I took it all apart.

DieselkW

I had an underbite. Not me, my BGE. I ignored it. It got worse.
I loosened the bottom strap, moved it up towards the gasket, tightened it back up, lowered the dome, pinched the back end and now the (2 year old original) gasket is unglued for about 4 inches.

More wrenches, a small chisel, both bands loose, disconnect bands from hinge, take hinge apart, remove top dome.

Find those stupid green threaded rods in the leaf litter behind the egg because apparently I'll need them.

Now I have both bands off. The hinge is in 3 pieces plus nuts, bolts, springs, etc.

The gasket needs scraping off. It comes off easy. Easier than I would've thought. Putty knife easy.

Reassemble everything. Ever put those damn springs on by yourself? Glad I figured out raising the dome brings the flat part of the hinge tantalizingly close to the spring hook. Vice grips did the rest... do not try to pull those with your fingers.

OK, it's aligned perfectly under the handle. No more under bite. The hinge end is showing daylight, about 1/4". WTF? What adjustment do I make to fix that? I might just build up a Permatex dam back there.

Gotta respond to RRP and get my check in the mail. Meanwhile, having it all apart I noticed the chimney gasket is ... crumbled black stuff. No wonder I'm using more lump than usual. Having a brand new 1/4" gap at the hinge end isn't going to help with that either.



Two hours of Egg maintenance. Fresh fill of lump and doing a clean burn now that I don't have to worry about burning the gasket anymore.

Questions:
1. What do I adjust to get the "dollar bill" test to work all the way around?
2. What if I put a bead of high temp permatex on the bottom, then Saran Wrap on top of the wet Permatex, then close the dome on top of the Saran Wrap? It would be airtight, wouldn't it? (Assuming I can adjust the dome correctly.) When the gasket cures, I can remove the plastic wrap.
3. Or is the gasket really that much more effective/forgiving?

bhedges1987

Mistake 1: Don't mess with your underbite if it's not leaking.

I did this and couldn't get my egg to pass the dollar bill test for a while. Had to work long and hard to fix it. 

RRP

I'm confused - have you already put your new gasket on and let it cure for the 24 hours? If not you are getting ahead of yourself. You might want to read my instruction sheet again.

dougcrann

Loosen the upper band....beat the dome with a bfh....

Just kidding. What size Egg?

SmokingPiney

bhedges1987 said:

Mistake 1: Don't mess with your underbite if it's not leaking.

I did this and couldn't get my egg to pass the dollar bill test for a while. Had to work long and hard to fix it. 

Completely agree. While I don't yet have a Rutland gasket, I chased a small underbite (1/8") for a few weeks that wasn't leaking finally gave up. 

The effort was wasted -  the gaskets didn't leak or fry in high heat. 

Botch

Questions:

2. What if I put a bead of high temp permatex on the bottom, then Saran Wrap on top of the wet Permatex, then close the dome on top of the Saran Wrap? It would be airtight, wouldn't it? (Assuming I can adjust the dome correctly.) When the gasket cures, I can remove the plastic wrap.

#2:  Yes.  My entire gasket is just a thick bead (actually two) of Permatex, with a sheet of Saran Wrap on top, closed the lid and let it cure.  The Permatex does not melt nor stick to the Saran Wrap.  

berndcrisp

If it's not broken, take it apart and find out why.

johnnyp

I just went through this myself.  I mean, literally the exact same thing. This week!

after taking to my dealer, he advised me to worry less about perfection on the under/overbite.  Close is genuinely good enough.  

Loosen the top AND a the bottom band.  When pushing down on the dome.  Your bottom band needs to drop down too, it's too high. I did this and it worked flawlessly.

RRP

SmokingPiney said:

bhedges1987 said:

Mistake 1: Don't mess with your underbite if it's not leaking.

I did this and couldn't get my egg to pass the dollar bill test for a while. Had to work long and hard to fix it. 

Completely agree. While I don't yet have a Rutland gasket, I chased a small underbite (1/8") for a few weeks that wasn't leaking finally gave up. 

The effort was wasted -  the gaskets didn't leak or fry in high heat. 

Honest? You chased 1/8th inch? These things are huge ceramic pieces cast by the 100's  as separate units. Your dome may be matched up with one cast 3 weeks ago! These are NOT fine porcelain China pieces fired to perfection! Whether an 1/8th, 1/4th, 3/8th, 1/2" off is NO great shakes. You are striving for something that just isn't going to happen! In fact please email me tomorrow as I'm afraid you won't be happy with what we talked about today. It's NOT too late to back out - OK?

NPHuskerFL

Anytime the hinge is removed it should first be secured with the two white plastic pieces it came with and then zip (wire) tie. If you're missing the white clips no biggie but, be sure to secure the hinge real good with wire ties (in the closed position). No need to remove the springs from the hinge. Doing so can cause it's own issues. 

DieselkW

I got it back together, it was a good learning experience, and now I understand much better not only how the hinge works, but how the bands affect alignment of the two halves.

For those that think I did all this for no reason, you may have missed the part of story where 4" of the gasket separated from the top dome because of the mis-alignment of the two halves. When I got it apart, the bottom half gasket was torn up as well in the same place, right in front of the hinge. So it needed to be looked at.

I went out and tightened everything again while it was hot, and of course, this morning the bottom band slipped down a third of an inch back by the hinge where it bears the weight of the dome when lifted. I'm going to look at making a better support to hold up the hinge

@RRP, I'll respond to your PM this week.