Second time making brisket questions

Everyone,

long time lurker here. Just this past weekend I made my first brisket (walmart select grade) which was good not great. I made burnt ends with the point and sliced the flat and all was good for my wife and buddy. Fast forward to this weekend I am having quite a few more people over and I am now making 2 briskets (Costco -- Prime). So my first question is temp monitoring. I have a maverick 733 that I usually use to keep a grate temp and a meat temp. But I'm cooking on top and bottom grates this time what should I do to monitor the temps. View both meats and use the stock weber dome temp? view the one grate and one meat, either top or bottom?

Second, I'm no expert on my 22" having it only for less than a year and much of that was last winter and now (Metro-Detroit). But I decided to cook at the 225 for this last cook and it went for almost 20 hours and it just never got up to temp (170 max measured in the flat) using both maverick and 2 instant read that I have verified to be accurate. I ended up taking the meat off the smoker and cooking it in the oven at about 375 for 2 hours to finish it. I was thinking of going hotter on this next cook but I want to eat at about 5pm so I want to make sure I can rest for a at least an hour but I'm afraid of the 20 hour cook again. It will be a little warmer this weekend than last weekend but even still I don't believe the temps ever got below 200 on the grate. and got to as high as 275 towards the end in my desperate attempt to cook it to completion.
*I guess my question is should I plan for the 20 hour cook and if need be let it rest for longer or even reheat as needed?

Sorry if this is long winded but I'm just looking for advise from you all with more experience than me.

Thank you,
Davegibson

I would use a pit probe and a temp probe in one of the briskets. Then just use your instant read to check the other one. You probably should try cooking hotter. 250 to 275 is a good range but the cold weather can really drop your pit temp if you've got a lot of wind. 20 hrs seems like a long time but it depends on the size of the brisket.

The brisket was only 13.5 lbs so not huge but I didn't trim a ton. Either way, it was about 10° overnight with a little wind, this week the low is 34 overnight and highs in the 50s. I will just plan on cooking hotter and giving myself enough time. Thanks for the advise on the probes. That's what I will end up doing. In my experience the top and bottom grates cook at the same rate. So I will probe the bottom meat and top grate, and instant read to check the top brisket. Thanks Dustin.

Definitely go in the 250 - 275 range. I usually wind up around 275 and a 14 lb brisket typically takes around nine hours. I would do one pit temp and one meat temp probe. The meat probe is just for reference. You're going to cook until it's tender, not until it reaches some predetermined temperature.

I have 22 WSM that I have been using for about 5 years now. The 2 things that I figured out, for me at least. When smoking at 225, just assume it will take 16+ hours to smoke a brisket or a Boston butt. Also, the 22 has a hard time getting above 310 for high heat cooking. This is just my findings. I use KB charcoal. I have never tried lump coal yet for higher temps. Just my .02$

Almost 20 hours, im guessing you didnt foil that thing through the stall? I have a decent amount of brisket through my 18.5 and have much preferred the results cooking around 265*, and as said above they usually cook between 7 - 9 hours. Id say cook it till 160*ish Internal temp (or whenever it stalls) then wrap it tightly in Foil. Iv found its almost the only way to get any kind of consistency in cooking time.

btw i do admire your confidence of attacking 2 briskets for a big group after only cooking ONE previous brisket. BALLSY!! and my kinda guy.

rb