TwoWheeler
New member
I bought a Weber Genesis Silver A about 15 years ago - it’s still going strong, but it’s been “promoted” to my camp and a new Genesis took it’s place about five years ago. The new Genesis is my workhorse, It’s a grill and an “outdoor oven” when I don’t want to heat the house up in the summer to bake something. It’s used year round - even if I have to shovel three feet of snow off it.
About ten years ago, my wife bought me a Smokey Mountain and, while I've had a lot of fun with it - and actually made some edible stuff- I wanted the ability to do longer, unattended cooks. Things like the “snake” and “Soo’s donut” mean you’re cooking with partially lit coals. White smoke - bleh.
When Weber came out with the SF, I was intrigued. After reading all the stories from early adopter, I decided to wait until it was out of beta. I wasn’t concerned about the missing features - most of them were things I wasn’t interested in anyway and firmware can always be updated. The grease fires were initially a concern, but I came to the conclusion that most of them were self-induced. My biggest concern was the pellet jams. After reading about the revamped auger and the new slide, I decided to take the plunge, last Friday.
The first thing I noticed was when I lifted it out of my truck: the underside edge of the shelf is sharp. An unfinished edge like that is not very Weber-like, in my book. I did the updating - it took an eternity, but went well- and did the burn in. When I went to clean the grill out after the burn in, as I started taking the grill apart to clean it, I was disappointed to see how cheap some of the construction was. The shelf that the flavorizer bars sit on is just thin sheet metal - the sort of thing that could slice you open if you weren’t careful when cleaning. Again, this is not the bombproof Weber construction I’m familiar with. I also noticed that the flavorizer bars on the right were much more bronze colored than the two on the left. Could this be a sign of uneven heating? Time will tell.
My first cook was a rack of “shiners” I had in the freezer- figuring, if I screwed them up, I wouldn’t be out much. Wanting to see if the temp swings I was hearing about were true, I put the probe from my Thermoworks Smoke right next to the grill temp probe on the SF. The Thermoworks read consistently 50 degrees higher, and the temp went up and down. BUT, all’s well that ends well and the ribs came out fantastic- my wife says my best ever.
I cleaned all the ash and grease out of the bottom of the grill. There was maybe, a quarter cup of grease in the drip pan. (The ribs had little meat on them, let alone fat!)
Tuesday, I did some burgers. First thing, my phone and the grill were no longer on speaking terms. I farted around trying to re-pair them and finally gave up, since it was a short cook anyway. About halfway through, I noticed flames coming out of the drawer. WTH? My first high heat cook and I’ve got fire coming out where fire isn’t supposed to be coming out?...and it’s not like I hadn’t cleaned the damned thing. (And they were lean, grass-fed beef burgers!) I can understand the drip pan for fatty stuff, but the whole idea of this thing is to be able to sear stuff like steaks and burgers, as well as smoke. After the cook, I again cleaned out the grease and the ashes. When I pulled the drawer out, the aluminum drip pan was a bit melted. Not good.
I’m going to do a brisket this weekend and we‘ll see how it goes.
All in all, I’m fairly disappointed with the build quality. This seems like another company with name recognition and a reputation getting bought out and accountants and marketing people starting to make all the decision.
About ten years ago, my wife bought me a Smokey Mountain and, while I've had a lot of fun with it - and actually made some edible stuff- I wanted the ability to do longer, unattended cooks. Things like the “snake” and “Soo’s donut” mean you’re cooking with partially lit coals. White smoke - bleh.
When Weber came out with the SF, I was intrigued. After reading all the stories from early adopter, I decided to wait until it was out of beta. I wasn’t concerned about the missing features - most of them were things I wasn’t interested in anyway and firmware can always be updated. The grease fires were initially a concern, but I came to the conclusion that most of them were self-induced. My biggest concern was the pellet jams. After reading about the revamped auger and the new slide, I decided to take the plunge, last Friday.
The first thing I noticed was when I lifted it out of my truck: the underside edge of the shelf is sharp. An unfinished edge like that is not very Weber-like, in my book. I did the updating - it took an eternity, but went well- and did the burn in. When I went to clean the grill out after the burn in, as I started taking the grill apart to clean it, I was disappointed to see how cheap some of the construction was. The shelf that the flavorizer bars sit on is just thin sheet metal - the sort of thing that could slice you open if you weren’t careful when cleaning. Again, this is not the bombproof Weber construction I’m familiar with. I also noticed that the flavorizer bars on the right were much more bronze colored than the two on the left. Could this be a sign of uneven heating? Time will tell.
My first cook was a rack of “shiners” I had in the freezer- figuring, if I screwed them up, I wouldn’t be out much. Wanting to see if the temp swings I was hearing about were true, I put the probe from my Thermoworks Smoke right next to the grill temp probe on the SF. The Thermoworks read consistently 50 degrees higher, and the temp went up and down. BUT, all’s well that ends well and the ribs came out fantastic- my wife says my best ever.
I cleaned all the ash and grease out of the bottom of the grill. There was maybe, a quarter cup of grease in the drip pan. (The ribs had little meat on them, let alone fat!)
Tuesday, I did some burgers. First thing, my phone and the grill were no longer on speaking terms. I farted around trying to re-pair them and finally gave up, since it was a short cook anyway. About halfway through, I noticed flames coming out of the drawer. WTH? My first high heat cook and I’ve got fire coming out where fire isn’t supposed to be coming out?...and it’s not like I hadn’t cleaned the damned thing. (And they were lean, grass-fed beef burgers!) I can understand the drip pan for fatty stuff, but the whole idea of this thing is to be able to sear stuff like steaks and burgers, as well as smoke. After the cook, I again cleaned out the grease and the ashes. When I pulled the drawer out, the aluminum drip pan was a bit melted. Not good.
I’m going to do a brisket this weekend and we‘ll see how it goes.
All in all, I’m fairly disappointed with the build quality. This seems like another company with name recognition and a reputation getting bought out and accountants and marketing people starting to make all the decision.
