Comparison and questions EX4

[Biglag]

Really close to buying my first pellet grill. Unfortunately I cannot see any in person locally except for the Traegers. I've been everywhere looking around and every store has Traeger and only one place had a Green Mountain Grill Daniel Boone. I did like the GMG but I'm a weber fan. The Traegers felt very cheap. The store owner said that all pellet grills need to be vacuumed between cooks. Is this true for the Weber also?
And do any of y'all regret your Smokefire and wish you would've gotten something else? I really don't wanna spend all month researching. I really just want to trust weber and assume it's the best bang for my buck.
TIA

 

[Goneincognito]

Keep it clean (vacuum is one way), remove the wire guard in the hopper and don't do stupid stuff like cook 4 pork butts then do a hot and fast steak straight after and you will love it.

 

[JpsBBQ]

The GMG are the cheaper of the units. Traeger is a standard bearer in the pellet grill industry regardless of what some may say on the web. The Weber is a truly new and unique experience as it melds a grill and a pellet smoker. I’m a huge fan, but it is different than all the other pellet cookers I’m aware of on the market. Stay away from the Costco crap as it pertains to Traeger if you go that route. Companies build some hokey stuff for these big box stores and contrary to popular belief, they are inferior.

 

[abmet]

I don’t vacuum my EX4 but occasionally. I do scrape the ash down into the drain holes pretty regularly though. Depends on the length of the cook and what cooking next. I love my EX4 and would certainly buy another but I have run into a few issues. From the research and reading I did it’s not uncommon with pellet grills in general to have some things to deal with. Weber customer service has been fantastic for me.

 

[Dassman5]

I have only vacuumed out my unit once in 6 months and over 70 cooks. However, I do check before each cook to make sure that: (1) the fire pot is clean with no accumulated ash or unburned pellets, (2) That the grease drains to the ash collection box are open and if necessary scrape any heavy ash or grease accumulations down into the collection box, (3) Every 3 or 4 smokes/cooks, that I have an empty clean collection box without excess grease or ash, and (4) When smoking I always use a water pan/grease to catch and capture excess drippings.

I am a great believer that, since I use my unit mainly for smoking and mid-level cooking, as with commercial smokers only occasional cleaning is required...but then I tend to treat my Summit S-679 the same way...and that I do use for searing and bigger parties.