Fire grate

[MMW]

Grates for a syrup evaporator. Old ones are castings and warped really bad. Of course it is a rush. Never saw anything like it. These go in the fire box for wood to burn on and ashes fall through. Supposed to be flat but they warped up. At first I thought they got to hot and sagged but owner says no, just the opposite.

[MMW]

I told him I wasn't sure how steel would work vs cast but decided on 1" square bar as the dimensions worked perfectly. Even the openings were kept the same. Welded up four pcs to make up the grate. Only time will tell if this is a fail or not. I know they are going to get super hot but hopefully they will hold up.

[ryanjones2150]

That’s pretty impressive, I’ve never seen cast warp like that.

The last big smoker I made, I used 1” round stock for the fire grate and it did ok. It gets super hot and sags over time.

I’m interested to hear if this replacement holds up. If not, he may be looking for inconel or monel.

[MMW]

Only thing I can think of is they are constrained on the ends where they drop in so as they heat up they grow but can't lengthen so they bow up then while cooling down they don't fully come back leaving a slight bow. Then it happens over and over till they eventually look like this. Just my educated guess. The two worst ones were the middle ones. I am thinking that the new ones can at least be straightened while I didn't even try to straighten the cast ones as they would most likely just break.

[seagiant]

Hi,
Good deal!

I don't think the steel will bow.

When I was a boy in Georgia, there was a guy that liked to smoke meat...

He built a 6 ft. wide fire place and had iron dogs every 16 inches or so.

He would burn oak wood and then take a flat blade shovel and scoop coals to scatter in the Pits.

Can't remember any problems!