A few weeks back, I was pushing one of our kamado tables and all of a sudden it ground to a halt. I figured that it must have hit a stray piece of smoking wood or lump coal. Nope, one of the wheel casings just fell apart.
This was a stock BGE short table that is about 5 years old. I suppose that's a reasonable life expectancy for rubber outdoors.
After our last BBQ contest, I decided to go ahead and replace the wheels before putting a 200 pound grill back in it. Unless I could find the exact wheel, I couldn't replace just one wheel. Turns out it didn't matter - all four wheels were cracked.
I decided to upgrade them while I was at it. I was surprised with how many caster wheel options the big box hardware store had in stock.
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I went with 4' instead of the 3' stock wheels. The new wheels were also locking casters and had double the weight load rating. They were about $9 each. |
As you can see from the above picture, the base of the older wheels was smaller and they had them mounted cockeyed. I think that was just because the way the three boards line up. I wanted mine straight so I added a 1" x 3" strip with 2" deck screws and then mounted the wheels into that strip.
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I'll have to stain the new piece later but I'll be doing cosmetic work on both tables this Spring. |
Once we got them all installed, we loaded the Grill Dome into the table.
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The larger wheels and the strip that I added raises the table about 1 1/2", which is actually better for me. |
In the Spring I am thinking about replacing the tile tops. My other table is going on 8 years old and it is showing the wear. I like the tile but even with a backer board, the different expansion rates cause a lot of cracks in tile and grout during the winter. I am thinking about either poured concrete tops (would rather avoid the weight) or stainless counter tops.