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weird smell coming from egg

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texegghead
texegghead Posts: 59
edited November -1 in EggHead Forum
For the past 4-5 cooks on the egg, there has been a weird smell. To me it smells like crayons melting. The lump has been changed out but the smell is still there. Has anyone experienced this?
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Comments

  • egret
    egret Posts: 4,170
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    Check your gasket! :ohmy:
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  • texegghead
    texegghead Posts: 59
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    I thought about that but, I burnt the crap out of it almost four months ago and hadn't smelled that smell before till recently. Maybe I'll scrape the rest of it off and see what happens.
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  • "Sparky"
    "Sparky" Posts: 6,024
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    Maybe a smoldering starter cube?.I quit using the starter cubes because of the smell :sick:
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  • texegghead
    texegghead Posts: 59
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    Nope. I use one of those plug in fire starters.
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  • 2Fategghead
    2Fategghead Posts: 9,624
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    It's possible your lump needs to burn longer before putting your meat on. :ermm:
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  • texegghead
    texegghead Posts: 59
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    I let it go for about 40min before cooking. The smell is there through the entire cook.
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  • 2Fategghead
    2Fategghead Posts: 9,624
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    Maybe a clean burn, then clean out your egg. You never know someone may have put Crayola's under your fire box. :S
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  • Rezen73
    Rezen73 Posts: 356
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    Yeah, this is my thought too. Perhaps some of the glue from the gasket has seeped down on the outside (or even inside) of the fire ring, and smolders during the cook...

    Try to find out where the smell is strongest... back or front of egg... top or bottom of egg... inside or out of egg, etc.

    It also might be a creature (rat, mouse, whatever) found it's way inbetween the fire ring/basket & the ceramic walls and got stuck, and now it cooks every time you do...

    Good luck!
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  • Grandpas Grub
    Grandpas Grub Posts: 14,226
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    Has you lump been urinated on by an animal?

    Are you using flavor wood? if so do you soak and possibly have left that wood in water for a long time?

    You are not going to get any aroma out of the ceramics grate DFMT or lower vent. Unless there is food on something. You are using an electric starter so no aroma from that.

    Has any animals crawled into the egg then cooked or objects of some type gotten/fallen into the egg?

    Any kids around that may put something in there or a possible prank?

    If the answer is no, get some strong paper towel with one piece each rub some of the soot/creosote off of the fire box, fire ring, egg base and egg dome. Smell the aroma of each piece and see if you can locate the source.

    Other than food there should be no other way to get anything on or in the egg to give off that aroma.

    One more thought, what type lump are you burning when the aroma is around? Are you burning mesquite as a wood or flavor wood?

    GG
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  • danv23
    danv23 Posts: 953
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    Yep. Made my food taste awful as well, really showed up (smoke you could see and smell-bad)around 300-400 degree range. The fix is simple. You have to do what they call here a clean burn, which is load up the firebox, start it, open the damper and leave the cap off, and let it rip. If you have a felt gasket you probably won't have one after doing this. The fix to that is to ping RRP to get a rutland gasket. They are good for over 2000 degrees.

    You may need to do this twice depending on how gunked up it is, but you should have a nice clean and white egg when you're all done. You may also need to do a burn with the platesetter if that is all gunked up as well.

    I think mine got messed up cooking 3 racks of chicken wings but I could be wrong.

    The Dude: This is a very complicated case, Maude. You know, a lotta ins, lotta outs, lotta what-have-you's. And, uh, lotta strands to keep in my head, man. Lotta strands in old Duder's head. Luckily I'm adhering to a pretty strict, uh, drug regimen to keep my mind, you know, limber.

    Walter Sobchak: Nihilists! *uck me. I mean, say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it's an ethos. 

    Cumming, GA

    Eggs - XL, L, Small

    Gasser - Weber Summit 6 Burner

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  • Grandpas Grub
    Grandpas Grub Posts: 14,226
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    Any cooking when the lump or flavor wood is not burning clean will usually give an acrid aroma and flavor to the food.

    I have cooked on my large for 2 to 3 years with no clean burn and there is no off off aroma or taste in the food.
    texegghead can check the smoke aroma exiting from the egg by the hand over the smoke then smell the aroma in the hand. If it is acrid, then don't put the food on. If it has a pleasant aroma it's ready to go.

    Should the lump bed be hot, putting chips/chunks on could also cause a new acrid smoke aroma.

    GG
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  • 2Fategghead
    2Fategghead Posts: 9,624
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    One other thing I thought of is do you have your egg in a table?

    If so could it be your scorching the shelf your egg is sitting on?

    Most of us who have a large egg in a table set it on a concrete paver plus on the three green feet that comes with your large. Over the years we have read horror stories about scorched tables and worse. Hope you find your problem soon. :ermm:
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  • texegghead
    texegghead Posts: 59
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    like I said before I'm going to have to remove the rest of the gasket and do another cook. I have completely disassembled the egg to clean it twice already. there definitely was not a trap rodent. thanks for the input but I think I'm gonna go ahead and remove the gasket completely.
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  • texegghead
    texegghead Posts: 59
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    It's definitely not an animal and I only soak my mesquite chips for about 30 min. As I mention later on, I've completely removed every single piece from the egg to clean out ashes. I have not done a complete cleaning yet. That will be my next move. As well as removing what's left of the gasket.
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  • Feeding Frenzy
    Feeding Frenzy Posts: 87
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    Although completely and totally unrelated to your wax smell, there is NO need to soak your chips. ;) As others have expressed, the gasket is my first choice since you arent using wax starters. (If you were using starters, that would be my first choice!) Again, no need at all to soak your wood supply, chips OR chunks! There may be seomthing in this load of lump...You'll figure it out. It's all ceramic...the bad smells come from something we have introduced TO/INTO the ceramic! You will have your "Ah-Haaa" moment soon. B)
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  • Mickey
    Mickey Posts: 19,674
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    Kent after that (very good answer)listing I am not sure I want to cook on the egg without takeing it apart and looing it over :S
    Never thought of all that :pinch:
    Salado TX & 30A  FL: Egg Family: 3 Large and a very well used Mini, added a Mini Max when they came out (I'm good for now). Plus a couple Pit Boss Pellet Smokers.   

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  • Grandpas Grub
    Grandpas Grub Posts: 14,226
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    ??? I'm lost.

     
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  • Capt Frank
    Capt Frank Posts: 2,578
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    "Soaking your Mesqite" may be the problem. Also, if you have cooked a lot of chicken the food/fat vapors can penetrate the ceramics and cause your problem. If you get a lot of yellowish goo leaching from the egg when do your clean burn, that is what it is. :ohmy: :sick:
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  • texegghead
    texegghead Posts: 59
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    I did another cleaning today. I had a bag of lump that was just over 3/4 full. I dumped the entire contents of the bag in the Egg and lit it. The highest temp on the guage read 670 deg. Everytime I've done this, the egg has never gotten "white" again. It just removes the soot that has built up on the dome, but it still looks black.. Anyhow, I was able to detect that smell again but this time it wasn't near as strong. Tomorrow I am going to smoke 2 racks of ribs to test it out.
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