Egg Assembly

BeerBQ

I have put my egg together and the band that goes around the top does not sit flush with the lip. It is down a little bit. Is this normal. When I open the lid it has a pretty good grip of the dome and I'm not too worried about it coming loose. Just curious if this was normal.

Grandpas Grub

What size egg?

Dome band, idealy the band would be above the ceramic, some green ceramic showing on the bottom of the band.

My medium top band was so low one could hear a metal click when closing the egg. The bands had to be readjusted so the metal did not touch.

It is very important that there are no gaps between the bottom and dome.

GG

JJA

There is an excellent assembly video on YouTube that Fred's put on there. I assembled my egg after watching it with no leaks. I hope this helps.

deepsouth

Barley, Hops, Water, Yeast

yum

BeerBQ

Thanks for the quick response. (Large BGE) There are no gaps that I could tell between the bottom and the dome. The black band just doesn't fit snug against the lip on the dome.

Grandpas Grub

I would be interested if you just watched the video or actually followed those procedures.

When I watched the video it all looked pretty sensible. However, in practice it ended up not working well for me.

The problem with the video is tightning the 8 hinge bolts last. It might just be my overtightning or doing something else wrong, I'm not sure.

Tightning those 8 nuts last can create misalighment and hard binding of the hinge.

Those 8 hinge bolts are pressure fitted into the band. If one is not careful it is easy to strip those bolt ridges which are inside the band.

Once stripped that paticular bolt will never fully tighen. If more than one bolt is stripped or the band hole is expanded then one will have continued hinge problems. The fix would be buying a new hinge/band assembly.

I won't use those procedure a second time.

That was my experience using the process.

GG

Grandpas Grub

If I am understanding you correctly, the top of the band on the dome isn't snug with the ridge cast in the dome.

Mine isn't either on the large. However, the band is far enough form the base of the dome that some ceramic is showing below the band.

I have a spot where the band almost is covering the felt but not quite.

If your dome doesn't have enough room from the cast ridge to the bottom of the ceramic to hold the band you should take a picture and send it to BGE and see if there is a problem with your dome casting. (or contact your dealer and ask them).

Your band should fit on the dome without extending below the dome.

I had the problem I am describing and had to have a dome replaced.

For fit between the dome and base. Use the dollar bill method to check for leaks. If you are not familure with the 'dollar bill' test then ask for help. This is important.

GG

BoneDaddy's

I had a similar problem, but I losened the top band bolt and opend the top a bit and used the weight of the dome to push the dome down onto the band...it worked perfectly.

Have you done the dollar bill test?