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7 replies

FEC Misbehaving

FM Former Member
I purchased a FEC100 in November 2007. It is the IQ4 with ramp model. I have
27 cooks on the smoker; two in competitions. I have used the smoker at altitude
(Allenspark, CO @ 8251 elevation) and live in Colorado Springs. The cooker
stays in a 6'x12' trailer and I exhaust it thru 5" stove pipe out the side of
trailer and then run the pipe up so the flue cap sits about 6-8" above the
trailer. When I light up the smoker, I do not prime the fire pot and simply
punch in the time and temps and away she goes. To my knowledge, I have not had
any issues with the smoker other than user error, like, forgetting to empty out
the fire pot.

This past weekend, we did a competition at North Platte, NE. One of the team
members decided to vend this event and we started the smoker up at 1030 on
Friday morning. The smoker took an inordinate amount of time to come up to
temp. After about 15 minutes we were only at 62 degrees. I opened the
smoker and the firepot was full of pellets, pellets had backed up on the ramp,
and the blazing fire was attempting to light the ramped pellets. I shut down
the smoker and let it sit for about 15 minutes and then opened and emptied the
fire pot with a spoon. I cleaned up the bottom of the smoker of unused and
burnt pellets and fired it back up. It did the same thing, filling the
firepot with pellets and started backing up again. I left the smoker on and
scraped the fire pot of pellets onto the floor. I closed the door and within 20
minutes, the smoker was at 224 and stayed there. We placed the ribs in the
smoker and I had to scrape out the top layer of the fire pot. I continued to
scrape the fire pot anytime I opened the smoker, and we were able to get our
meats cooked that weekend.

Does anyone know why the smoker would behave in this manner? This is the lowest altitude that I have used with the smoker as North Platte's elevation is 2779. Any suggestions are welcome.

Thanx
Mike
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FM Former Member
Sounds like it wasn't igniting. The only way you get overflow like that is the fire never lights. Could be the igniter.

Start a manual fire (glow gel, wax sticks) and then turn it on. It's a bad up method.

That's why, although I have years on my FE's, I never walk away from them until I see the fire lit and smoke coming (old smoker ways die hard, I still like to watch it)
L larryjacobsMember
If I don't vacuum out the firepot and then prime with a handful of pellets, mine will do what yours is doing. Also, check and make sure your vent fan is running, it should be on and blowing. Mine went out a three months old and CS sent me a new one, thanks. When I was installing the new fan I found these things that may lead to your trouble.
If the vent holes in the firebox are blocked at all by ash, there is not enough air to keep a good flame. The temp. drops, the auger dumps more pellets and the overload begins. There are several reasons for the low volume of air in the firepot other than ash build up:
1) The screws holding the fan on are to short. Mine had the same short self tapping screws used to hold the panels together. Sticking them through the fan body you will notice that there are no threads left to hold the fan tight. I replaced them with longer stainless steal sheet metal screws, it really let me get a tight fit.
2) Where the fan seals to the square duct, it was warped from welding. This left a gap open on both sides. Also where the ignitor wire enters the duct, rather than have a small hole, there is a large one leaking air. I sealed both these areas using high temperature silicon sealant like you would use on a car engine.
I now get a better air flow where it counts, in the fire pot.
FM Former Member
Mike,
I had the same issues with my cooker. First thing with the IQ4 is always vacuum out the fire pot after each cook. The ignitor does not stick very far into the fire pot so the pellets have to sit against the side of the fire pot with the ignitor. I vacuum out the cooker and then add about a quarter of a cup of pellets and place them on the side with the ignitor.

I also drilled some extra holes in the fire pot so that the cooker would get some more air. That helped along with using a dremel tool to remove the metal "screen" that covers the fan. Both of these made a big difference. Eddy gave me the suggestions and so far they have helped.

Mark
FM Former Member
Mark,

So this is what you were telling me about couple of months ago. Funny that it happened going down in altitude. I had filed our conversation away for the Frisco/Dillon trips. I'm off of work next week. After this cook in Ordway, I'll call the Cookshack folks and get the details.

Safe travels!
Mike

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