Charcoal Pellets in Searwood

[Crice561]

Has anyone tried the charcoal pellets from Royal Oak?
I am concerned that they may damage the auger after watching the Basement Hangout YouTube videos where he was saying that the auger was making a funny noise with the charcoal pellets and 3 months later his auger damaged his pellet hopper and pellets were leaking all over the ground.

 

[BlackAcid]

I use them, but have always blended them 50/50 with hickory pellets. As of a few months ago some of my local stores sell Royal Oak pellets that are 50/50 hickory and charcoal blend in the bag.. those are my go to pellets for hot / sear cooks. I don't know what happened to that Basement Hangout guy's auger system. I watched that video and it looked like the Pit Boss pellets, which were cut ridiculously long, may have led to the problem. The Royal Oak all charcoal pellets tend to be a little longer, and you will hear some noise when they are being broken up as they pass through the auger. The auger is designed to do this. That video seems to demonstrate the power of the auger system as it actually bent the metal framing on the auger motor and the hopper while it tried to force through the jam.

I've had my Searwood for 15 months and have been using the Royal Oak blended pellets since day one without issue.

Just my two cents..

 

[MackeyC34]

I too, use them frequently and aside from a little more 'crunchy' noise than usual - I've seen no issues. I tend to pull the augur out on a regular basis for cleaning and have seen no adverse effects. One thing that the charcoal pellets do, however, is to confuse the 'low pellet' alert feature. To get around that, I taped a small piece of thin cardboard such that I can flip it down to cover the sensor when using charcoal and up for normal pellets. Have to keep an eye on the charcoal pellet load in that case, but I don't use the charcoal for long cooks so it's not an issue.