How to Maintain your Grill and Keep the Bugs Away

December 23, 2019 Preston Ledford

If you own a gas grill, a charcoal grill, or an electric grill, is it clean? If you do not clean it before you put it away last season, you know good and well bugs are in it.

If you are refusing to get your grill out because of bugs, get a giant stick, some leather work gloves, and a bunch of courage.

What’s with the stick? That’s to rattle the grill by making sure that the spiders scamper offline.

If you don’t treat your grill an excellent clean before you put it away, you probably already aware it will be housing some spiders and their prey. These are some tips for you to follow to get your grill in ship shape and prepared to grill.

These tricks will work just as well when you need to clean your grill to get you ready to barbecue, and also mainly because the last thing you do when you put it away for the season if you put it way. I use mine year-round!

1. Remove all the visible dirt.

If it is a gas grill and has food residue on it, use a small brush or damp cloth to remove it. If you own a charcoal grill, and it still has ash in the pan, remove as much as you get out.

Now, if there is a lot of dirt, ash, dust, or other junk in your grill, take your garden hose and wash it away. If you don’t, it just makes a cleaning job that much more difficult.

2. Remove any loose parts.

Remove anything areas not affixed to the grill. Grill rails, propane tank or canister, grill lid, and the grill shelf.

I favor cleaning the grill itself first so I can put these parts back when I finish cleaning them. Check for any loose items and remove them or tighten them.

Sometimes it is easier to remove them, but make sure you keep them safe. Grill’s most significant bits are at the lid of the grill. Soak everything seriously dirty in the cleaner of choice. I like to use this cleaner on Amazon.com. The grease falls off nicely once it has soaked for a little bit.

3. Clean the barbecue.

If you have a chrome steel grill, avoid using a wire brush. Please pay attention to the manufacturer’s recommendations when it comes down to abrasives. We are using them to have a beautiful sparkling grill, but we don’t want to ruin it. I realize that my charcoal grill doesn’t have a significant hefty amount of grease and food debris as the ash catches these. My propane grill can get extraordinarily greasy and usually has burned fat, meat, and chunks of waste at the bottom.

4. Check balance and fit.

Once the actual grill is all clean and dry, examine the stability and fit. If some from the screws loosened during the past season, your grill may sit some lopsided. Loosen the screws. You don’t need to remove them entirely unless necessary and uncover everything prepared. Replace the screws and replace any other items that you removed in the earlier steps. If there are chips in the paint, touch them up with heat/flame resistant paint. It isn’t essential to do this step, but if you want your grill to look new again, it is well worth it.

5. Clean the rails and accessories

Now you’ll want to clean the tracks and additional bits you took off earlier in the process. Empty the dirty water, where they were soaking in and freshen it with hot soapy water. Give everything a good scrub and clean. Not all grill rails are high quality, so don’t use anything but a wire brush if you have tracks that take it.

Do not use one if it is stainless lightweight aluminum. Please be sure to use protective materials, like rubber gloves, when using harsh chemicals. Please avoid the use of the cheap single-use disposable kind mainly because they will crumble in the first minutes of hard cleansing.