Ok this is gonna be a bit of a story so here goes.......my Char-Griller Pellet Smoker #9020 Exploded!!!!.....the end.
Thats the short version below is a video of what it did on a little bit larger scale.
Yesterday 5/5/2014 I was smoking some ribs and after about 3.5 hours the temp dropped to 100 degrees and appeared to shut down on its own, I unplugged the unit and turned the knob to off figuring all it needed was a reset there were no error codes. Once I turned back on I put it on 225, walked inside for a few minutes.... my Brother in Law noticed it smoking ALOT, we went out to investigate, at this point I knew something was wrong and knelt down to turn off the unit, this is when it just exploded, I felt tremendous amount of heat on my head...fortunately I was not looking up or it would have been my face that was burnt not just my hair singed, my brother in law that was about 2 feet away right in front of it had both legs singed, as you can imagine my brother in law and I were stunned. I have attached pictures of both of us, and some of the grill when I opened up to investigate further, to me it looks like there was a malfunction with the PID, and the auger was feeding to many pellets, probably because it wasn't reading the temperature inside the smoker correctly it was always 10-15 degrees off and occasionally 20 degrees off hotter than the current setting, since it was so new this was something I was watching carefully, as I was contemplating calling in a service ticket to have it looked at since I purchased the Lowes extra warranty with it. My twins were outside about 10 feet away with there mother when this did what it did!!!!
I emailed the company and this is the Corporate F&^& You I got:
"Thank you for your email. This is the first time that I have seen anything like this and I’m grateful everyone is ok. I’m not sure at this point what would have caused it to do that, but I can tell you the best way to get you a refund or a replacement is to take it back to the place that your purchased the grill. Did you purchase you grill from lowes? If you did you can let them know that we have authorized the return of the grill. The only thing that we as the manufacturer would do is send replacement parts, but I’m not sure what you would need at the is point and I think it would be fastest and easiest for you to get a return or refund. Since you did not purchase the grill from us directly you would have to go through the retailer."
"Thank you for your email and I hope the information above helps. If you have any other questions please feel free to contact myself."
Bottom Line....Char-Griller did not give a damn about the consumer and wanted nothing to do with me is essential what they said..... fortunately Lowes is taking the whole thing back, I asked if they would come get it but they said no, which kinda pissed me off but whatever, I will be taking back for a full refund and CAN NOT recommend to anyone.....I think the pictures speak for themselves....... I don't trust this grill, and wont be "setting and forgetting" when I have 1.5 year old twins the running around the backyard, as I was planning on having this for at least 4 years. Just be aware that this can happen to anybody.
Its back to the ole drawing board, time to find another pellet smoker, at this point I really am about to order a
Rec-Tec, I talked to there guys, and he immediately explained to me what might have caused this explosion, and he said that that has never happened with there grills and doubt it would because of how heavy the steel is on the door.
