Hello

Huskersteel · February 20, 2011, 07:23:24 AM

Hi all, I am new to the forum and I want to know what happened to fairly new (three month old) OBS. Recently caught some nice chrome steelhead and about an hour into the smoking process the smoker quit on me. Temp dropped and luckily as a new owner I was checking the PID often and noticed the problem so I finished the fish in the oven. I plugged the power directly into the tower and noticed the element wouldn't get red. I am assuming I blew the element but after only five uses I find this hard to believe. Anyway, I will continue to search the Forum for troubleshooting techniques. It is a Holiday weekend so i will have to wait until Tuesday to call Bradley directly to see what they have to say.

GusRobin · February 20, 2011, 08:40:56 AM

Welcome to the forum. Not to worry as you are just experiencing the result of the non-defective elements that fail .07 (or is it .7) of the time. The good news is that they will get you out a replacement asap and you should be back working in n time. Not everyone celebrates President's day so you may want to call them Monday.

Quarlow · February 20, 2011, 09:58:29 AM

Welcome to the forum and it is definately not a holiday up here. So give them a call monday, they will get you fixed up.

Huskersteel · February 20, 2011, 10:01:41 AM

Very good, i will give them a call Monday. Can either of you guys tell me how hard it is to put in a second element. I am not a very adept electrician but am great at following directions. Is there a plug and play way to install the second element?

GusRobin · February 20, 2011, 11:22:52 AM

The hardest part is drilling the hole in the reflector. It tends to bind and is easy to break the solder or whatever is holding it together. I would recommend ordering one just in case as cheap insurance. If you step drill it, it should go fine. The other difficult part is grinding the bevel in the ceramic clamps. If you have a roto tool it is easy, a little harder with a rat tail file. Time consuming but not too difficult even for a novice.
While I call these the hardest, I don't mean to infer that they are that difficult.

The other hardest part is remembering which wire is which. So I recommend you take pictures as you go along so you can refer to them and get a set of colored markers and mark the wires as you go along. I also bought a few extra wire connectors since I figured I would mess one or two up ( and I did)

Other than that the detailed instructions are easy to follow. Many of us have done it and are here to help walk you through it (or PM one of us and we will give you our number to call). I recommend you also install a switch for the second element. It is cheap and easy to do. You never know when you may want to run with one. I had a PID fail so while Auber turned it around and I had it back 5 days after I dropped it in the mail, I was able to run my Bradley with one element. I could turn the 2nd one on to get to temp then shut the switch and then turn it off and cook with one. (For safety reasons you want some type of PID type controller if running 2 elements).

watchdog56 · February 21, 2011, 07:25:47 PM

welcome and as others have stated it was probably a bad element.

Huskersteel · February 21, 2011, 09:44:07 PM

Gus, You mention grinding a bevel in the ceramic clamps. Is this on the back of the piece that attaches to the back of the cabinet? To allow the new high temp wires to pass through to the second element? If I do this modification I would like to put in a switch like habanero did. The more I look at the photos of all the mods being done I feel more confident about attempting the process. If you can pm me I will try and respond. I am new to the whole forum lifestyle and not sure I would be able to send you one.

SouthernSmoked · February 22, 2011, 06:21:36 AM

Welcome to the forum!