Pit Boss Copperhead 5 - some observiations on clean out & pellet dust

[dward51]

OK, I've been playing with the PB5 for a while and figured it was time to do a clean out.

One question I keep seeing is "how much pellets does it burn". Since I knew what I started with in a new, unseasoned PB5, I figured this would be an ideal time to find out that answer also. There are also threads I've seen on pellet smokers & grills back burning through the auger tube into the hopper. I have a friend in another forum who has a Louisiana Grills LG900 (LG and PB are both made by the same company and share most components). Now yes, I have a vertical smoker and his is a horizontal grill, but there are a lot of similarities. I've seen a few threads that suggest the back burn via the auger tube may be related to pellet dust.

Ok, how many pellets did the PB5 use? I started with 20 lbs of Pit Boss brand hickory flavor pellets. I did notice a good bit of "dust" when I dumped those pellets into the hopper (more on that later). So after the initial burn in, and then playing around with running the temps up and down an hour or so, plus 4 additional smokes with startup and shutdown, I took 10.1 pounds of Hickory pellets out of the hopper today. I used the pellet dump and then an ash vacuum to get as many out as I could. There was probably another 1/3 to 1/2 pound in the auger assembly. So in all fairness I would say I have used 9.5 pounds total over the initial burn in, testing, and 4 different smokes. That's pretty dang good IMO as 2 of those smokes were at 400*.

I bought a 4 gallon Powersmith ash vaccum on Amazon for $84. Will use with the pellet smoker, the grills, and the fireplace. Note: I got the 4 gallon for $84 with all the accessories and an extra filter, but if you buy the smaller 3 gallon model you have to pay extra for the accessories and extra filter. The 4 gallon was only $17 more than the 3 gallon, but to buy all the extra stuff that came with the 4 gallon, its another $33. So the 4 gallon package is actually $15 less than the 3 gallon with comparable accessories (and it hold more ash per cleanout). This is the one I bought:

https://www.amazon.com/PowerSmith-PAVC101-Amp-Ash-Vacuum/dp/B0193TKNBE?th=1

Pellets I had left (turned out to be about 10.5 pounds) before the cleanout:

This is as far as you can get using a flat tool to push pellets out the pellet dump door. Still a good bit of pellets left and note all the pellet dust (sawdust) in the hopper.

Again, note the pellet dust!

Yes, I vacuumed all of that dust out in the final cleanout.

Inside of smoker before vacuuming - note the pellet ash (more like small burned fines)

Cleaned the burn pot out.

I also had vacuumed the hopper area and pellet auger as much as I could to get the ash out (and a few pellets). I then decided to run the smoker on the "FEED" setting to push the remaining pellets and dust out of the auger tube into the burn pot. Only took about 45 seconds of holding the feed button. Note the amount of dust intermixed with the pellets in the auger. This is why I'm wondering if pellet dust is not acting like a sawdust tray and possibly giving a smoldering path of dust for the fire to advance back into the hopper. Remember the fan is constantly pushing air so it sounds like a reasonable theory to me for a stream of dust to burn back to the hopper once it lights.

No more pellets or dust to push out - clean system!

Going forward, I'm going to find a way to sift out as much of the pellet dust from a bag of pellets before I put it into the hopper. I think this is the likely cause of hopper fires or smoldering in a pellet smoker/grill. It would also help if clean outs were more thorough and often.

Oh, I also did my 2nd mod. I added a Tel-Tru 2" BQ225 thermometer to the PB5 door. If you unscrew the wing nut on the inside of the door at the back of the PB logo, there is a 3" recess and 1/2" hole in the glass for a thermometer. Unfortunately all the Tel-Tru 3" models have a 2" NPT mount which requires a 7/8" hole (do not try to drill tempered glass - it will shatter). So unless we can find a 3" dial thermometer with a 3/8" mount that will fit in a 1/2" hole, the 2" BQ225 and similar are what will fit (uses a 1/4" wing nut).

 

[dward51]

Let me add this. I sifted out the 10.5 pounds of pellet and got at least 1 1/2 cups of pellet dust (very fine sawdust). IMO that's a lot of pellet dust. I'm going to look at sifting pellets when they go into the hopper going forward. The dust in the 20lb bag would have been much more. Clearly the dust has been fed into the burn pot with the pellets (as can be seen in the photos above). So how much pellet dust was originally in there is unknown, but more than 1 1/2 cups.

 

[jstrand]

I have the same feelings as you, I was just doing 10 racks of ribs in mine for my neighbor and based on how much pellets I've dumped in since owning it I said it burns about a pound an hour as a WAG. Better than I thought it would do. I also agree with the amount of dust I find in the Pit Boss pellets vs. say Lumberjack, I only have those to compare. I also find that as had been mentioned before that the 225* setting has huge temp swings. So I usually drinking beer and paying somewhat closer attention to it when I have it at 225*.
So far though I haven't noticed any kind of burn back into the auger at all, and I love how easy it is to vacuum out the burn pot and ash on the bottom compared to my Davy Crockett.
All and all for the 199 I paid I think it's totally worth it.

 

[pjtexas1]

Funny...I was just thinking about putting some kind of screen filter on one of my 5 gallon buckets to see how much dust I could filter out. I don't see a lot except at the bottom of my bags.

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[pjtexas1]

I think I have that same vac. I find that a regular shop vac works for pellet clean out but will not work for real wood ash.

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[Czarbecue]

What’s the longest burn time you’ve done without issues? I did 16 hours before the fire pot was full of ash.

 

[dward51]

This was the first time I've cleaned it. So probably 11 to 12 hours total spread over the burn-in and 4 cooks. Yeah, I know I should have vacuumed it sooner, but the ash vac just came (dual purpose - bbq cleaning and wood fireplace).

As to the pellet dust, I've read this may be common with Pit Boss brand which is what I had in there for the burn in. I've got about 1/3 of a pallet of Lumberjack (mostly competition blend, but some fruit wood blend), but I wanted to use the local Pit Boss for the initial burn in and trial smokes. I have to order Lumberjack as I don't have a local supplier and shipping is murder on that unless I can find it on sale with free shipping somewhere (rare). I'm thinking the LJ will be less dusty also.

I have some 14" pizza screens I bought and used with my 18" WSM to smoke jerky. I stacked the screens with 1" spacer blocks between them to get some extra rack space. I just found a 16" metal farm tub at Tractor Supply that I think the screen will fit well. I'm thinking cut out a large circle from the bottom of the tub and pop-rivet in a pizza screen and I have a pellet dust sifter. I'll try to get to TSC and see if this will work in the next few days. The metal tub is like $6 at TSC.