Unless you're one of those that likes to hold the beans at a given temp below where that thermal cutout is.
A fair rebuttal, do you actually do that Peter ? Does anyone ? Based on what I read of popcorn, the cutout is likely ~450F,and non too accurate. I'ts mostly to prevent oil from scorching at ~500F while getting the popcorn hot enough (400+F). So you'd be doing a rest out around cty+ or vienna, exothermic territory. That doesn't sound smart to me, but 'm willing to learn.
You'd think that 1KW SC heater would really help in the "boost" phase, but in my experience it seems fairly inefficient compared to the GG's ~1200/1400W heater w/ convention. I've never measured, but I expect the SC heater actually cuts out before 1C, - when the GG's hot breath heats the 'pan', not beans to ~450F. I will measure this and report next time.
===
Peter - it looks like you use those dual SC+TOs pretty hard, yet report no failures after the hanger-bolt hack. My experience is that the SC works for a while with the aluminum foil or copper end-cap trick, but eventually the threads fail. Then it lasts for a much longer time w/ the hanger-bolt & washer trick. But eventually even that fails, and the top of the shaft melts & deforms.
I push 3x 350gram batches (occasionally a 4th batch) thru the SC+TO, every 10days/2-weeks. I'd roast weekly if time allowed. I'd imagine that your are seeing heavier duty and therefore SC problems earlier - not so ?
