I'm glad someone gave me some direction on this project. It would not have occurred to me to use a charcoal-lighter otherwise. And, checking the wattage was important. The 600-W dimmer can readily handle the 550-W heater. The heaters, without any limiter, get up into the 1200 deg. F range... charcoal starter for real-- the ribs would start to turn to charcoal immediately.
I have the dimmer turned to about the halfway mark, and it works perfectly with zero scorching. I found that location by trial and error. I first tried 2/3 setting, just to see what would happen, and it scorched the scrap rib I used for the test--not terribly, but definitely a little too hot.
So I turned it down to halfway, waited while it cooled, and tried again. Bingo! I marked the dial, and, while I may mess around sometime, and fine-tune things a little, I was completely satisfied with how it bent the ribs, and probably will simply consider that to be the "correct" setting. No idea what temperature it is, except that if I spray water on it from a spray-bottle, the water instantly explodes into steam, but I still am not getting any scorching of the wood.
