Hello all,
I just bought my 1000 on Sunday. After putting it together and running it for about an hour I had ash every where. Last night before cooking I removed everything and cleaned all the ash. But like before ash was getting blown every where. Any ideas.
The firepot fly ash is from the air gap on the left side.
Unfortunately there is a well known, but easily corrected, design anomaly in some units ... a gap between the bottom of the drip tray and the top of the left side grease tray lip that allows firepot heat to blow directly on the digital temperature probe... it’s causes slower startups, flameouts and other temperature related issues.
Since the firepot heat is blowing directly on the digital temperature probe, It’ll cause the smoker to flameout for no apparent reason. It’ll cause a flameout because the digital temperature probes temperature readings are falsely reading too high; it causes the digital temperature probe to register higher than your set temperatures. And that’ll cause a flameout every time … shutting down the auger and starving your fire of pellets
The air gap mod is a big deal on the Austin XL , the pro series 1100, PS2 1150, 1600, Laredo and basically ANY 1000 inch barrels AND the KC Combo. It takes them forever to settle down especially in the Smoke setting, and that's why, when people have them set to Smoke they're wondering why it's up around 250 or 300 degrees ... and it's all because the firepot heat is all blowing on that digital probe. Do the mod and it registers the temperatures correctly and it settles them right down.
Additionally, a QUICK and simple foil fix will work ... Fold sufficient aluminum foil to cover the gap from side to side and put in place. Try 4-5 layers … Done right, the foil will fold over and sit on top of the drip tray and this quick fix blocks the firepot heat from blowing directly on the temperature probe.
A detailed Instructional Video is below ... AND the Video is also in Announcements section of this page ... and if you’re interested, the prefabricated mod plate available at
https://smokeslikeaboss.com/
This video explains better ..
