Powering pellet smoker from rear power port

[Bzinsky]

Why on earth would you use a generator or a portable battery pack when you have a $10,000 lithium ion pack under your back seat and a muffled 2.0L direct injection generator under the hood.

Using anything other than an inverter is on a 4xe is ridiculous. Get a sine wave inverter, max is 200amp, hardwire to the jeep, use it for anything.

That’s about 2500 watts of continuous power. That’s enough to power that smoker, a live band to play while you cook, a light show for the dance floor, and a full size fridge for the beer. And it could do for about 6 hours on battery alone if you’re running at full capacity, and then you could fire up the gas engine.

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[Bzinsky]

It sounds like he was trying to run the grill off of a tiny inverter that plugs into the cigarette lighter.

Thats not going to do the job.

You should get a (still pretty cheap) inverter in the 200 watt range and use the included clamps to clamp it to the 12v battery.

200 watts is definitely not enough for a pellet smoker.

 

[Jank4AU]

Why on earth would you use a generator or a portable battery pack when you have a $10,000 lithium ion pack under your back seat and a muffled 2.0L direct injection generator under the hood.

Using anything other than an inverter is on a 4xe is ridiculous. Get a sine wave inverter, max is 200amp, hardwire to the jeep, use it for anything.

That’s about 2500 watts of continuous power. That’s enough to power that smoker, a live band to play while you cook, a light show for the dance floor, and a full size fridge for the beer. And it could do for about 6 hours on battery alone if you’re running at full capacity, and then you could fire up the gas engine.

Well shit: Grilla 400W Inverter | Power Inverter | Grilla Grills

Guess I know what I'm buying next....

 

[Bzinsky]

Well shit: Grilla 400W Inverter | Power Inverter | Grilla Grills

Guess I know what I'm buying next....

I would get something like this
https://www.harborfreight.com/2000-...ubTo-g7pEEDhLJxyyDLKLJZFeYfG6ph0aAjcvEALw_wcB

I realize you don’t need it that large, but keep in mind you probably never had this ability before so you might not realize how useful it can be.

Under $200 and you have a mobile power station and the full power of a 20amp house circuit. Can use it to power up essentials in your house during a power failure.

I use mine to plug in my power vent water heater, my gas furnace, my fridge, electronics, and a portable AC unit for the bedroom I have. Sure we don’t have power failures often but it’s nice to have.

It also stays with you after your jeep is gone. I have a similar one that’s 1500watts and I’ve had it for 15 years now. In my previous vehicles I’d have to keep them running all day, in the 4xe you can take advantage of the main battery. If you ever go glamping it would be a no-brainer.

I would hardwire it, which just means you mount it somewhere in the jeep and you run a power cable direct to the 12v battery and a ground somewhere.

The good ones are sine wave. I use the cheaper kind, which I assume is square wave. I’m only recommending sine wave because apparently they are more efficient and better for electronics running off them. I’m never had a problem with my cheapo HF 1500 watt one though.

 

[Vanburi]

Well shit: Grilla 400W Inverter | Power Inverter | Grilla Grills

Guess I know what I'm buying next....

Perfect

 

[dcmdon]

200 watts is definitely not enough for a pellet smoker.

You may be right depending on the size of the grill. My little portable pellet smoker draws 100 watts, so it's not hard to imagine a larger one drawing 2x that.

Though I wonder how much of that draw is the igniter. A larger grill would draw more to run the fans, but no more to run the igniter.

Either way, a 400W inverter is dirt cheap at about $30.

The OP just needs to understand that 400 watts at 12 volts is over 30 amps. Pretty big current. So the inverter needs to be clamped directly to the 12V battery.

 

[ErAcEr]

Well, I owe you guys an update so here goes. Okay, so I failed pretty miserably at this in my testing. I'm 100% sure it was user error but the bad news is that in failing miserably, I also fried the controller on my smoker.

So, I plugged in an inverter (I know now that it was not made for the constant power draw of my smoker, more like to be able to charge your phone in the car) to the 12V outlet in the rear. Then I plugged my smoker into that. I routed the cord out of the window flap where the small tab at the bottom of the rear window hooks into the tub just to the left of the tailgate so that I could keep the windows closed and not fill my Jeep with smoke for hours. The smoker turned on and started working and shortly thereafter I started getting smoke. I was super excited, pulled the cooler out of the Jeep, and was just about to put my rub on the ribs when I heard it shut off. I couldn't power it back on so I made sure the inverter didn't have a tripped fuse. I couldn't get that to turn back on and it was super hot. My dumb ass is lucky I didn't burn down my Jeep. Also, I didn't realize there's a 115V plug in the back of the center console above the rear cup holders (I added them back in). That probably would have worked fine. At any rate, I tried plugging my smoker into that outlet and while I could get power to the heating element (the pellets started to smoke again) there was no power going to the auger or the fan. I moved the smoker back to the backyard and plugged the smoker into the outlet I normally use with the same results: the heating element worked but no power to the auger or fan.

Let me make a plug for Grilla Grills here, they're an awesome company. I messaged them on Facebook this morning and got an instant reply. They gave me the CSR # to call for help and asked that I get back to them to let them know my problem was resolved. They're sending me a new controller to get my smoker working again, no questions asked. When I was originally looking for a smoker, I had heard their customer service was stellar so put it to the test by messaging the owner some questions I had about their stuff. Always heard back either right away or within an hour or two. When I called this morning, the phone was answered by a real, native English-speaking person in just a few rings and he was super helpful. I can't recommend their stuff enough if anyone is looking for a new grill, smoker, griddle, or outdoor kitchen equipment. Guess I need to invest in a simple tailgate generator.

As info, this is the smoker I am using (I have the non-wifi version from a couple years ago): Chimp Tailgater WiFi Wood Pellet Grill - Spring Sale Bundle (grillagrills.com)

Great to hear about Grilla. Any company that supports parts for an individual to repair their product is a ++ in these times.

 

[Jank4AU]

You may be right depending on the size of the grill. My little portable pellet smoker draws 100 watts, so it's not hard to imagine a larger one drawing 2x that.

Though I wonder how much of that draw is the igniter. A larger grill would draw more to run the fans, but no more to run the igniter.

Either way, a 400W inverter is dirt cheap at about $30.

The OP just needs to understand that 400 watts at 12 volts is over 30 amps. Pretty big current. So the inverter needs to be clamped directly to the 12V battery.

I've since read the Grilla Chimp uses upwards of 270 watts during heat up then goes down to 70 for the sustained smoke.

 

[Viking Jeeper]

I've since read the Grilla Chimp uses upwards of 270 watts during heat up then goes down to 70 for the sustained smoke.

Sounds reasonable. The igniter gets hot enough to start the fire. After that its just a small fan and auger.

 

[dcmdon]

Yup. So a 400 W inverter clamped to the battery will do just fine.

 

[diesel_dave]

My Pit Boss smoker came with instructions to disconnect the heater element and light it manually while the controller still is doing it's thing with the fan and auger. It's running on like <50 watts in that configuration. So that might be an option as well.

 

[Jank4AU]

Here's the new controller and a picture of the one I removed. Looks like at least one of the resistors blew and overheated.

See the blue resistor(s) in the top image and compare with the second. Smoker is back up and running!

 

[LKG]

Curious if I were to power my pellet smoker from the power outlet in the cargo area, which battery would it be pulling from? Would that all come from the front engine battery? I'm going to be at my kids' soccer tournament all day Saturday and was going to run the smoker and didn't want to drag the extra generator out there if I didn't need to. I'd probably be running it for about 5 - 6 hours. We only live about 3 miles from the fields so I could easily get there with almost a full EV battery.

Thanks.

Here's a pretty good little video.

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