This is my first pellet smoker and have a lot to learn. With my old gas grill I would fire up to high temp for 5 min to burn off then hit with wire brush.

I use a ball of aluminum foil, sometimes when the grates are hot and sometimes when they are cold.

I heat it, brush it and I'm good to go. 

We use a dough cutter for the heavy cleaning and aluminum foil to finish on a warm grill.

Right after the food has been removed and the grates are still hot, I wire brush followed by wiping the top and sides of each bar w/ a paper towel. If anything remains, it is scraped off using a metal scraper ( 1/2 round concave end that fits over the top and sides

of each bar), then brush and wipe... It's amazing what the paper towel picks up.... Following a high temp cook, that is 400º up, it's the same regime followed by a light coating of oil to keep the grates seasoned.

Note- I use this procedure w/ all grate materials..

WARNING: The use of any bristled brush could result in bristle dislodgement. A proper wiping procedure should always following brushing.

I heat it, brush it and I'm good to go.

+1

I will occasionally brush them with a wire brush when grill is hot.  I usually will use a pressure washer on them once a year then soak in hot soapy water and scrape off any remaining parts with a paint scraper or a Lodge scraper.

Have the brush scraper combo but with the plastic bristles. Note to self always use the bristle side when the grate is cold? I for the majority of the time use the scraper along with the side that is shaped out the size of the grate and will run that up and down each grate.  Will also after quite a few cooks just take the grates off the smoker and take them to a car wash time it so my car needs washed at the same time. Works pretty slick.

 Old and forgetful. Forgot this: Once in a while I turn the grates over and do a number on the bottom side. The accumulation is harder to remove and requires scraping. I don't do as good a job as is done on the top side.

Old and forgetful. Forgot this: Once in a while I turn the grates over and do a number on the bottom side. The accumulation is harder to remove and requires scraping. I don't do as good a job as is done on the top side.

For bottom side of stainless, once in a blue I put them in the oven and do an oven clean procedure, then scrape off the residue. Have to re-season before using again.

Define clean...

I got into this habit of cooking on some jerky racks that I bought from Cabela's   I love them, because I can take them into my house, load the food up on them, and carry them out to the grill.   Because I rarely ever place food on the actual grates in the grill, I don't typically care how dirty the cooking grates are. I'll use a grill brush on them to knock off any big crusty attachments... but outside of that , I don't clean my grills gates much at all.

 Now, my jerky racks... if/when food sticks on them, they can be tricky to clean.  I recently found a method that seemed to work well for me.  I bought a couple heavy duty bus tubs, the ones I got are like 21x17", made by Tablecraft. My jerky racks easily fit in these tubs... some really hot tap water combined with Oxyclean in the tub with the jerky racks... 10 or 15 minutes of soaking, the gunk on the racks is easily brushed off with a stiff bristled cleaning brush. Since these Cablea's racks aren't stainless I do have a little concern with them rusting, so I stuck them in my oven after I rinsed them off... 150F for a hour or so and they were nice and dry. In the summer, I'd probably just stick them back in my pellet grill to dry off at 180F or so for  a while.

 Another option that can be obtained easier than those bus tubs, and can even be found large enough to hold a actual grill grates... a drywall mud tub... can be found at Lowes or Home Depot, etc...

  All else fails, I do have a power washer...

I got into this habit of cooking on some jerky racks that I bought from Cabela's   I love them, because I can take them into my house, load the food up on them, and carry them out to the grill.   Because I rarely ever place food on the actual grates in the grill, I don't typically care how dirty the cooking grates are. I'll use a grill brush on them to knock off any big crusty attachments... but outside of that , I don't clean my grills gates much at all.

 Now, my jerky racks... if/when food sticks on them, they can be tricky to clean.  I recently found a method that seemed to work well for me.  I bought a couple heavy duty bus tubs, the ones I got are like 21x17", made by Tablecraft. My jerky racks easily fit in these tubs... some really hot tap water combined with Oxyclean in the tub with the jerky racks... 10 or 15 minutes of soaking, the gunk on the racks is easily brushed off with a stiff bristled cleaning brush. Since these Cablea's racks aren't stainless I do have a little concern with them rusting, so I stuck them in my oven after I rinsed them off... 150F for a hour or so and they were nice and dry. In the summer, I'd probably just stick them back in my pellet grill to dry off at 180F or so for  a while.

 Another option that can be obtained easier than those bus tubs, and can even be found large enough to hold a actual grill grates... a drywall mud tub... can be found at Lowes or Home Depot, etc...

  All else fails, I do have a power washer...

I use similar process to clean my Cabela's jerky racks.  My wife used to work at Tablecraft.  I have shelves full of their products.  Nice to buy stuff at employee rates.

Define clean...

What is this clean everyone is talking about

Define clean...

What is this clean everyone is talking about

Are we supposed to clean them?