I have noticed that under the left side (hopper side) that under the area of the firebox I seem to accumulate a bit of grease dripping and some ashes as pictured below. I vacuum out my firebox before every cook and once I saw a tiny lit ember fall where you see the small amount of ash on the ground. Is this normal or is something not sealed quite right or something else?
Let me know if you need any other pics taken.
- Grease drip and ashlings
Look to see if the 1/4" hole in the bottom of the firebox of your 1500 has not been sealed. There is a hole that is used for the 640 mounting of the firebox. It is unused in the 1500, and should have been sealed with silicone. Put a 1/4 bolt and nut in the hole to seal it up.
I think the hole you mention was plugged at the factory and here is a pic of what I think your talking about:
Interestingly enough I did find out I have daylight showing between the firebox and the hopper box is that supposed to be there and is that where I might be getting the leaks from? Picture below shows what it looks like without the flash on:
The area between the firebox and the hopper is supposed to be open.
Ok I guess I'll need to get some pic of the under side to figure out where my grease and ash are coming from.
I've got the underside shots. We'll start with the source of the grease:
Looks like I have some grease leaking from the side walls leading down to the bottom of the firebox. Guess I need to line something with more of my copper thermal stuff?
And then move onto the source of the ash:
Looks like the ash I saw is just coming out of the gap at the bottom between the hopper and the firebox. Is this normal/expected?
Thanks for your help on this.
I would definitely do some more sealing with the high temp silicone for the grease issue.
Putting silicone where the ash is coming from should not impact how the cooker functions.
Should I line all three sides of where the firebox/hopper meet? This is where I saw the daylight in the last picture posted on the 11th.
It should not affect anything to put silicone anywhere you feel that needs it.
Thanks for the response Herb and just want to be sure before I go throwing sealant everywhere. You mentioned on the 11th that the area between the firebox and hopper was meant to be open and just want to make sure I'm not going to end up covering gaps meant to relive back flow pressure or something.
Ok, now I can see your issue clearly.
Yes, it appears that the factory missed the silicone on the bottom side of the firepot.
Here is the open area that I told you is normal:
Here is where the silicone is missing and needs to be applied:
If you do not have enough silicone to do the job, send an email to customerservice@yodersmokers.com with your fiull name, shipping address and phone number, and we will get more sent to you.
We apologize for this inconvenience and oversight.
Yea, all is clear now. Thanks for the detailed pics. A sealing I will go! That bright white line on the right of your first noted pic is the daylight I'll soon be blocking out.
I did a big clean out of the 1500 (thank god for the shop vac) and performed the pinstriping (sealing) of my my firebox. Here are the pics for review:
Thanks for all you help Herb.
No problem, again, sorry for the oversight. Let us know how it works out.
Gonna let the copper stuff cure for 24 hours (waiting is the hardest part) and then give my cooker another run at the temp test or maybe do some beef jerky at 175 then test.
Did the beef jerky @ 175 for 4hrs preceded by a 30min 250 startup. The internal firebox sealing is unfazed. When it stops snowing I'll do a temp test.
Completed my temp testing with the firebox sealed up and got some interesting results. I repeated the same test I did in Nov however this time I used BBQR's Delight Pecan instead of Hickory since its what I had and here the results from both sets of tests:
Pre Firebox Sealing
Average Temp @ 325 (Diff from Controller)
Controller: 322.3
Bottom L: 336.9 (14.6)
Bottom R: 334.9 (12.6)
Top L: 323.5 (1.2)
Top R: 331.8 (9.5)
Average Temp @ 225 (Diff from Controller)
Controller: 224.2
Bottom L: 230.7 (6.5)
Bottom R: 231.5 (7.3)
Top L: 224.2 (0.0)
Top R: 228.8 (4.7)
——————————————
Post Firebox Sealing
Average Temp @ 325 (Diff from Controller)
Controller: 327.2
Bottom L: 352.7 (25.5)
Bottom R: 360.4 (33.2)
Top L: 330.8 (3.6)
Top R: 340.2 (13)
Average Temp @ 225 (Diff from Controller)
Controller: 221.9
Bottom L: 231.7 (9.8)
Bottom R: 255.3 (33.4)
Top L: 226.6 (4.7)
Top R: 240.2 (18.3)
It would appear that my new sealed firebox has resulted in higher grate temps, wider left to right temps and my right side becoming hotter than it had before at both temperatures. I'm tempted to pull the seals off again.
I don't remember if you have the new reinforced burn grate or not...when the burn grate is in the firebox, what is measurement of the gap between the edge of the burn grate and the hopper wall?
I do have the reinforced turn grate (11-10-14 build date). My burn grate rests upon the hopper wall I've attached a picture of it. Let me know if I'm misunderstanding the gap you are referring too.
Honestly, I think your are good to go. The temperature differential percentages are right in there. If you run the 2 hours temp test again, you will find that you will get a different set of readings because of ambient temperature, humidity and particularly fuel. If all pellets were the exact same length, and each pellet had the exact same BTU potential (take 4 cups of pellets, and calculate the average length of pellet per cup), the controller could be much more accurate. This is why we work with averages, different lengths of pellet in each auger drop, differing humidity and ambient temperatures, and other environmental factors.
The easy answer is to change your set temperature too correspond to the grate temperature that you desire, based on your temperature testing. The left to right temperatures can be fine tuned on the 1500 by experimenting with the HMS damper plate and the chimney damper.
For fun, do what I did, and do the 2 hour temp test on your kitchen oven. In my expensive electric convection oven, I found it had upwards of a 100 degree temperature swing (+ and -) at times. I sometimes wonder how our ancestors were able to cook and bake on wood burning stoves, and get the results that they did...and they burned wood, cobs, cow patties, coal, etc.
When I bought my first Yoder, I had twelve probes in it and obsessed over the variances, and drove the Yoder dudes to drink. I don't think that there was anyone more concerned with temperatures that I was. I built spreadsheets, databases and spent countless hours on the phone and sending email. In the end, I realized that I had spent so much more time doing all of this, than I did cooking and enjoying the results. Now, I do not use any probes, except for the quick read thermometer that I use to check for doneness. I let the cooker do it's thing, and I do my thing while it does the cooking. I am now enjoying the cooking process, and the end results much more, and my stress level with all of this has dropped to zero.
I'm cursed with an inquisitive and technical brain as it seems you are as well which no doubt contributes to the excellent work you do for Yoder. I too had detailed heat maps of my prev Lang 60, which I had to have as its temp differences across the grates were much much wider than my YS1500. I am certainly not trying to point out my cooker is defective but am intrigued with the positive air flow environment and if I've changed something, its effect if any. When I went into this test today I honestly expected to see no real differences so when a difference showed up, intrigued!! You have to admit that my right side temps are now right at the edge of the 35 degree range expectation so given the variable minimizing of the averaging done in the test, something is different.
My theory: The gaps were not only a slight ash leak but also providing a bit of back pressure relief and now that it's gone all the air is being pushed into the cooker resulting in the now overall higher temps and higher temps on the side of the HMS holes. I have also noticed that since sealing the firebox there is less ash in the burn grate after cooking which also indicates increased air through the grate.
I know there are YS1500 owners who keep their internal damper open 2 inches to even out the temps but I previously I didn't have to do that to reach even temps. I'd bet that now my firebox is sealed as they normally are, I may have to open my damper 2" as well. I know these little facts together must intrigue you a little bit. Cooking is fun, puzzles are fun too. I get a 2 for 1 with my 1500 - w00t.
I'm cooking tomorrow and will try the 2" open damper to see where that puts me but the idea of opening up the gaps again to just see what happens does sit in my mind.
Let me know how it goes. I am interested in what you find out and your course of action.
Preliminary test shows promise. I was cooking two pork tenderloins on the top rack today but had left all my probes in from yesterday and casually monitored the temps. With the damper closed I noticed the same temp variations from yesterday were still present so I began to open up the damper a bit. Eventually settling on having the damper handle pulled out two finger widths. This gave me temps across the bottom rack were on avg only 11* higher than the controller and only .5* apart left to right. As I was cooking on the top rack these are more observations than test results but they show promise.
So I thought I'd update ya. I performed several more tests with the seals on and tried to tweak my internal damper all of which resulted in effectively the same test results I posted on 1/24. Strangely the internal damper seemed to have little effect.
After some cold and snow days the temps outside finally climbed again to the 50s this week so I pulled off the seal I had added to the bottom of the firebox and performed the temp test again. I'll be damned if the temps didn't fall back in line with my original temp tests in Nov:
Looking up at the bottom of the firebox - daylight showing through
Looking into the firebox
Removal of Bottom Firebox Seal
Average Temp @ 225 (Diff from Controller)
Controller: 224.7
Bottom L: 237.7 (13)
Bottom R: 242.5 (17.8)
Top L: 231.5 (6.7)
Top R: 236 (11.3)
The bottom and top racks are now only a ~5 degree difference left to right. My difference from the controller is only ~15 on the bottom and ~8 on the top. This is happy happy temp range.
So what have we learned? Either that bottom gap wasn't supposed to be sealed OR I have an overactive fan and this gap manages to compensate for it OR [insert really cool theory here] OR this is just the quirk of my YS1500 (I know each cooker is unique).
Adventures in flow dynamics.
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