inacoma

Hi all!  I've owned this bad boy for 14+ years.  Now it's time to move.  From Colorado to Florida.   I've never once moved the KK , and am worried I may pop tiles during the move.... dunno, maybe overthinking it.   Can someone point me to crating instructions or maybe someone in Denver has a crate I could buy?  Thanks in advance?   I was thinking of wrapping the kk parts in plastic and then putting into a wood box sitting on the bottom center (off the wheels) and then spray foaming the cavity.  Any suggestions weloxme!  Also, I won't have a lift gate, just the ramp to the 26' penske truck.  Thanks in advance!

I have to sympathize with the issue inacoma is trying to solve.

for a while there I thought I was a man alone upon an island!

Re: never been called the manufacturer!

Point taken I will experiment some more without my grate...don't want to upset the MFG!!!

Kumar

Yeowch.. never been called the manufacturer! The walls are just 3/4" of dense refractory hot face compared to more than 21/2" firebox which can expand and contract freely up to 1,500º in the charcoal.. The done temp is a far cry from the actual heat down in the raging charcoal.

Maybe the "mfg" can crate an extended firebox insert (one that sits on top of the current firefox and is deep enough that it reaches the bottom of the lower grate That would actually work out very nicely. I know I'm not the only one with this heartburn Then I could use my Weber grill grate for coals (limiting the fuel burn with less coals) and not worry anyone about the temperature increase (PS...I tagged the temperature at the coals with an infrared at 450-650 degrees prior).

Kumar

Honestly I've NEVER used the sear grill and find the heat at the upper grill is quite even (in temps)There are are hotter areas and the "hot spots" will move around depending on how the charcoal is burning.

Having said that I see no reason to pull the coal higher into the cooker.

If I need high heat for steaks I will light a single layer of lump on the bottom of my basket. Once they're red hot I'll pile on more coals and pull the damper door out about an inch. This really allows a lot of airflow and temps will climb rapidly. If I used that technique with sear grill my steaks would look like meteors and be raw on the inside.

In summary, if the coals are lit evenly the heat at the grill will be even. Surely there will be hot spots but no grill is perfectly even.

Point taken I will experiment some more without my grate...don't want to upset the MFG!!!

Kumar

Re: Please keep your charcoal inside the firebox

Please keep your charcoal inside the firebox.. The firebox is designed for the extreme high temps that charcoal gives off.. If you want to put something inside the basket that's fine but please keep it all inside the firebox.

I don't plan on going super high temperature. the dome temperature never gets past 300 (tested it closed, even though the cooks will be open lid)...this is with all the dampers opened. I also keep one layer of coals on the weber grate and I don't let it touch the sides of the cooker.

PS...you'll notice I deleted one of my posts...I decided to quote posts and reply

Kumar

I just over fill the charcoal baskets up to the top of the handles and I'm grilling at over 500 degrees in less than 20 minutes. A whole grate full of ribeyes http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=9 ... 1490303216 This was after flipping them after 3 minutes. Crappy droid camera at night! Very hungry crowd after the St. Paddy's Day parade in Chicago' date=' they were gone almost before I could sit down! That fire would have gotten to over 700 very quickly, but with ribeyes it could have been a problem, my judgement after all day may have been compromised! Oh well I fell off the wagon for a day...or two. Back to Lenten promises again.[/quote']

You'll notice that the grill marks are awesome in the middle section of your grilled steaks...but the outer steaks do not have the same appearance (I'm sure they tasted good). I know I can move the steaks around the gril, but then you start to get mish-mash grill pattern on the steak (yes, appearance is something sometimes

kumar

I just over fill the charcoal baskets up to the top of the handles and I'm grilling at over 500 degrees in less than 20 minutes. A whole grate full of ribeyes(on my Facebook site) .

I don't want to be that hot

...I replied individually to the other posts.

Yes, putting the coals on the weber "coal" grate and using the factory lower grate for quick grilling. This brings the food closer to the coals and I get a wider grilling platform (even heat) due to the spread of charcoal the new grate allows for. When grill I tend to grill a lot of things...and I want flame under all of it. with the stock firebox, there's a lot of flame concentration in the center and not much at the edges.

I'm doing sausage and veggies right now, it's working great. Did a bunch of skirt steak the other day, also worked very nicely.

Possible solution

Went to Lowes and bought a Weber 22.5" Charcoal Grate. It fits on top of the charcoal basket handles pretty nicely. I loaded the new grate up with lump and had a nice big flat (and even) grilling area...I'm still looking forward to the upper/sear grill that Dennis is sending me, but this works as a decent solution (for around 10 bucks at Lowes) in the mean time

Maybe there's already a work around

Was looking through the posts and found this:

http://www.komodokamado.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2354

I haven't received my sear grill yet (Dennis is kindly sending me one ...but it looks like if you flip the sear grill, then it provides a new platform for charcoal (again, for grilling and utilizing more hot space on the mid or upper grill)

Kumar

I'm not sure if this has been suggested yet, but it would be cool to have a nice wide Charcoal basket that would fit between the lower grate and the top lip of the firebox. Actually, if it could sit on the Firefox that might be ideal, and cheap to mfg (not much engineering). If we wanted to get fancy with the engineering, one could make the basket adjustable while the coals were still HOT!

This could allow quick/hot grilling (not smoking, not super hot searing) on the entire surface of either of the two upper grills. Right now, due to the basket being centered, you don't get great temp distribution when filling the grill up with brats, hot dogs, burgers, skirt steak. Again, I can't emphasize that this is for GRILLING (and with the lid open).

You COULD fill the entire bottom bowl up with charcoal up to the firebox upper lip, but that's a lot of charcoal that is wasted (even after shutting down all the dampers post cook). With open lid cooking, this tends to get that firebox pretty damn hot!

...just a thought. It's simple enough that if I get some time I might go grab some steel and break out the ol' plasma cutter.

kumar

So what sort of distance are we looking at here?

if the probe is on the outer rim of the grate, it could be reading too high since the deflector deflects all the heat that way...if too close to the meet (center of grate), then it's too cold. I guess split the difference?

ktp

Wow!! Thanks for all the replies!! I'll try to address them here:

Yes, the probe's are calibrated (had to calibrate at 6k ft...as I live in the Greater Denver Area...thus our boiling, on day of calibration, was 201 degrees IIRC

The pit probe is actually very close to the butt, I would say about 1 to 2 inches. I'm guessing that's why the temp is reading very low there. I also have the large pizza stone over the coals AND a stainless drip pan on the lower grate (butt is on the top grate).

...I just checked...my dome temp is at 280 and my probe temp is at 245...I'm 35 derees off!!! rather than open the KK I'll just adjust my pit temp down about 15-20 degrees or so degrees (some had said thy only had a 10 to 15 degree variance between pit and dome)...

...thanks!

Kumar

All,

throughout the years many have stated Dome (or normal top temp probe on non-dome grills) as the way to read temps...i.e. low and slow between 200-250 for pork butt. Well, my question is this.

I use a Stoker and when it shows the pit temp (the temp at the grate) at 250 degrees, my dome temp shows around 310-325 degrees...

So based on old lore...you would think you are cooking too high? but based on pit temp, you are right where you need to be?

Which is the correct way?

ktp

I have only used it a few times and I have had no issues. My stoker is plugged into a wireless gaming router so I don't have to run RJ45 out to the back patio. I used Firefox and IE 7 and had no issues. The fan runs as it should and I have only had it over-shoot the temp one time....and I believe that was caused by me not shutting the blower off while I opened the lid and inspected the meat. I'm sure Rock will help you out.

Is it necessary to turn the fan off when opening the lid? Granted, I've opened the lid while the fan was running with success before...I normally never open the lid.

Re: stoker issues

Does anyone else have issues with their stoker?

Mine sometimes runs spot on. But more often than not my fan decides it doesn't want to work until I reboot the stoker unit. It tends to do this multiple times during a single cook. I've emailed Jon today about the issue and hope to have an answer...not the first time I've had issues with the device (one time the fan just didn't turn off and ran the grill very hot).

Most of my problems, and there have been several, have been user error. I'm not a big time techie and I find the thing frustrating at times.

But on a couple of occasions, I know it wasn't me. I called the manufacturer. They concurred and graciously replaced it without question even though the exchange period was over.

But I'm not so sure I can trust the replacement either. It just seems to have a mind of its own.

" bind of its own" is kinda how I feel about it sometimes. I will see with what Jon emails me back with.

ktp

I live in Aurora, CO...should you want to come see my KK beauty

ktp

Does anyone else have issues with their stoker?

Mine sometimes runs spot on. But more often than not my fan decides it doesn't want to work until I reboot the stoker unit. It tends to do this multiple times during a single cook. I've emailed Jon today about the issue and hope to have an answer...not the first time I've had issues with the device (one time the fan just didn't turn off and ran the grill very hot).

Does the stoker unit have issues when using Mozilla Firefox? Does it have issues when being accessed by multiple computers? ... reason I mentioned both those items is cuz that's the only variable I can think of.

I really like the device...but I need to "trust" it...hence the reason I bought it in the first place...so i can walk away during long low/slow cooks.

anyone else with issues or suggestions?

thanks!

kumar

I started using my stoker this weekend and absolutely love it!! One suggestion would be to have the stoker shut down when the meat temperature is met. Or can it and I have no clue how?

ktp

huh...I went outside to check on my KK and noticed that the stoker fan did not turn off. Sensor 1 is pit sensor set to 225. Sensor 2 is the food sensor and is set to 175. When I went out to visit my Q...Temp was up to 290 and the fan was still going strong!!! The only way I could get the fan to turn off was to remove the sensor 2 (food) plug. Guess that's the way it will have to stay till I can get some support to "fix" it.

I started using my stoker this weekend and absolutely love it!! One suggestion would be to have the stoker shut down when the meat temperature is met. Or can it and I have no clue how?

ktp

Re: If You Are A Little Geeky You Will Love The Stoker!

Well actually if you are not you probably will still love it. As and EE and Communications Architect, I just love it. Have it hooked up to my wireless network. In fact as I am typing I am monitoring two chickens as they cook! It is a way cool device. Got mine a while ago and just upgraded the software to Version 2.X. The upgrade was free and a big improvement in functionality....

Last winter I was running the KK from my laptop in front of the fireplace while it cooked away in below freezing temps...just tooo cool...

Dan

I was looking at using a wireless game adaptor to convert the rj45 to wireless...is that what you did?

he he...I found out about their sports affiliation FROM the QUE invite!!!

the raiders guy might actually be moving back to California this summer. So let's cross our fingers I get lucky and get another chiefs fan.

It's nice to see that there ARE chiefs fans in Denver (I used to see a lot of Denver fans in KC). I feel I should go up to those jersey wearing fans at HD/Lowes and what not and just randomly invite them over for some Q....just for their team affiliation...besides..who else but a KC native (in my area) would enjoy Q more!

later,

k

Tell me you are still a chiefs fan and not letting oxygen deprivation cause you to wear orange and blue

die hard chiefs fan!!! my neighbor is actually a chiefs fan too!!! another neighbor...RAIDERS fan...wtf is up with that.

everyone else...they like them ponies.

k

Let's see some pics from the mile high city.

he he no pics...ironically..I am back in KC for work (travel here every week since i moved). but i think this is my last week here. will take pics next time I cook....