Mak Grill Newbie Question

As some may know I recently purchased a used, but new to me Mak Grill. My question I have is how do you guys light it? I had done all of my temp testing with none of the grates installed, and the grill would get to 400+ within 10-15 minutes, but yesterday I installed all of the internal shelving and started the ignite, and it took the grill 4 failed ignite cycles before it would light. Once I did manage to get it lit, the grill temp was consistently 20-30 degrees below the set temp. The pellets were new Traeger pellets, and should've been dry. The weather conditions were very windy, and somewhat cold (30s).

I guess I just want to know how you guys get your stuff started when you are doing a cook.

Pull out the grates, drip pan, diffuser plate, etc. Everything that obstructs your view of the fire pot needs to come out. Clean out the fire pot and make sure the fire rod is poking out into the fire pot by at least a 1/2 inch. Put a few pellets around the fire rod and start your grill up, SMOKE setting is fine. Now stand there and watch the fire pot. If you never see any smoke or any indication the fire rod is heating up, call the folks at MAK. This is assuming you have a fire rod and not the FlashFire ignition system.

Yea I don't have the Flashfire yet, but the firepot is catching great, and catching quickly, just last night it wouldn't get the grill up to temp and stay at temp once I had all of the grates and things in.

OK, so you don't have an ignition issue any more?

When you say it doesn't stay at temp you realize none of our MAKs "stay" at temp as they're constantly fluctuating to create smoke and heat?

scooter said:

OK, so you don't have an ignition issue any more?

When you say it doesn't stay at temp you realize none of our MAKs "stay" at temp as they're constantly fluctuating to create smoke and heat?

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It isn't that my grill doesn't stay at temp, it just stays consistently 15-20 degrees below temp. It never really gets up to the grill set temp.

Usually when I see this it's one of three things:

1) The time of year and where you live could be an issue. In the Winter time, it's common for my MAK to run 5 - 10° cooler than the temp I set (depending on ambient temp, wind, etc.).

2) Be sure the heat sensor (thermocouple) is clean. It's an easy thing to overlook and any buildup on it can act as an insulator and keep it from reading accurately. If it's not shiny, it's dirty.

We clean our thermocouple regularly with just a small, moistened piece of Brillo or S.O.S. pad (steel wool scrubbing pad with powdered soap). then follow it up with a damp paper towel.. The grease cutters in those pads work very well to get the gunk off with minimal scrubbing.

I'm not saying this is your issue, but if it is dirty, then it could be a factor. Either way it's good to keep it clean so it's detecting temps as accurately as possible.


3) The type and condition of your pellets play a role here as well. Oak-based pellets seem to give me the best performance.

Also be sure your pellets are always dry. Just because it's a "new" bag of pellets doesn't mean a thing. They are "new to you" and could have picked up moisture sitting somewhere else before you bought them.

I recommend staying away from Traeger pellets; you don't know for sure what kind of base wood they used in any given batch, no matter what a dealer says!

BBQer's Delight or LumberJack are my go-to brands because they are consistent!

Generally, for running the MAK, I use either oak-based/blended pellets or I mix 100% flavor wood pellets 50/50 with Oak to run in the MAK.

100% flavor wood pellets (100% hickory, 100 apple, etc.) tend to create more ash. About the only time I use 100% flavor wood pellets is in my A-Maze-N pellet smoking tubes (for cold-smoking).



Again, these are my observations based on my experiences. Give these things a try and, don't hesitate to call the folks at MAK if this problem persists!