Stainless Steel Grate Throwdown Challenge Results


 
Josh Dekubber said:
It's just my opinion but I believe the center reinforcement bar saves these Chinese company a lot of bad reviews. You really have to beef up your packaging to protect these grates if they don't have a center reinforcement bar and even still if they get banged around super hard they will easily get out of square and need to be straightened by checking with a square and tapping the appropriate corner on the concrete. I've had to do this with old 9930s and I have had a shipment from Dave that was one box of about 70 lb of SS that got a tossed around by shippers I had to tap my grates back to square because of shipping had beat them around enough that they were not square. After they were tapped back they were perfect but most consumers are not going to know this and are going to give a bad review and a return. This center support bar saves this from happening and that is my opinion on the center support bar.
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This sounds logical and as others have pointed out it saves on potential returns and negative reviews. However, if grates are shipped and are straight and square one could remove the centre rod with minimal risk id have thought. If I ordered a second set to experiment with, that would be crazy right?………
 
JKalchik said:
That's a straight go back to the vendor. There's no way that I'd accept that. I'd be concerned about popping joints if I tried to square that back up.
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I ordered over 70 lbs of custom 304 SS parts made by someone I consider a friend. We realized after that we should have had that shipment in multiple boxes instead of one box with 70+ lbs of 304SS. You can imagine what that box of parts went through in the shipping process. I called my friend and told him what happened and he said that if I felt comfortable tapping them back to square if anything happened he would replace them for free in a package by them self or if I didn't want to do that he would replace them free of charge.

I think most of you probably know who the seller of these grates is. I never showed these pictures before because I don't want to show him in a bad light. He doesn't deserve it and would do just about anything to make sure I'm a satisfied customer or anybody else. Also his work is impeccable as he is a highly respectable Craftsman.
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Josh Dekubber said:
I ordered over 70 lbs of custom 304 SS parts made by someone I consider a friend. We realized after that we should have had that shipment in multiple boxes instead of one box with 70+ lbs of 304SS. You can imagine what that box of parts went through in the shipping process. I called my friend and told him what happened and he said that if I felt comfortable tapping them back to square if anything happened he would replace them for free in a package by them self or if I didn't want to do that he would replace them free of charge.

I think most of you probably know who the seller of these grates is. I never showed these pictures before because I don't want to show him in a bad light. He doesn't deserve it and would do just about anything to make sure I'm a satisfied customer or anybody else. Also his work is impeccable as he is a highly respectable Craftsman.
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Okay, vendor aside...... to spring those grates out of square like that not only takes quite a bit of force, but force applied in a rather specific direction. Did those come of of the packaging at all? Were they still planar before & after?
 
JKalchik said:
Okay, vendor aside...... to spring those grates out of square like that not only takes quite a bit of force, but force applied in a rather specific direction. Did those come of of the packaging at all? Were they still planar before & after?
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The box was quite beat up but everything inside was packed well. The weight of the package and force on the grates isn't surprising in hindsight. After being tapped back to square they fit perfectly in all aspects.

I can easily understand why these chinese/asian companies put in the center support on their grates.
 
Josh Dekubber said:
I ordered over 70 lbs of custom 304 SS parts made by someone I consider a friend. We realized after that we should have had that shipment in multiple boxes instead of one box with 70+ lbs of 304SS. You can imagine what that box of parts went through in the shipping process. I called my friend and told him what happened and he said that if I felt comfortable tapping them back to square if anything happened he would replace them for free in a package by them self or if I didn't want to do that he would replace them free of charge.

I think most of you probably know who the seller of these grates is. I never showed these pictures before because I don't want to show him in a bad light. He doesn't deserve it and would do just about anything to make sure I'm a satisfied customer or anybody else. Also his work is impeccable as he is a highly respectable Craftsman.
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I must say, the visual without the center support is more appealing. But the middle bar has never bothered me.

That being said, my forever grill will likely be getting a set of refreshed 9930 grates.
 
Josh Dekubber said:
If you come across another set like that I would suggest trying to tap them back to flat. If you didn't already try that.
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I did try first, with a heavy rubber mallet. They were stamped stainless steel Weber grates and I just couldn't quite get them to lie flat again so I gave up on them. Edit: I don't think I threw them away, just put aside in case I want to try again I guess.
 
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