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17 replies

Fire in new FEC100

FM Former Member
I had a fire in my FEC100 Saturday and I don’t mean a small fire. I’ve only had the smoker for a month and this was my third cook on it. First cook was 6 racks of ribs and second was 8 chicken breast. This cook was 7, 10-12lb packer briskets. I put the brisket on the smoker 11:00 Friday night at a temp of 225 and checked on the briskets about eleven on Saturday. One was done and the rest were about 180 degrees so I ran to the store for some butter and when I come back there was smoke and flames coming out the pipe and the control board was off. Not knowing if to open the door because of backdraft I decided to let it burn out. Big mistake as you can see by the pictures there is no repair. So the question is why did this happen? The unit was clean, new foil and the drip pan was clean. It was also level. Did the briskets put out that much grease that it started a fire? I’m lucky it didn’t burn my house down. I’ll be contacting my distributor on Monday not knowing what will happen, but after reading about all of fires with these units can they defective? I’ve had a Traeger 075 for four years and never had a problem with grease and the only problem was a control board going out. I’ll let everyone know what the out come is and if you have a weak stomach don’t look at the pic’s.

Steve

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M maxqMember
From the picture it's safe to say that there was some serious heat resulting from the fire. Once the flames hit the meat, they became fuel. Question is, what started the fire to begin with? You say the unit was clean. My only guess is that something might have blocked the drain hole on the right drain channel, which allowed grease to accumulate on the bottom. Hard call.

I have noted a number of fire issues here on the FEC forums....nothing as serious as yours though. Give CS a call tomorrow morning. One would think that they'll make this right for you.

Sorry your 1st post was such a sad one.
C coachMember
I had this happen once with a load of ribs. Unit was clean, level, foiled, etc. After putting out the fire I noticed that I had rib grease dripping outside of the drip pan and accumilating on the bottom of the unit. It did not take long for the grease to light. Make sure the foil on the bottom is smooth so that if grease does get there, it has a way to exit.

My $.02

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E ezgoinMember
Call me lazy, but I don't foil anything but the drip slide. I use a wide putty knife to scrape out the bottom when necessary, and make sure the unit is level.

The only fire I've had was when I tried to cook 40lbs of leg quarters on three racks. Grease was missing the drip slide. It burned out the bottom door seal, but didn't hure the chicken. I cooked on it for quite a while before I replace the bottom door seal.

When I'm cooking a large load of briskets, as the meat starts to contract I move them more toward the middle of the racks to avoid grease running down the sides and missing the drip slide.
E ezgoinMember
quote:
Originally posted by EZ Goin:
Call me lazy, but I don't foil anything but the drip slide. I use a wide putty knife to scrape out the bottom when necessary, and make sure the unit is level.

The only fire I've had was when I tried to cook 40lbs of leg quarters on three racks. Grease was missing the drip slide. It burned out the bottom door seal, but didn't hurt the chicken. I cooked on it for quite a while before I replace the bottom door seal.

When I'm cooking a large load of briskets, as the meat starts to contract I move them more toward the middle of the racks to avoid grease running down the sides and missing the drip slide.
FM Former Member
EZ i do the same and only foil the drip slide also. I have had a load of 98lbs of pb and never had a problem. I am very careful to make sure that anything that does drip will hit the slide. I use a foil that is wider than the slide and turn it up slightly on the edge it reaches the back all the way to the door.

Also it is hard to tell but it doesnt look like the slide is in place in this pic? Am i missing it or is it not there?
FM Former Member
I've attached a photo of the bottom of the unit. The drip slide, heat shield and bottom of the cooker were all foiled. I can't see any build up of grease on the bottom of the cooker. There was also about 2" of grease in the slide out drip pan. What scary is most of my cooks will be large and I'm afraid to leave it alone all night.

I'll be in touch with cookshack this morning and I'll keep everyone posted.

Thanks

Steve

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R randye 2Member
I want to say that I have not had a fire in my Cooker yet.

But I got a call from a friend last night who had sold three FEC100's.

One guy had cooked some chicken, and was cooking 4 butts, and he had a fire. He told my buddy he opened the door and the flames came shooting out at him. He said the flames were shooting out of the fire pot very high.

He saidthe unit did not cut off. The fan was still blowing, and the aurger was still turning. He also said the high temp did not kick.


RandyE
FM Former Member
Just talked to the service tech and they are coming Wednesday to take a look at the damage and hopefully it can be fixed that day with the parts they are bringing with them. The tech I talked to said he also had a fire in his and didn't seem to think that it was a big deal. He might change his mind when he see's mine.

Steve
FM Former Member
Key at this point is to get it fixed.

The challenge is to determine how the grease ignited.

If it gets a direct path to the fire it can.

If the unit gets ULTRA hot, it might.

It's just not a simple thing to solve over the phone.

Regardless of what the tech says, I'd call CS direct and talk to them, they can sometimes help pinpoint where it happened, but it's hard to do that via the forum, since it's very much like detective work.

Try to find the hot spot.

FYI, they are built like tanks. You can replace the parts and clean off the stainless and you'd be surprised how it can be repaired.

Let us know what they say after they see it.
FM Former Member
Is that foil over the heat sheild above the firepot? Ive seen 2 FE 100s catch fire during long cooks at comps. Foil on heeat shield will catch fire sometime after a long cook. Then will catch the grease on the foiled slide on fire then your meat. Look at the foil in your picture, you can see where it caught fire
E ezgoinMember
If I had to guess by looking at the picture, I'd say the foil in the bottom prevented grease that missed the drip shield from draining through the bottom hole.

Call me lazy, but I don't foil anything but the drip shield. I scrape down any excess build up on the bottom and sides.

Sometimes I think we get too obsessed in trying to keep it looking just like it came out of the box. My only concern is making sure it's sanitary.
FM Former Member
I've foiled the "hood" above the firepot for years and never had a problem. I also just use a piece to cover the top from grease, not wrapping so much around it that it gets hot and comes down into the firepot.

I'm not sure I'd point the foil as "catching fire", take a torch to some and see if it burns. It's doesn't burn as much as just dissolved.

Doc, I've not heard that theory of grease on the hood if foil is catching fire.

The key, we can't really tell from the photos, is what was the starting point. That's why fire departments are great, they always try to figure out the starting point in a fire.

All good info to have.
FM Former Member
Sorry it took so long to post back, but I wanted to get everything taken care of and let everyone know how things turned out. Remagen's out of Eaton OH, is where I got the cookshack, and they sent a repairman out to see what happened. He agreed with me that the fire somehow started on the grease pan. They also contacted cookshack and cookshack stated that they knew of one other time that a fire had stared in a new unit. Cookshack believes that somehow the cookers temp dropped and to get the temp backup to temp it loaded the fire pot and the sparks from the fire caught the grease shield on fire and from there the meat also caught on fire. Remagen let me either get my money back or a new unit. I chose a new unit. I had a cook this last weekend for 100 people and I have to say the cookshack is everything I was looking for in a smoker, but I was up at 2, 4 and 8 o'clock checking on the smoker! Everything turned out great and I'm happy that Cookshack backed up it's product. Thanks to everyone on this forum for there input and great advise they give. Steve

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