"Best Cost" Grill suggestions

[wenger7446]

I am looking to purchase a new grill for a second home. It's only going to be used a few times a month. Does anyone have any suggestions for a quality grill that doesn't cost a fortune?

A small grill is okay (<400 sq in), sideburner is not needed and while infrared burners are nice they are not necessary.

Basically, I'm looking for a simple quality grill.

Thanks in advance.

 

[heat seeker]

I have a 12 year old CharBroil gas grill. It stays outside, but under a cover. I've had to replace the burner twice over the years, but that's about it. Nothing fancy, but it does the job, and parts are inexpensive.

 

[begreen]

Weber Spirit.

 

[Warm_in_NH]

I have been grilling for 5 years on my "Char Broil Tru-infared". Got it end of year sale for under $200, I have replaced the grilling surface once ($50 +/-) I probably grill 3-4 times a week in the summer and once a week in the winter.

I've cooked on a variety of grills from Weber's and Vermont Castings, to no name $80 specials. At any price, I love my grill, at this point it owes me nothing but I think it's still got a couple years left in it. Burners are still great, grates are still good (second round), igniter still works perfect, and it still looks good.

Don't mean to ramble but I find it so hard to find anything worth spending money on these days, I'm happy to be able to share what I feel was a great product at a good price.

http://www.lowes.com/pd_404328-8221...=320011480000777150&kpid=50029234&CAGPSPN=pla

 

[wenger7446]

Thanks for the great replies. I am seriously looking at both the Weber Spirit and the Char-Broil options.

The Char-Broil Tru-IR seems to really offer great bang for your buck.

 

[fbelec]

at this point grills are so cheap it doesn't matter what you pick. i have been seeing grills that are in the 150 to 200 range that are stainless steel. i made the mistake back in o2 of paying 1100 for my ducane. it is to the point of needing a new lava rock grate but is still working fine. the cost is not much to fix but if you buy a grill that's in the 350 to 500 range it still needs parts every now and then and at the cost of parts the grill can be replaced for the same money. it's not that i don't like my ducane but they closed shop so the parts if you can find them are expensive. back when i bought my grill good one cost more. the best was at it's peak. when the day comes the say good by to the ducane it will be replaced with a cheap stainless 200 dollar unit. as long as it doesn't have 90 degree pieces of metal over the burner that some call flavorizer bars. the fry the burners and rot themselves.

 

[begreen]

That is why I said the Weber Spirit. Built a little tougher for longer life. Cast iron grille and good parts supply chain.

 

[Retired Guy]

I am a fan of the Weber Q grills. Have a Q300 home and a Q220 at the camp. Neither are good for indirect cooking though.

 

[bassJAM]

I'll second (or third) getting a Weber. I picked mine up for $75 used, and it's got plenty of life left in it. I've know too many people who've bought brand new stainless steel grills, even well known brands, and they fall apart in a couple years, and never cook that evenly to begin with. Webers cook evenly, and last.

 

[Highbeam]

Here's mine. It was from lowes and still is available. I bought it several years ago, maybe 5, and it has needed nothing. I really liked the webers but the price of triple or more was just outrageous. Maybe next time.

Another odd thing is that the BBQs are now huge. I could probably cook 30 burgers at one time on mine and it is nothing special. You don't need to cook 30 burgers at one time very often.

I do own a weber Q for camping. It is smaller cast aluminum table top unit and has been wonderful. Really, the webers are that much better than the standard box store stuff but the cost is so high.

 

[mustash29]

I moved to CT in late 95 and got an el-cheapo for the deck at the apartment. Mid 96 I moved it to my newly built home and replaced the rotted burners. By spring 97 the burners were rotted again. Complete garbage.

I replaced it with a Weber Genesis Silver A for 400 bucks. It's a small grill with 2 stainless burners, reversible cast iron grates, aluminum tub, powder coated lid. The cheap thin porcellean coated flavorizer bars rotted out after a few years. I replaced them with 1.5" angle iron.

This evening I will be replacing those angle iron bars again. They were needing replaced anyway, should have done them last fall, but my GF recently melted the thin one. She was supposed to burn the grill off, she lit it but got to BS-ing with her GF on the phone and left the grill cranked too long. All the grease in the drip tray lit up, 3 foot flames shot out of the grates when she opened the lid. I doused it with a spray bottle. Other than ruining the well seasoned coating on the cast iron grates, the massive inferno did no damage.

Home Depot wanted 40 for the thin porcellean bars, or 70 for the thin stainless ones. I picked up 10 feet of 1.5" angle iron for about the same price. These should last another 10 yrs or so.

The igniter has long been dead. We just use a long lighter in the match light hole.

17 yrs and still cooking yummy stuff multiple times every week. Pretty good service life IMO.

 

[Jags]

One new requirement that I have for gas grills is N-S burners instead of east west. Fantastic for indirect cooking and/or different levels of heat from one side to the other.
They don't make my model anymore, so I am of no help to the OP's question, but if you are gonna buy a new grill, you might as well like it.

 

[Adios Pantalones]

I have a Weber. It's under a porch roof, which I think is a significant help. Leave any grill out in the elements and it will cut its life short

 

[begreen]

I bought the cover for it to keep it dry. So far no rusting, though that seems inevitable. High heat accelerates oxidation.

 

[Warm_in_NH]

Never gave the north / south burners a thought til I got a grill with them and realized how much easier it was for indirect cooking. And the 5$ stand for the beer can chix is also well worth the investment.

 

[fbelec]

isn't it funny for so many years of making grills they all put a hole or two for lighting it. it's like they know the sparkers are made like s--t but don't make a better one just put a hole on the side for when the thing fails. i don't know if anybody else had the same problem but when i bought my ducane i bought a cover. we were using the grill 5 days a week. in the winter the grill sits on our deck open to the elements took me a while to figure this one out but winter day the grill in the sun warms up the black cover the sun drops and the temp change made condensation between grill and cover and the thing would get stuck on top of the grill i had to get use to lighting the grill first then remove the cover.

 

[wenger7446]

I have been grilling for 5 years on my "Char Broil Tru-infared". Got it end of year sale for under $200, I have replaced the grilling surface once ($50 +/-) I probably grill 3-4 times a week in the summer and once a week in the winter.

I've cooked on a variety of grills from Weber's and Vermont Castings, to no name $80 specials. At any price, I love my grill, at this point it owes me nothing but I think it's still got a couple years left in it. Burners are still great, grates are still good (second round), igniter still works perfect, and it still looks good.

Don't mean to ramble but I find it so hard to find anything worth spending money on these days, I'm happy to be able to share what I feel was a great product at a good price.

http://www.lowes.com/pd_404328-8221...=320011480000777150&kpid=50029234&CAGPSPN=pla

Thanks for the suggestion. I purchased this grill from Lowe's on Monday. I take delivery on July 3. I'll be sure to post an update once I have a chance to play with it.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

You just cant beat a charcoal grill for taste. My gas grill i think i used it twice in 3 years. Charcoal is king. There are other variations of grills such as "the green egg" and pellet grills allowing for custom pellets,hickory ,applewood ect.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

I have a Weber. It's under a porch roof, which I think is a significant help. Leave any grill out in the elements and it will cut its life short

My 2 weber charcoal grills are out in the weather for 12 years plus. Still look new.

 

[Butcher]

What is this gas grill you speak of? An oven maybe? Yuck.

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[jharkin]

Weber Spirit.

+1 We just bought a Weber spirit 3 burner this year to upgrade from our well worn weber charcoal kettle. Its a very nice grill, well made and tought for the price. I love cooking on charcoal but this thing sears suprizingly well (much better than the cheapo gas grill we had when I was a kid) and based on the first couple weeks use an $18 tank fill is going to get me something like 10x the cooking time of a $15 bag of bricks.

 

[bassJAM]

isn't it funny for so many years of making grills they all put a hole or two for lighting it. it's like they know the sparkers are made like s--t but don't make a better one just put a hole on the side for when the thing fails. i don't know if anybody else had the same problem but when i bought my ducane i bought a cover. we were using the grill 5 days a week. in the winter the grill sits on our deck open to the elements took me a while to figure this one out but winter day the grill in the sun warms up the black cover the sun drops and the temp change made condensation between grill and cover and the thing would get stuck on top of the grill i had to get use to lighting the grill first then remove the cover.

A lot of people don't bother putting a cover on their grill, they say it traps moisture and causes rust as opposed to preventing. Makes sense to me, it's a similar concept to drying wood. I'm lucky that I have a covered porch to store mine in, but if I didn't I think I'd just lay a piece of plywood over my grill as opposed to a full cover.

 

[jharkin]

it's like they know the sparkers are made like s--t but don't make a better one just put a hole on the side for when the thing fails.

Thats one of the thing I liked about the new Spirit. It has a AA battery powered electronic ignition that works much better than those useless pushbutton piezo electric jobs did. And for backup they include metal wand to hold a match to reach down to the burner, hangs on a chain inside the cabinet.

 

[KD0AXS]

Here's mine. It was from lowes and still is available. I bought it several years ago, maybe 5, and it has needed nothing. I really liked the webers but the price of triple or more was just outrageous. Maybe next time.

Another odd thing is that the BBQs are now huge. I could probably cook 30 burgers at one time on mine and it is nothing special. You don't need to cook 30 burgers at one time very often.

I do own a weber Q for camping. It is smaller cast aluminum table top unit and has been wonderful. Really, the webers are that much better than the standard box store stuff but the cost is so high.

We have one of those too. Exact same thing but ours must be the next smaller one because it only has 3 burners instead of 4. We also got ours from Lowes, IIRC it was $189. It's about 2 years old now and still works as good as the day we bought it. Very well built for the price.

 

[Highbeam]

We have one of those too. Exact same thing but ours must be the next smaller one because it only has 3 burners instead of 4. We also got ours from Lowes, IIRC it was $189. It's about 2 years old now and still works as good as the day we bought it. Very well built for the price.

Really it's been pretty good. Mine does have a hotter area in the back center but I have actually learned to use that to my advantage.