Too much info


 
J

JayHeyl

TVWBB Pro
I'm feeling a bit like a man with three watches who has no idea what the time really is. My Smoke arrived yesterday and I'm putting it to use on a rib cook. I have the grate probe just stuck through the silicone grommet on the WSM reading the temp of air coming up the side. The meat probe is sticking through the top vent reading the dome air temp. Both probes and the dome thermometer in the WSM are all giving different readings. I have no idea which one to go by. The WSM thermo is considerably lower than the other two so I'm inclined to disregard it. I've paid little attention to it in the past, instead going with the digital readout of the separate thermometers I used to use.

The two probes attached to the Smoke are sometimes apart by 10-15F, sometimes almost exactly the same, and sometimes apart in the other direction. I probably should have checked calibration on the Smoke before using it.

The other thing I've noticed is fairly wide and rapid temperature swings that I've not seen before with the other digital units. Several times I've seen swings of 10F over the course of a minute or less. I'm using the grate probe I bought for the ChefAlarm, also from ThermoWorks, that I know works and has not given these wide swings before. So now I'm wondering if these swings are actually happening, if this temporary deviation is just how the Smoke works, or if I've discovered why this unit was "open box".

Fortunately, I don't think any of this will impact the ribs.
 
Somewhere here in the forums a while back there was a discussion of where to put the air temp probe if you had such a thing. Different people did it different ways, what a shock, and seemed to feel their way was perfectly acceptable. I had originally used the grate clip and put the probe kind of to the side so it wasn't in the way quite so much. There was another suggestion to insert the clip so it hung down from the grate, an easy approach to keeping it out of the way that I'm ashamed I didn't think of. There were a few people who said they simply pushed the metal part of the probe through the silicone grommet, leaving all the cable outside the smoker. I switched to using this approach because it seemed close enough to the grate temp and was obviously a lot easier.

Today I found a problem with this approach. I had just one bottom vent open about 25%, and it happened to be the one directly under the grommet. I also put a probe through the top vent, mostly because I could. I was seeing significantly higher grommet temps than dome temps. When I thought I was ready to foil the ribs I noticed the parts closer to the partially open bottom vent where clearly further along than the parts directly opposite. The bone ends on the hotter side were actually black while those on the other side were still white. This lead me to believe I had way more heat coming up the side near the open vent. This made sense given the other vents were closed.

So I switched the vent positions, closing the one under the grommet and partially opening one of the others. Now I'm seeing a much hotter dome temp (311F) than grommet temp (270F).

This suggests to me that fully closing any of the bottom vents can lead to very uneven heat within the cooker. I'd guess what I have right now is a lot of heat coming up the side with the open vent and greatly reduced heat, if any, coming up the grommet side, with much of it collecting in the dome lid.

In the future I think I'll make two changes. First, the air temp probe will go in the grate clip and be positioned well away from the side. Second, if I'm shooting for a uniform fire, I'm going to set the bottom vent positions identically rather than having just one open. (I have done a purposely non-uniform fire where it was intended for it to start on one side and move toward the other. In that case it makes sense to vary the vent positions according to the progress of the fire.)
 
Color me confused but why use a meat probe for monitoring dome temp when also using a grate probe for monitoring grate temps.
I've seen so many threads where folks try to mix and match temps in different areas and go bonkers, so the best advice is to pick one and stick with it.

Tim
 
timothy said:
Color me confused but why use a meat probe for monitoring dome temp when also using a grate probe for monitoring grate temps.
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I used a meat probe because it was at hand. I stuck it in the dome because the Smoke has two inputs and I figured I might as well use them both. I was doing spare ribs so there was no reason to put the meat probe in the meat.

As it happens, I later swapped the positions, putting the meat probe through the grommet and the grate probe in the dome vent. That got the actual sensor through the grommet a lot further into the smoker and made it less sensitive to the heat coming up the side. With that done I saw a fairly consistent difference between grate/grommet and dome, with the dome being the warmer as would be expected.

I do think in the future I will try to keep better balance on the bottom vent settings. It's easier closing down two and using the remaining one alone, but it appears to produce significant hot and cold spots in the smoker.
 
JayHeyl;
I tried my new Smoke therm out Friday with a Bone in Boston Butt. As always, I set the smoker temp probe on the grate clip in past the edge where the super heated air rises. I want my grate probe next to the meat (inch or two away) so I get the temp where the meat is cooking. I had the meat probe in the butt. I got very consistent results and am REAL happy with my Smoke.

I've used a Maverick 732 for several years but had a couple of probe failures. The Smoke probes look to be MUCH better built. Further, I am appreciative of the intuitive operating system on the Smoke.

I believe you are on the right track and will be happy with the Smoke, too. It sounds like having balanced vent openings are a good idea, also.

Keep on smokin',
Dale53:wsm:
 
I do pretty much the same as Robert said. I'm sure the smoke is a quality product like all the other thermoworks are. I'm going on year four with two Mavericks which are still working fine. I've gone through three probes in four years so I can't really complain.
I've noticed a trend on the forum that the more experienced folks are not using remote temperature devices and are using their dome thermometers as a reference instead. At this stage I'm not that confident in doing that as I don't do a lot of long cooks, mostly grilling for us.
As far as the vents go I usually get to the point that I shut down all but one vent and have had no adverse effects doing that.
 
Go with your Pit Probe that came with your unit. Should be mounted at grate level. Disregard the other stuff for monitoring pit temps. Go with it and have fun. You'll figure it out.
 
The other thing I noticed but didn't mention is that the built in dome thermometer read much lower than either of the digital probes. On close inspection I saw that the needle isn't perpendicular to the dial face. The outer tip is down from where it's mounted on the center stem and appears to be making contact with the face. This has to be creating some amount of friction that likely interferes with it producing a proper reading. I've not looked but it's also possible there's a lot of gunk built up on the inner side that's insulating it from the interior and resulting in lower readings.

For me the remote temperature device is just for convenience. It's just so I don't have to trudge up and down the stairs every half hour or so to be sure my last adjustment didn't eventually have undesired effects. That's the primary reason I got the Smoke -- I'm lazy.

This may be mostly my imagination, but I'm of the opinion that the metal temperature probe stuck in a large piece of meat will eventually transfer heat into the interior of the meat. It's not a lot, but over the course of 10-12 hour cook, it can make a difference. If you're only cooking one piece of meat, no problem. It just gets done a bit faster than it would otherwise. If, however, you're cooking multiple pieces, it can result in one being done well before its similarly sized brethren. For this reason I shy away from using the meat probe for the entire cook, instead going by time/feel and spot checks with an instant read thermometer. So the second probe on my Smoke likely won't get a lot of use unless I want to check the dome temp like I did yesterday or maybe monitor both grates when I'm cooking enough meat to employ the lower one.

I hadn't notice adverse effects to the one bottom vent approach either until yesterday. It was probably a perfect storm of conditions. One of the racks of ribs was significantly larger than the other two and it happened to be the one furthest from the one partially open bottom vent. Had I given any of this thought at the beginning of the cook I could have adjusted my technique to compensate, but it never occurred to me that an unbalanced fire would have that effect. The result was two racks that were more than a little overdone. Definitely wouldn't have won any competitions with those. Still tasted good though.

Drifting a bit in this thread, but the probe transferring heat has me now wondering if big pieces like pork shoulder could be made to finish a bit faster without significantly altering the results by running a long metal skewer through them. I would think on a really long cook like that you could maybe trim an hour or more from the total time.
 
JayHeyl said:
..instead going by time/feel and spot checks...
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I'm inclined to feel our methods are derivatives of our personalities and/or fields of expertise (if such theory can be applied to our cooks). I prefer a probe in my meat so that I can monitor its temperature and not pull the lid unnecessarily prior to feeling for doneness; you [sometimes] don't want the conductive property of the probe to influence surrounding meat temps. I monitor my grate temp; you monitor grate and dome. I increase my pit temp to speed-up the cook; you may experiment by piercing your meat with a skewer. In general, I apply the kiss mentality; you seemingly scrutinize many facets of the process. If we each enjoy our own methods then we both are good to go. As a side note, I do believe two identically-sized cuts of meat will most likely finish at different lengths of time with or without an internal conductor.
 
I you really want to confuse yourself, get a iGrill2 -- you can connect up to 4 probes. Couple of things: Thermapen stuff is pretty good. The probes are likely accurate. In that past I have questioned the accuracy of a number of my probes, so I tested them with boiling water. All were accurate ±2 degrees. The actual issues have always been elsewhere. As far as placement is concerned, the only thing that matters is that your are consistent in where you put it. Don't fuss too much. The phrase "Close enough for barbecue" is a truism. Experience is the best teacher. I've cooked a lot, but I still don't feel like I know all that much. Have some fun.

Heff
 
I used to drive myself absolutely bonkers fiddling with vents over 5 degree differences. That was ok on my offset, where it would react to a vent change almost immediately. The WSM because of its vertical configuration takes longer to respond to vent changes in my opinion. It's always drifting up or down. I just try to get it balanced and if its sitting at 240 when I wanna run 225, I just leave it. There is such a thing as too much information. The thermoworks stuff takes some getting used to because it is so fast and accurate. You will think something is wrong if you are used to slower thermometers. I think there's a switch to turn off the extra decimal places, and that might help some people.
 
I'm with Dustin, I have a maverick that I liked but got tired of messing around chasing the temp, now I used a thermometer thru the top vent and if it settles in a little more or less than what I thought I wanted , I let it ride there.
 
Dustin Dorsey said:
... if its sitting at 240 when I wanna run 225, I just leave it.
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Dustin has the hang of it. The way I start a fire and fiddle with things, my WSM seems to like to cook at 245, give or take. I have given up trying to bend it to my will. The Minion Method will produce some temperature drift as the fire spreads through the chamber, but again, it's futile trying to fight the small ups and downs -- you usually end up just creating bigger ups and downs.

Jeff
 
I have enough experience with the WSM to know better than to chase precise temps. That way lies madness. If I want 225F and it's at 240F, I'll maybe give one vent a very slight adjustment, but I'm not going to get really concerned. And I know any change in pit temp is going to happen long after I make an adjustment. Sometimes it just seems to want to stay at 240F the whole time. If that's the case, I can live with it. 15F isn't going to make that much difference in the final product. It's a bit like herding sheep. You're never going to get them into a straight line. If you can keep them heading in the general direction you want, you're doing fine.

No, achieving or maintaining a precise temp isn't my concern. I mentioned the swings mostly out of concern that my Smoke might not be working properly. I'm actually more worried about heat imbalance that results in the meat on one side cooking at a much higher temp than that on the other side. That's what seemed to happen this time when I had just one bottom vent partially open and the other two closed. I'm sure it's happened every time, I just didn't know about it. So in the future I'll try to keep all the bottom vents at least cracked open unless I really want a directional fire.

I don't think I mentioned this previously, but toward the end of the cook I used one of the meat probes through the grommet to measure air temp. The longer probe got the tip with the sensor further away from the hot air coming up the side of the WSM. As long as the probe doesn't touch any of the meat, this seems a simple way to get the sensor well toward the middle of the pit and not have a lot of trouble with feeding stuff through the grommet. The probe easily slid through the small hole and stayed in place. I checked the inside after the cook and the probe was almost perfectly parallel to the top grate. Of course, if you only have the one meat probe and want to use it for reading the meat temp, this won't help you much.
 
JayHeyl said:
I used one of the meat probes through the grommet to measure air temp. The longer probe got the tip with the sensor further away from the hot air coming up the side of the WSM. As long as the probe doesn't touch any of the meat, this seems a simple way to get the sensor well toward the middle of the pit and not have a lot of trouble with feeding stuff through the grommet.
Click to expand...

I did that once. Unfortunately when I turned the meat (ribs, I think) some meat juice dripped onto the probe. The temp went crazy and it took me the rest of the cook to discover what happened.

Jeff
 
All I really need is my dome thermometer and an instant read. I use the Maverick because it's neat watching a game and seeing what's going on inside my pit.
 
When I got my first maverick I chased temps all over the place. When the cook was done I felt like I had run a marathon. Now if it's in 15 -20 degrees either way.... well good enough will have to do. Coals lighting, burning out, wood starting to smolder or burning out, wind direction, wind speed, all of those will cause temperature variations. Don't worry about it or your beer will get warm while you're adjusting vents every five minutes.
 
Rich, those are words of wisdom which many people need to heed!
The tail chasing of the elusive five degree perfect temperature will drive some folks crazy but, as you say, it does keep them from their beer.
 
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