quote:
Originally posted by Hogback:
For the past 3 cooks I have done with my FEC120 it has stalled and fire went out about 6-7 hours into the cooking. Last Friday night I lost a whole load of meat. Saturday night I super cleaned everything and it went out again but this time I had my Maverick on it. I cleaned out the fire pot and re-lit it with chafing fuel and it cooked the rest of the night. Coocskack support told me to make sure the slide was as steep as possible and vacuum out the hopper which I did yesterday and it went out again last night. I caught it fast last night and it seemed to have filled the fire pot up too high with ash and pellets were stopping at the bottom of the slide and they had begun to burn back up the slide as the pot was full of ash 7 hours in and it had been vacuum cleaned at the beginning of the cook. Re lit and finished the cook without incedence all three nights. Thoughts? Fans seemed to be working when I checked.
I've had this happen on occasion, and have deduced a few things.
- Do you burn any wood other than pellets on your FEC-120 ? Something I've noticed is that when I burn a 'supplemental' block of wood (on the log burner shelf) in my FEC-120, I run the risk of the supplemental wood block generating enough heat that the pellets don't need to feed, and the burnpot basically burning itself out! I guess that's the 'downside' of such an efficient well insulated smoker.
- What temp you cooking at ? If I'm smoking below 250, I don't use any supplemental wood. If smoking at 225, the burn pot is barely being fed pellets once the smoker is at temp. Again, a very efficient smoker.
- What type of pellets you burning ? If your burning Oak pellets for example, they are the highest BTU output of the hardwoods, and will require even fewer pellets to maintain a temp, so might burn out earlier.
Unless you find something else mechanical/electrical is the problem, you could always stick another temp probe in the smoker to keep your eye on what the temp is when it 'goes out', which you might find is right around the point when your meats are all nice and warm, the smoker is well heated, and it just needs very few pellets to keep it warm, so few pellets that it 'burns itself out'.
I must say, cookshack makes a real efficient smoker. You could do a test run, with an empty smoker. Set to 225 and see if it goes out after 6 hours. Then set to 270 and see if it goes out after 6 hours. I know this has happened to me if I'm set below like 240. Again, an efficient smoker for sure.
Rick