Tim,
Your WSM sounds exactly like mine. I'm still struggling dialing in a low temperature but I'm getting better.
What Kevin meant by "out of round" is that sometimes on a new smoker the middle section will not be perfectly round. So when you seat it into the bottom section there will be gaps which allow air in. This would be the same as opening the vents and drive your temperature up.
I've used my smoker about 5 times now and even though I thought I checked and adjusted the center section for being out of round, I must be pulling in air from somewhere because I have a heck of a time keeping my temps down. I've haven't looked into yet because I just thought it was a case of after a few cooks it would start to seal itself. However, today I did that peppered chuck recipe found on this site and here is how it went:
Assembled the smoker with a 5# Chuck (Ribeye?) Roast on the top grate at 12PM. Measuring at the grate, when it hit 220F, I closed all the grates expect for the top, of course. I know I have to be this aggressive from past experience. It finally stalled at 260F at the grate and held there.
At 2:30 PM I knew I had a problem because the temperature of the meat wasn't as high as I had expected. I cracked two grates to 10% open and over the next hour the temperature at the grate continued to rise and it was at 300F when I pulled the meat at 3:30PM because I was up against time constraints and had to move it to the oven. When I pulled the chuck it was at 142F and I was hoping to hit 165F. When it got to 138F it hit a wall and took a ton of time to move that last 4 degrees. So your six hours to bring it to 165F doesn't surprise me. If I would have left my smoker at 260-265F at the grate, I'm guessing to get to 165F I was looking at least another couple of hours. I was only at 142F after 3 1/2 hours and that includes a bit of higher temp for the last hour but it does include some lower temperature in the beginning as the temperature at the grate takes time to rise to 260F.
So over the next couple of days, I'm going to recheck that my middle section is making a nice fit and I'm also going to recheck the door but I'm relatively sure the door is pretty darn tight because I've never seen smoke come out of it and I spent quite a bit of time shaping it when I first got it so it would fit snug when closed.
Your WSM sounds exactly like mine. I'm still struggling dialing in a low temperature but I'm getting better.
What Kevin meant by "out of round" is that sometimes on a new smoker the middle section will not be perfectly round. So when you seat it into the bottom section there will be gaps which allow air in. This would be the same as opening the vents and drive your temperature up.
I've used my smoker about 5 times now and even though I thought I checked and adjusted the center section for being out of round, I must be pulling in air from somewhere because I have a heck of a time keeping my temps down. I've haven't looked into yet because I just thought it was a case of after a few cooks it would start to seal itself. However, today I did that peppered chuck recipe found on this site and here is how it went:
Assembled the smoker with a 5# Chuck (Ribeye?) Roast on the top grate at 12PM. Measuring at the grate, when it hit 220F, I closed all the grates expect for the top, of course. I know I have to be this aggressive from past experience. It finally stalled at 260F at the grate and held there.
At 2:30 PM I knew I had a problem because the temperature of the meat wasn't as high as I had expected. I cracked two grates to 10% open and over the next hour the temperature at the grate continued to rise and it was at 300F when I pulled the meat at 3:30PM because I was up against time constraints and had to move it to the oven. When I pulled the chuck it was at 142F and I was hoping to hit 165F. When it got to 138F it hit a wall and took a ton of time to move that last 4 degrees. So your six hours to bring it to 165F doesn't surprise me. If I would have left my smoker at 260-265F at the grate, I'm guessing to get to 165F I was looking at least another couple of hours. I was only at 142F after 3 1/2 hours and that includes a bit of higher temp for the last hour but it does include some lower temperature in the beginning as the temperature at the grate takes time to rise to 260F.
So over the next couple of days, I'm going to recheck that my middle section is making a nice fit and I'm also going to recheck the door but I'm relatively sure the door is pretty darn tight because I've never seen smoke come out of it and I spent quite a bit of time shaping it when I first got it so it would fit snug when closed.