Dave - Unixadm
TVWBB Super Fan
Weber strayed a bit off the beaten path with the Smokefire:
1. DIrect grilling chamber, versus the more conventional drip pan arrangement. Opportunity for improved grilling performance, but risk to potential grease fires.
2. Less conventional hopper assembly.
3. Use of a smaller glow plug in place of an igniter rod.
4. Electronic controls which in their first iteration may require some tweaking.
5. Adoption of a vertically air fed fire pot with forced air ash pan.
Some of the other companies acquired controllers from another manufacture and simply incorporated them into their earlier pellet grills. That certainly would have reduced the risk. Weber looks to have gone their own path, so they're potentially not only having to work out software issues on a controller, but also two different apps and hardware.
If they can sort out the issues and maintain the smoke output I've seen, I'm going to love the Smokefire. They got a lot right and have a few pretty significant issues that I hope they acknowledge and resolve.
1. DIrect grilling chamber, versus the more conventional drip pan arrangement. Opportunity for improved grilling performance, but risk to potential grease fires.
2. Less conventional hopper assembly.
3. Use of a smaller glow plug in place of an igniter rod.
4. Electronic controls which in their first iteration may require some tweaking.
5. Adoption of a vertically air fed fire pot with forced air ash pan.
Some of the other companies acquired controllers from another manufacture and simply incorporated them into their earlier pellet grills. That certainly would have reduced the risk. Weber looks to have gone their own path, so they're potentially not only having to work out software issues on a controller, but also two different apps and hardware.
If they can sort out the issues and maintain the smoke output I've seen, I'm going to love the Smokefire. They got a lot right and have a few pretty significant issues that I hope they acknowledge and resolve.
Last edited: