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129 of 131 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Seems well-built and functional with very few annoyances., March 28, 2005
I bought myself this grill for Christmas when nobody else got it for me, and now I've had it almost three months and have used it quite a few times. I bought it based on the Amazon recommendations, and the recommendation of FoodTV host Alton Brown in his book, GEAR FOR THE KITCHEN. Also, in perusing the internet, I found the "Blue's BBQ" web site from Australia. One reader asks, "How did the Weber become the icon for the Australian BBQ?" Blue had to disappoint the reader by informing her that the Weber is actually American. But if it has that kind of reputation in Australia, is must be good.
Judging from the reviews here, I'll have to wait 20 years to see how it holds up. It does live on my back porch, but with the Weber cover.
It is fairly easy to assemble, and in my humble engineering opinion, seems well-made and designed with few exceptions. The Silver model has an ash catch-pan hung between the legs. The pan sits on top of spring clips clipped to the leg. After how well everything else went together, this seemed really cheesy to me. If you're a prefectionist, you'll go nuts trying to level the pan.
I guess that the "one touch cleaning" feature is the vanes on the bottom that also act to adjust the temperature in the grill by adjusting the airflow. If you swish them back and forth, opened and closed, it'll push some ash through the vent in the bottom. The problem is that the vanes themselves are wide and flat, and half of the ash just rides back and forth on them. I think Weber overstates this "one touch cleaning" feature.
The vanes closely fit the bottom shape of the grill when assembled, but after a couple of uses, one warped. I don't know if this is from heat, or something I lodged under it. I had to disassemble the vanes, and bend the offending blade a bit, and it's been perfect since.
I am a bit disappointed in some of the accessories, like the tool rack and little side table. They hang on the edge of the grill, and compromise the otherwise pretty good seal between the lid and grill. They also sell a lid rack, but note that the lid does comes with a hook in it so you can hang it on the edge of the grill, although it is certainly not as easy as using the optional rack.
Based on recommendations here, I got the 22" (larger) model. I can't disagree with that. Unless you just don't have the extra 4" of storage space or REALLY need a good grill, but just don't have the money, get the bigger one. It doesn't use that much more charcoal.
The other thing I scratched my head over was whether to get the Silver or Gold model. The differences were not completely clear to me until I actually got the grill. First, the Gold model adds a catch can that fits closely to the bottom of the grill instead of the pan I complained about. That would be nice. Maybe when you're grilling, hot specks of charcoal won't fall out the bottom and burn your legs, and if you grill somewhere where you don't want a lot of ash, this might be worthwhile. But the Gold is almost twice the price of the Silver, and I had a hard time justifying the additional cost.
The other feature added by the Gold is a grate with folding sides to allow you to add more charcoal when doing a long roast. A handy feature for sure, if you're cooking includes that, but I found those replacement Weber grates locally for twelve dollars, so wouldn't pay for the Gold model to get them.
And I guess that's another advantage of the Webers in general: They're so popular, replacement parts are easily found locally.
Sometimes, I long for the built-in side table of the Platinum, but that's a lot of money.
The grill came with a small cookbook that has proved useful. I don't know getting burgers and steaks done right has been such a hit or miss, trial and error, proposition that most people make it out to be. You look up in the little book, "Beef, 1-1/2 in thick, well-done (I know, Alton Brown wouldn't like me), 10 minutes first side, 9 minutes second side" and they come out perfectly.
DEFINITELY pick up a Weber charcoal chimney if you don't have one yet. It's the best way by far to start the grill - no kabooms, no fumes, no smell, no dangerous fluids stored in your house, and a good use for Florida Today newspaper. If you want to try something different, pick up the book AMERICAN PIE by Peter Reinhert and try the grilled pizza.
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