Kamado JoeBig Joe Series II 24-inch Ceramic Charcoal Grill and Smoker with Cart, Side Shelves, Stainless Steel Grates and 450 Cooking Square Inches in Red, Model BJ24RHC

This grill is HUGE, its hard to tell from photos the size of this thing. It is very pricey though so make sure this is what you want. I started off with a Chargriller Akorn and used that for around 2 years before deciding we wanted something bigger and longer lasting. The Akorn is a great grill and I still have it and I'm planning to move that to our cabin, but there is certainly big differences between the two but then you would hope so for a ~$2000 price difference.So far have made pulled pork, pork ribs, beef ribs, spatchcock chicken, and pizza on the new grill. The grill is able to handle everything we've thrown at it and the food all comes out great.The only complaint I have so far is not actually with the grill but with the Amazon "Expert Assembly" I got it because it was free at the time and this grill is so heavy. I tried to reach out several times to make sure they were aware this is a very big and very heavy grill and not a lightweight gas grill like they probably do a ton of. I had no luck getting through to anyone to understand my concern or make sure they're prepared with multiple attempts. As a result of course they sent one small guy to try to assemble my grill all by himself. Of course he couldn't do this solo and we even took a picture of him next to it (he barely stood higher than the crate) which he sent to his boss. Then the next guy to get scheduled was also alone, luckily he was able to get someone else to show up, but it's rather ridiculous that it was so disorganized. Once they had the right number of people they did a great job and I don't blame any of the technicians but the management and scheduling of the service needs to improve. When all the stats of what is being assembled are right there on the item page and I tried to warn them multiple times of the size and weight they should do a better job.

I had the Kamato original 18” grill and loved it but at times the grate space was a little crowded so I ordered the Big Joe 24” and it is huge. I included pics of the two grills side by side. If I had it to do over again I would keep the original 18” Joe. The 24” Big Joe is a great grill but just like a small car vs a SUV, it takes more gas to drive the SUV(charcoal). Both grills cook well but the 18” grill uses less charcoal and I feel was easier to keep on temperature but if you need the extra grate space maybe look at the larger grill. These things hold heat extremely well and will stay at temp for hours. I love the taste of charcoal over propane and while it takes a little more work to charcoal grill, I feel it’s definitely worth it.

This is a great value. The Big Joe 2 and 3 are rather pricey. I got this one on the big Amazon sale for under $750 which was an incredible value. But even at $1100 I can’t see spending over double for the version 3. I have it paired with a Joe Jr which is the perfect set up. The Big Joe holds temps like setting an oven and you’ll be surprised how beneficial the extra grilling space is. One thing about the BJ that never gets talked about is the ability to grill direct (without the deflector plate) but almost a foot above the coals. You get the benefits of direct grilling without scorching the outside of your protein. Perfect for spatchcock chicken. I have a bunch of different grills and enjoy them all but the Big Joe is easily my favorite. Zero regrets except should have bought one sooner.

We use this grill to smoke ribs, steak and chicken. We also used it took cook several pizzas. It is a large grill which allows us to smoke/grill enough meat for big crowd

I’m not a seasoned smoker yet, but so far, I actually love it! Made the absolute juiciest and best tasting burgers. There was about 12 of us and everybody kept raving how delicious they were. They were so perfectly cooked throughout. I have purchased some of the accessories, and I definitely plan to become more comfortable with using it. But so far it doesn’t seem too difficult to use and cook with.

The grill I received had manufacturing defects, the ceramic under the bands had gouges and additional material so that the band could not stay seated, when you attach the lid and adjust the resistance the bottom band eventually slides down over the lip on the bottom and top band up over the lip on the lid. This happens no matter how much I tighten the bands. De-assembled and re-assembled multiple times getting everything PERFECTLY aligned. The band just cannot stay where it is designed to stay. The lid also ends up with a severe overr bite and side-bite due to the band displacement. This mis-alignement is so bad that the lid cannot be closed and latched without forcing the lid forward and sideways with a fair amount of muscle when closing it. This grill also came with poor pain job, the pain didn't go all the way to the bottom in some locations which is a huge eye sore, but I wouldn't have cared if it was at least fully functional (I only mention it because it shows what poor QA they have when assembling and sending stuff out the door). It also arrived with verry poor lid alignment and bands not properly seated - which is a two-fold problem: 1. They shouldn't have let it out the door like this and 2. If they had not let it out the door like this they would have taken the time to figure out why the lid and bands were not set properly and not sent me an un-fixable grill.That's not the worst of it. I opened a support ticket and listed my problems, 5 of them. I even made a video and posted it to youtube so they could visually see what I was describing. The support representative replied back with a copy/paste "To fix lid alignment issues take off the bands and hinge and reassemble, tighten each bolt slowly one at a time". They failed to acknowledge the other issues I listed, they failed to acknowledge that I've already done what they suggested twice, and thus left me with no path forward. They even didn't have enough respect to add any kind of greeting or signature to their response, it was literally "Take the stuff off, put it back on" and NOTHING else. Weirdest support response I've ever had in ANYTHING I've ever dealt with - and this is supposed to be a quality company. So I replied to the representative and said "I've done this three times now and it hasn't fixed anything, I've also mentioned other issues and you left me with no path forward on any of them" They did not respond for 2.5 weeks. I finally replied again and asked them to escalate my case. To which they replied by CLOSING MY CASE without saying or doing anything. What...The...Actual...Eff, KJ?! Is this how you treat people?I'm not even all that mad about it coming to me with issues, I'm more than willing to work toward a resolution, but I cannot get over the lack of respect this representative has - I wouldn't treat anyone this way, paid or not. It feels absolutely terrible.DO NOT buy Kamado Joe. It is far too expensive to be this risky of a purchase - sure you might get a good grill, but if you don't you are completely boned. If you are on the fence buy the green egg.