Cutting A Probe Thermometer Slot & Buying the Smoke


 
Hello people! I used to come here regularly several years ago (some of you are still here!) but not so much over the past couple of years. Both my husband Brian and I had/have health problems and physical limitations and using his two 22-inch smokers has become somewhat difficult. Brian uses a cane and doesn't do stairs very well anymore or walking long distances. Anyway, he's been pining lately (me too!) about missing all the great meals we've made on our smokers. I thought it was time I came back around here and tried to devise a way that he wouldn't have to check on the smoker as often as he used to, thus minimizing walking to and from the smoker(s) and going up and down the two steps from the back yard to the kitchen.

First, I was debating finally getting a remote temperature system. We don't use smart phones so I wanted one that that didn't use Bluetooth. I'd always wanted to get one as I figured I could set it up each time, not Brian's comfort zone by any means, but still hesitated how long the cables would last when just running under the hood of the smokers. Lo and behold, I ended up on Thermoworks's website and saw the Smoke! By reading the poop there including reviews and links to sites with comments, I learned how easy the Smoke is to set up and also saw info about possible modifications when using the Smoke system, and ran into Chris's helpful postings about mods to WSMs when I saw "Cutting A Probe Thermometer Slot."

I thought this is for us but to say Brian and I are not handy would be putting it mildly. Not only didn't I have an angle cutter but if we did, neither one of us would know how to use it. But recently while making repairs, changes and redecorating with new furniture in our living room/den, I'd had to hire a guy to replace a rotten sash on one of our all wood windows (our house is in an historic district so all windows of our 130+ year old house that can be seen from the street have to remain wood). In order to fix the window, it had to come out, he had to finish a piece of cypress along with matching grooves to repair the sash. Turns out I also had to replace the outside sill which was also water damaged, so I had all 18 panes re-glazed to stop the water which had eventually intruded via worn out glazing on the lower panes. Frank still had to come back to finesse the wide wooden trim around the inside of the window with a finer saw as in this old house, since one piece of the old inside sill wasn't level. Soooo, I figured I'd contact Frank, remind him that he needed to finish up the window so I can get it painted (just had the room painted -- walls, ceiling and all windows including all those damn mullions on 18 pane windows but had the painter skip that window until it was repaired), see if he had angle cutter and send him the link to cutting the probe in the smoker.

I had an appointment when he showed up so I showed Frank the two smokers, and how I wanted the slot to descend a small distance beneath the groove of the middle section. Since this was being done as a surprise to Brian (our 40th anniversary is April 29th so I'm way ahead of the game), I told him they needed to start with cutting the smokers & they could go back to the window work as I had to leave and once Lynn moved to upstairs to clean, Brian would head downstairs so I wanted them either working on the window or gone so as to keep Brian in the dark. My housekeeper Lynn was here cleaning and I showed HER what I wanted done, too, and personally witnessed Frank telling his worker how deep I wanted the slots cut. When I came downstairs to head out, they'd finished both tasks and were gone. When I went to check the smokers, the idiot had ONLY cut through the lip of the edge and not beyond a bit as in pictures I'd shared and per my instructions. Lynn said she tried to catch them after she'd checked it and they were already gone. They came back after a phone call to re-do and of course, when I returned home after my appointment, the slots were deeper than I'd showed them (natch). For this I'd paid $40 to someone who was coming here anyway (the guy cutting had looked at Chris's instructions as well as Frank so I expected to see a duplicate slot, you know?). Anyway, it will work. I saw where someone said if you're not using the slots for cables that a refrigerator sheet magnet covered his slot so I can always try that if heat seems to be escaping after 2 cables are in the slot.

If you haven't died of boredom by now and are still reading this :D, I'm going to order the Smoke 2 this week. The fact that reviewers said it was easy to set up really sold me, in additional to the availability of different probes for meat and temp. Brian is an excellent smoker but never tried doing an overnight smoke though he really wanted to do so. The 15 STEEP steps in this old home without a system to monitor even smoker temps took the fun out of the midnight rambling up and down the steps an overnight smoke would involve (we had a stair lift installed almost a year ago which trumped even our whole house generator purchase in sheer adoration). Come our April anniversary and his first smoke using his new Smoke, Brian is going to discover that I had slots cut into each smoker to accommodate the probes so he wouldn't have to worry about the cables getting squished! I also plan to have a whole brisket at the ready so he can do an overnight smoke right away if he wants to.

Not only did I want to thank Chris for making the post available showing me what to do and how to do it, but knowing you guys whose expertise I admire sanctioned doing such a thing to your smoker made it a no-brainer. It's going to bring such joy to Brian to be able to get into using the smoker again on a regular basis.

We used to smoke and deliver turkeys to several people for Christmas (that included the one or two which served as reasonably-priced yet fantastic Christmas gifts to my grateful bosses each year). It was so much fun delivering them as most were to people we'd lived by or made special friends with who we didn't see regularly. Weezy was an older lady who got on the list over 25 years ago by befriending us as she walked by our house on her way to the bus stop. One time while passing she stopped and asked me what the heck we were cooking all the time that smelled so good when she walked by during the holidays. I told her we smoked about 8 turkey for gifts and she smiled and said how wonderful it was for people who were on our Christmas list (yes, the following year she was added to the list! Life has passed quickly but this past year, Weezy, who'd lost her husband "Bat" since Katrina forced them out of the City back in 2005 to live with one of their grown kids, returned to live in N.O. We'd kept in telephone touch over the years and when she called to tell us "I'm finally home" and living by herself in a small apartment way out in East N.O., we immediately knew she'd kill for a smoked turkey though Brian told her he hadn't been doing too much smoking lately. I just know one of his first cooks will be two turkeys -- one for us and one for Weezy, who's in her mid to late 80s now. She'd always call us whenever she was getting ready to make gumbo with her smoked turkey carcass she'd just taken out of the freezer and would remind us our smoked turkey served as two presents rather than one! It will be such fun to call her and tell her we're coming to see her and I know she will actually wonder if we're going to show up with a turkey.

Thanks for putting up with the most longwinded thank you ever posted here. Should you have any tips regarding use of the Smoke and your use of any slots you might've made to your WSM, please post away. If that has to be in another area of the forum, just let me know where to look.

Thanks, Chris, and all of you who post helpful information for the rest of us. Using a temp monitoring system will be a new thing for two people who've had Weber smokers for almost 40 years, and will make things so much easier for us no matter what we're using the smoker for.

Michelle
 
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Welcome back Michelle. I know that Chris will appreciate your very special thank you not. Here's hoping you and Brian have a bunch of Turkeys in your future.
 
Welcome back, Michelle. The red Smoke is on sale 20% off today only at thermoworks.com.
 
It' will be my pleasure to use that link when ordering it, Chris. Thanks for the heads up. I'm sure I will have questions or seek advice once we start using it and it's so nice to know this is a land of so many people willing to help others out.

Appreciate the posts from both you Lews -- just wish I would've seen one of them yesterday!

I hope to be posting more soon, Dustin, but am definitely lurking more lately. Thanks for the welcome. I definitely check this place whenever I have a question or am curious the way others handle a cook. Plus I've gotten so many good ideas here before, both for the grill and the smoker, like the infamous smoked mushroom dip I found here many years ago.
 
Just wanted to stop by and say welcome back Michelle. it's good to see you posting again.
Best to you and Brian!

Bob
 

 

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