I’ve had a 57cm Weber kettle grill for five years. It’s been used every summer, sometimes every weekend from May to September, and it’s held up well — the body is still solid, the vents work, the lid fits properly. The one thing that hadn’t held up was the original cooking grate. After five years of use, cleaning, and exposure to heat and moisture, it had developed rust spots, the chrome plating had worn through in several places, and food was sticking to it in a way it hadn’t when it was new.
I’d been putting off replacing it because I assumed a replacement grate would be expensive or hard to find. The 304 stainless steel cooking grate for 57cm kettle grills turned out to be neither, and it’s made the grill feel completely new again.
Why the Original Grate Had to Go
The original Weber cooking grate is chrome-plated steel. Chrome plating works well when it’s intact, but once it starts to wear — which it will, with regular use and cleaning — the steel underneath is exposed to moisture and heat and begins to rust. The rust isn’t just an aesthetic problem: it affects the cooking surface, it can transfer to food, and it makes the grate harder to clean because the rough, pitted surface gives food more to grip onto.
I’d been cleaning the grate more aggressively to try to manage the rust, which was accelerating the wear on the remaining chrome plating. It was a losing battle. The grate needed replacing.
Why I Chose This Stainless Steel Grate
The 54.5cm Stainless Steel Cooking Grate is made from 304 stainless steel, which is the grade used in professional kitchen equipment and outdoor cooking surfaces. Unlike chrome-plated steel, 304 stainless steel doesn’t have a coating that can wear away — the corrosion resistance is inherent to the material itself. It won’t rust, it won’t pit, and it will maintain its cooking surface indefinitely with normal care.
The 54.5cm diameter fits the 57cm kettle grill correctly — the grate sits inside the grill body rather than spanning the full 57cm, so the 54.5cm measurement is the right size for the cooking surface. The grill clips secure it in place and the handle makes it easy to lift and reposition during cooking, which is useful when you’re adding charcoal or adjusting the fire.
First Cook — Immediately Better
I seasoned the new grate with a light coat of oil before the first cook — standard practice for any new cooking surface — and then cooked a mix of burgers and sausages for a family barbecue. The difference from the old grate was immediately apparent. Food released cleanly from the surface without sticking, the grill marks were clean and even, and cleaning the grate afterwards was straightforward — a brush while it was still hot and it was done.
The stainless steel rods retain heat well and distribute it evenly across the cooking surface, which means more consistent results than the old chrome grate had been giving me in its worn state. The burgers cooked evenly without hot spots causing some to char while others were still underdone.
A Full Summer of Use
I replaced the grate at the start of last summer and used it throughout the season — probably thirty or forty cooks over five months. The stainless steel surface has shown no signs of rust, no pitting, and no deterioration of any kind. It looks essentially the same as it did when I first fitted it, which is exactly what you’d expect from 304 stainless steel but is a significant contrast to the chrome grate it replaced.
Cleaning has remained easy throughout. A wire brush while the grate is hot after cooking removes any residue, and the smooth stainless surface doesn’t accumulate the kind of baked-on deposits that the rough, pitted chrome grate had been developing. The grill clips have stayed secure and the handle is still firmly attached.
The Broader Point About Grill Maintenance
Replacing the cooking grate has made me think differently about grill maintenance generally. The Weber kettle body is essentially indestructible — the porcelain-enamelled steel will last decades with normal care. The components that wear out are the replaceable ones: the cooking grate, the charcoal grate, the ash catcher. Replacing these as they wear rather than replacing the whole grill is both more economical and more sustainable.
The stainless steel grate will outlast several chrome replacements and probably outlast the grill itself. That’s the right kind of upgrade — one that improves the performance and extends the useful life of something you already own.
Where to Find It
The 54.5cm Stainless Steel Cooking Grate for 57cm Kettle Grill is available in our Home & Garden range.
If you have a 57cm kettle grill with a worn or rusted cooking grate, this is the replacement I’d recommend. The 304 stainless steel is a genuine upgrade over the original chrome-plated grate — better cooking performance, easier cleaning, and no rust. My five-year-old Weber feels like a new grill. That’s a good result from a single straightforward replacement.
— Steve Callahan, five-year Weber kettle owner, former chrome grate sufferer, and now the person at the barbecue who gets asked why his grill looks so clean
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