Help, temp not coming up


 

G John B

New member
I have gotten pretty good with smoking, with water in the pan.

Problem, I have people coming over in 4 hours! Turkey was prepped using the apple brine method.

I used the chimney of lit coals and chimney of unlit.

No water or sand in the pan, just foiled.

The smoker will not go over 250. All the vets are full open, it is smoking like a steam engine, but no heat. She will not go to the correct temp.

Outside air is 20F, wind is under 5 and the smoker is in a protected area anyway.

What do I do to kick up the temp?
 
I take you're trying to get to 325ish. You didn't start with enough lit. To reach those temps I need to start with two chimneys of lit. I light one, dump and then dump and unlit on top. When they're all grey/ashed over assemble and cook (for future reference).

If it was me, I'd lift the middle and top section off, let all the coals get going and then re-assemble. Other options would be to turn the door upside down and prop open and/or crack the lid just a bit. Or you could do what I do and just pump your guests full of booze and no one cares when she's done.

Good luck and enjoy your bird!!!
 
Larry is on point. When I cook that high, I also leave the door open in addition to the vents.
 
One more thing to consider:

Any time you fill up a cooker with a lot of meat (or turkey), meat temp. becomes MUCH more critical.


I can't count how many times that I've forgotten to pull meat out of the fridge soon enough (that I rubbed ahead of time.) You can really see the stubbornness that "chill" adds, both in pit temp and in the meat to finish cooking. I just got my wsm, but I would think this would play an even bigger part with such a small cooker.
 
It ended up taking 4hr15m, and the smoker never did get over 325, but it turned out nicely.

I did take it apart once, to add the extra lit chimney, and I took the top off three times to check the meat temp.
 

 

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