I've done plenty of research and seen many grills before picking the 'Char-Griller Pro 3001'. I think if you really want a solid grill that lasts forever, get a Weber. For me paying $700+ for a similar Weber isn't an option. You also should beware of the inexpensive stainless steel grills (anything under $400). Their not stainless, the metal is thin & flimsy and they start showing signs of rust in a matter of months. I even saw some demos with rust stains?? This shouldn't be a problem with the finish on the Char-Griller. Plus I noticed it ranked well in Consumer Reports. I picked mine up at Menards for $149.00 (on 06/26/09).
At times it was challenging to put together. The pictures and directions could've been more descriptive on which way things face when you put them together (ie: the legs). Plus the location of parts within the box. I had to find parts that I needed early in the installation that were wrapped up with things late in the installation?! Once you get it together it's pretty solid. It starts easily and heats up fast. For me in less than 5-10 min. on high the temperature gage was at 650 degrees (on a windy 70 degree day in Chicago). The grates are porcelain coated cast iron. That's a feature you want to look for in a grill. You'll see those on higher priced models. The grates have a side for 'Searing' and a side for 'Grilling'. They cleanup easily and give GREAT grill marks. Now mind you my last grill was a 12 year old 'Char-Broil' that was shot and I've only used this one twice. But from what I can tell (so far) unless you want to pay a ton for something better this is a great grill for the price.
Update: 07-27-09
It's still a great grill for the price. I have one thing I never liked and if you're coming from an older grill like me you should be aware of this. Older gas grills (5 or 10 years) had the burners right along the bottom of the grill base with a metal shield over the top. You then had 5 inches or so between the shield and the grilling grates. This would give you space for 'Lava Rock', 'Ceramic Brickets' and some wood chips if you choose. The rocks or bricks would catch grease and reduce flare ups. To keep the grill clean you change the rock out once a season or so. NONE OF THE NEW GRILLS (including the Char-Griller) are setup like this. They ALL have the burners and shields right below the grilling grates. And you have no room for anything below the burners. So you need to be sure to keep the bottom of the grill CLEAN and CLEAR of debris (drip trays too). As I stated before this grill heats fast and puts out a good flame. Well after cooking about 10 times or so I had some debris and an oily film on the bottom from cooking & basting things. Yep you guessed it, FIRE, FIRE! Luckily I caught it after just a couple minutes of cooking and shut it down and put everything out. I cleaned out the bottom turned it back on and it was fine. So be safe and keep it clean!
After lots of research settled on this grill and at under $200, nothing compares. After three months of use, looks and works like new. The cast iron construction leads to even heat, the burners work well, there are trays on both sides (one is a side burner with a flat cover), and it does a great job of grilling.
The drip TRAY is easy to reach (as opposed to a hole that a can hangs under) and the barrel construction also lends to the even heat of the grill.
The smoker attachment is a nice idea for those who want the flexibility and convenience of a gas grill with the option for smoke/charcoal; although I have not used it I think I will be purchasing the attachment before next Thanksgiving (nothing like a smoked turkey on the grill).
Cons: Assembly is a little bit of work and is best accomplished with two people. It is not something you want to do in a hurry and while not easy, it wasn't an overwhelming challenge either. In other words, yes, you have to do a little bit of thinking and it really helped to have another person to verify understanding and help to hold pieces. If you feel you are mechanically challenged, could be frustrating, but don't be scared away. Assembly time for two people who don't do much if any mechanical work, was about 90 leisurely minutes.
With so many nice-looking but cheaply made grills with cheap parts out there, the Char-Griller stands out with it's simple efficient design and comparatively heavy parts.
Buy Char-Griller 3001 Grillin' Pro 40,800-BTU Gas Grill Now
If you are looking for a good gas grill and you are on a budget, then the $170 for this is probably a good buy. Frankly I don't see the need for $500, $800, $2000 grills that are mostly name buying or grill envy inducing. You buy a grill to cook food not to be backyard bling. If you one of those huge backyard million dollar mansion types, then your not reaidng this anyway and move on to you Weber's and such. For us down to earth people this will suffice.
I've read alot of reviews saying that the directions are utterly useless and hard to understand. I don't know if Char-griller re-wrote the directions or what but I didn't find them difficult to follow. Maybe if you are the type that only looks at the pictures to assemble things, you might have a little prblems, are they are all in grey scale and not color, but even the picies are marked with stickers saying things like, "this side faces inside" or "this is the long wired burner tube". Sometime you might even feel alittle insulted that they tell you the burned tube has a longer wire attached because its some 4 inches longer and VERY obvious. But the directions have words besides pictures and they are quite clear on what to do and what pieces you need. Plus the screws/bolts/washers are very nicely packaged with sizes printed on both sides of the pack.
I'm not mechanically inclined by anymeans, but save your wallet some heartache and put it together yourself. all you need is one phillips head screw driver (maybe a pliers for when you attach the warming grate). But other than that its simple to assemble, eventhough it took just over two hours doing it by myself. But even the directions tell you that you need two people. Well you don't. The hardest part is getting the cart legs to stay put when your attaching the all and connecting them.
There was only one piece that I had to bend slightly to make it fit and that was the front panel. There was alittle too much bend in the top of the piece but once I bent it down about 10 degrees it fit perfectly. As for the rest of the grill, everything lined up perfectly and went together without any naughty words needing to be uttered.
This grill heats up very quickly, but then again I've never had a gas grill before so maybe everyone does, but I can get the temp to 600+ in around 5 minutes.
The one thing that I noticed is that there seems to be quite a bit of manufacturing oil residue. And it is real sticky when you putting the top and bottom grill barrels on. The directions say to run it for 15 minutes with the ild closed to get rid of it, but there is still quite a bit left. Maybe I just got an oil happy factory cutter, but I won't speculate on that.
The surface area is quite large for the over all size of the grill. Most grills seem to be wide and shallow where as this is quite deep and could be an optical illusion, but nice size for my family of four.
I'll update with more comments when I get a few meals put on this.
Over all I am very happy with the grill and my decision to assemble it myself.
The three piece grate system seems to stay in place well enough and should present a problem. They are also porcelain coated cast iron and should hold the heat nicely and be easy enough to clean. Another cleaning feature I like is the easy to reach drip pan. some people have written that it doesn't drain well, but I can't comment on that yet, but will in an update post later. The nice sized pull out pan seems large enough to not have to worry about it overflowing except in the large of cookouts doing multiple full loads.
I was very suprised at the weight of this grill for the cost. This looks and feels like a heavy charcoal grill (probably since Char-griller is more known for that type of grill). I liked it better than the shiny, "polish me every weekend" looking cookers out there and it lends itself to being rather manly in appearance as apposed to a lot of the fairy foo-foo stuff out there. The box weighed around 90 pounds and assembled with the tank on it it still sits around the same weight, so I don't think anyone short of tornado ally dwellers need worry about it blowing over, even with a cover on it.
I would have liked to be able to have those lava rocks or similar things in the bottom of the grill to help against flare ups from the food juices but there doesn't seem to be alot of room to put stuff like that in there as the heat shields are within a few inches of the grates. I remember a friends older grill have lots of room and the burners/heat shields were under all the lava rocks and it looked nice and it helped with flare-ups quite a bit, but it seems all the grills are made like this now. Hmm. I wonder why.
One thing I'd like to see changed is the thin side tray. Not so much because it feels flimsy, because it feels solid enough to hold stuff, but when you move the grill, I'd like to see something alittle more robust to grab hold of to move this 90+ pounds around with.
In closing, if you want a gas grill, don't have alot of money, want a masculine look, buy this. remember its the quality of the cook that makes a good meal and not spending alot of money on asthestics.
Anyway, I'm off to the store to buy some grilling food so I can update this later.
Read Best Reviews of Char-Griller 3001 Grillin' Pro 40,800-BTU Gas Grill Here
If you pay $300 you are getting ripped off. It should only cost about $189. Look somewhere else.
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Originally bought from Lowes. Had no trouble assembly, but instructions were not good. Having assembled a few grills in the past sort of know how things went together. The grill cooked well and everything was easy to regulate etc. The sheet metal that formed the base was bent in one area but I made it work...this metal was very thin and it showed it when the full propane tank was put on it. The side burner almost useless; it seemed like the vertical distance between the burner and grate there was too much and even on high it was hard to get consistently hot enough. Had a lot of flare ups with this grill even with temp medium or below with burgers, etc(sometimes pretty serious ones,as in having to remove all food out of there as it was a raging inferno inside) and you have to pay VERY close attention to this. The grill is difficult to clean. the area under the burners is hard to get to and keep scraped out...the whole grill nearly burned up once because of a flame-up there, and the stuff doesn't drain out of there nearly as well as it should but will just pool there over time. After three years, the brackets holding the drip pan have rusted away and the brackets holding the flavorizing bars have rusted away and the flavorizers themselves are rusting away. this grill kept covered the entire time. the burners themselves have held up but look like they could be replaced easily by the standard tube burner replacement seen for 15 bucks or so at wally or HD. sadly, going to have to toss the grill because of the rust. It was covered, but I do live in a humid climate. no serious complaint, i did not pay much for this and did not expect to get very many years out of it. This grill lasted for 3 years under a stored covered patio, but wheeled outside to cook, but has to be retired due to severe rust....the flavorizers now just sit on the burners themselves(now making grill unusable) due to the brackets that once held them about an inch over the burners are gone from rust and the drip pan fell off due to rusting brackets too. I have considered drilling holes and putting in some stainless or brass nuts and bolts etc to try to serve as holders, but nah, the difficulty cleaning and maintaining under the burners and the serious flame-up problems I've had cooking burgers on this have made me tired of fooling with it and now am looking elsewhere. I will not buy another one.
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A coworker bought this fugly Hershey's one from Sam's Club and it was huge and very cartoonish. I wanted something fun for the kids that also looked nice enough to set out with adults. This smores maker works great, the whole thing is on a lazy susan which adds to its appeal. I'm very happy with it and so are my kids! We had Thanksgiving smores and they were a hit : ) I set out long bamboo skewers for kebabs instead of using the metal forks, then more people could use it without having to wash the forks between each person.
