gotta a few questions

BuffaloChip

Opened my egg this morning and found moisture over everything. It did rain the past two days and found I had left the bottom vent open after cleaning the ash out. May be able to see it on the top vent. Normal or did I cause it?



Bought a 14" CI pizza grill which fits fine on the fire ring. Was thinking of this for grilling those philly cheese steaks Zippy so thoughtlessly posted. I think it should be a rule he has to post the ingredients a day or two before the pictures. How may others got hungry from just looking at those and couldn't get to a store??

Will there be enough room for air flow setup this way? About 1/2 to 3/4 inch clearance all around.



... and a gasket question. These gaps are in the factory installed gaskets. Top has a 1/4" gap and bottom tapers from 1/8 to 1/4" gap. Problem or just live with it until it's time to replace them?

WessB

You shouldn't normally get to much moisture inside the egg..close it all up next time and see if it stays dry..if not you may havve an issue somewhere..

About that CI pan...would the handles sit on top of the fire ring ???? If so I would think that would give you more clearance around the edge of the pan...and you could just add extra lump the get the coals close to the bottom of the pan..

If you can control lo temp cooks with the gaps in the gasket, no biggie, if not, I would be contacting your dealer...

gdenby

Moisture all over everything is pretty much standard if either top or bottom vent is left open, and it rains, or there's heavy fog, etc. The only thing I've had a problem with was when rain got down to ash all the way at the bottom. When dried, the ash was about as stiff as plaster, and was very difficult to scrape out. For awhile, the fire-box was glued to the bottom,

With an air flow that restricted, it will be hard to get much heat. Might work, but my guess is that it would take forever to get hot enough for grilling.

Little gaps in the gasket will slowly erode, but probably not be much of a problem for some time. I've had a gap like that in one of my gaskets for 18 months, and it still isn't enough of a leak to significantly change how anything cooks.

Grandpas Grub

DFMT, I have seen that on mine a couple of times when there has been no weather moisture. I am not to sure why the condensation has accumulated. Ceramic cap on, bottom vent closed.

I just heated up the DFMT and put some light cooking oil it again.

If you find you lose temperature with that set up, figure out something to go under the handles so you have more air flow. But you might just be fine the way it is.

Those gaps need to be closed. IMO those gaps are a perfect setup for gasket failure. My first two eggs came without gasket gaps. The last three have had similar width gaps. To me its is just some employee not thinking or caring about what they are doing.

You should email those pictures to HQ service. As well tell your dealer. Let them both know you need some felt material to make a patch to fill those gaps. The patch's work fine.

Lower temp cooks will probably be ok, the higher the temp the more potential there is for a gasket failure.

An idea is to use some balled up aluminum foil to fill the gaps.

GG

stike

that was dew, baby. mornin dew. yep, leaving the bottom vent open won't help. but it's always moist in the egg. unused, you might get mold, for example.

looks like you set the cast iron on the firebox? looks awful low. do you have a fire box below and fire ring above? i see a lot of distance from the cast iron to the rim of the egg.

as for the felt. that's a less than excellent installation. see what happens. you will probably be fine. very low temps might be an issue, but i bet you can hold 225/250 like that.

might lose the gasket prematurely due to hot gasses escaping over the felt at anything over 600, but that's risky anyway

BuffaloChip

Handles are sitting on the fire ring not the fire box.

I left the lid open since this morning and all is dried out.

I'll send the pics to HQ just so they know what is going out the door. I'm in the QA business. Maybe they need an auditor/inspector.

Thanks for the help.

--Dave

thebtls

I'm thinking you will burn your pizza with that set up without adding a layer of something to make the cook indirect.

BuffaloChip

Wasn't really planning on cooking pizza on it. I like cast iron and will be using it to grill rather than bake.

Thanks for looking out for me.

--Dave