Upgrading my thermometers not sure which way to go first

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flyinion

Smoke Blower
Original poster
Jul 9, 2012
117
12
Sacramento, CA
So, right now I use a combo (depending on what/how much meat I'm doing) of ET-73 from Maverick with usually just the air probe (the meat probe has given me really weird results even though it's accurate in an ice water test, I think the sensor sits too high in the housing) and some "standard" Oneida digital probes.  I think the air probe on the maverick is maybe 5 degrees high at times but I'm not sure.  I think the little metal clip heats it up a bit sometimes even though I have the probe pushed all the way through nearly.  

Anyway, so I've been wanting to "upgrade" to some thermapen products.  I've been thinking about doing a standard thermapen first, but I also want to do one of their dual probe "BBQ kits" that they have (not decided which combo to go with yet as far as armored vs. non-armored for the meat probe).  What do you think?  I was thinking with having decent meat probes at the moment to go for the thermapen itself just because for things that I don't want to put a probe in right away like Tri-Tip I can get accurate temps FAST.  The air temp on the Maverick might run a bit off but I think it's "close enough" to not worry about.  The thermapen would also be REALLY useful immediately for grilling.  What do you guys think?
 
Both styles have different uses. The maverick lets you monitor your food and smoker temp without opening the door, a running temp. The thermapen is instant temp. It is very handy for checking sausages when you have many hanging or different ends of a brisket. Like you said it is very handy for grilling. Both styles have their uses.

I have the Maverick 73 and the 732. I like the 732 much better because of the range and the dual probes.   
 
Thanks guys.  I think I'm going to go ahead and grab a thermapen first and then upgrade my Maverick.  I've never been totally happy with the ET-73 (yeah I know probably should have gone ET-732 oh well).  Mostly because the food probe has given some really unexpected readings, as mentioned I think due to the location of the sensor in the housing.  Oooo, I just found that bluetooth one.  Oh man I have to have that lol.  Thermoworks accuracy & speed and now with wireless.  Looks like it also works with android which is good since I'm running android stuff right now.
 
The bluetooth probe seems to only serve a purpose if you are in the restaurant biz.  The probe is not meant to be left in food/smoker during the cook.  I wish thermoworks would develop a unit similar  to the mav 732.
 
The BlueTherm Duo is a professional instrument designed for commercial applications but can be easily used in home or backyard settings for sophisticated and convenient temperature monitoring and recording.
 
Thanks for that as i was looking at a different instrument.  This was the unit i was referring to http://www.thermoworks.com/products/logger/bluetherm_bluetooth_probe.html   The unit you linked looks nice but for that money you would be better off investing in a pid setup imo.
Oh hmm didn't think about that.  Actually I forgot about those.  I think I had been looking at the Stoker units last year and yeah for about $130 more I could get the basic kit for that.   So I'll get the regular thermapen for sure and then maybe something like http://www.thermoworks.com/products/handheld/TW8060.html  if I'm not ready to jump into an automatic setup (though that would be great for sure).
 
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