand that you could be well into hundreds of green backs and even if you have so far evaded burn through on the fire box know it's waiting right around the corner. As it's not a matter of "if" but "when". As for the lid just rip out that shield. It's only there to prevent the stainless lid from "bluing". If you ever rode motorcycles you know all bout "bluing" LOL
Bottom line think it though carefully. You may find there are better places to invest a few hundred $$$$. BTW if you can't think if any I'll send you my Zelle or PayPal address :D
 
If I was in your shoes, I would verify (as others have said) that the grill only had the problems listed in your post. If that is the case, and you love the grill and have the rotisserie already, it makes a lot of sense to remove the lid liner and throw some aftermarket parts at it. Replacing parts is just a part of keeping any grill for a long time. What you did is essentially defer some routine part replacement until the total dollars required to keep the grill going got fairly high and now it is time to pay the piper. The cost would have been the same and your overall grilling performance would have been better if you had replaced the parts earlier.

No disrespect intended and I'm sorry if it comes across that way. I defer maintenance on stuff all the time and it does have real benefits (you might have found another great grill for a song in the mean time, for example).

Nice big brand name grills are fairly expensive as you indicated. Even parts are expensive.
 
I restored my Summit Gold D4 a few years ago that had many of the same issues as yours. I was able to get a warranty replacement lid and firebox from Weber free of charge which made it more reasonable. They are worth restoring if you can get a replacement firebox. You can search for my thread and see what it took.

Ironically, I originally bought mine from the same dealer in WI.

If you search "weber summit gold d4 restoration" my thread should come up. Good luck!
 
Thanks all, for the great advice. I’m have some work to do this weekend. I’m going to give it a good cleaning and look over. I’ll keep you all posted!

Thanks again,
Kris
 
Yah, pump your brakes on doing a refurb on that. Unless you can still get the panels, it is a likely money pit.
 
It's interesting to me that on his model, there appears to be a stainless reinforcement around the actual burners, but behind and above that are the fatally flawed porcelain steel panels that comprise a major portion of the firebox.

Someday, someday, I am going to pick up a 2nd generation Summit - hopefully a Platinum - and work with my sheet metal shop to come up with a fix for those grills like they did for my 1st generation Summit.
 
I noticed that as well Jon. I kinda figured it was Weber's attempt at protecting the porcelain coated steel panel....but it doesn't seem to have worked very well.
 
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