Searwood 600 question

[Cato]

New to pellet grills, so a newbie question on pellets in the auger.

I live on the east coast and it's humid in the summer. After using the grill I've been dumping the hopper pellets back into storage container.

Is it okay to run the grill until the auger is empty? I've been doing that the day after I cook and clean the firebox etc because I figured they'd get moist fairly quickly if I just left them.

 

[BlackAcid]

Just speaking from my own personal experience..

I live in the northeast.. plenty of humidity here through the warm weather months. I have never ran the auger empty and have had no issues. Usually, I let the Searwood start up and run for 15 minutes or so before I start cooking on it.. that burns most of the pellets that were sitting in the auger and gets the clean smoke rolling.

Honestly, I don't even empty the hopper unless I know I won't be cooking on it for an extended time period... the pellets are not going to get "wet" or unusable. In my opinion.. I think the humidity concerns with pellet grills tend to be a little "exaggerated" at times. A good cover and routine cleaning / maintenance go a long way. Just my two cents..

Congrats on the new Searwood!

 

[Cato]

Thanks!

 

[GRT1959]

Same here in the Midwest, no issues with pellets in the auger or hopper for extended periods. In fact my glow plug went out last winter during an extended cold snap and when I finally replaced it two months later it fired right up with pellets that had been in the hopper since Thanksgiving. The only times I have ever emptied the hopper is if I want to use a different "flavor" of pellets or to blow pellet dust out. FYI, I've used everything BUT Weber pellets with no issues.

 

[2Maybe4]

Thanks for the input guys. Being in the midwest, often with 80%+ humidity, I too was concerned with leaving the pellets in the hopper for a while. It's good to know that I don't have to dump the hopper after each cook, when we're not going to use the Searwood for a few days.

I will be with a friend this week who is an avid smoker, but uses a Traeger. Because he lives nearby, I'll pose the pellet removal question to get his thoughts based on local experience.