Controlling heat on MES

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joedirt27

Newbie
Original poster
Mar 28, 2015
5
10
Southeast michigan
Hello all! Newbie here. So I bought the propane 40" and am having some troubles maintaining temperature. Have read a few of the older posts and tried most things with no luck. Anybody else having these problems? Anybody with any input? Thank you all in advance for any help
 
First, to avoid confusion "MES" typically refers to Masterbuilt Electric Smoker and I see you have a propane.

Second, can you provide more info to better assist in getting an answer. for instance, what temp are you trying to run and what is actually happening? Are you using a secondary thermometer to check temps or going off the built in thermo?
 
I'm trying to maintain around 120,doing some bacon. Temp will be stable around 125 for 30-45 minutes and then jumps up to 150ish all of a sudden. No flare ups to speak of. The propane part is new to me and I know there's a learning curve. But help is more than welcome!
 
120 is going to be hard to do using propane as your heat source. The flame is going to constantly burn putting out heat as opposed to an electric smoker that cycles on and off as needed to maintain temps.

I have only used a vertical propane smoker a handful of times and never at low temps. Hopefully someone who has will chime in.
 
Thank you very much for your input. I've had a electric for years and got this as a gift. Holding temp at 130 for about a hour now, leaving a crack in the door and soaking the chips for about two hours and putting them in a foul pouch has helped with the heat spikes
 
You can get more flame control by installing a needle valve regulator. But i'm afraid that trying to keep temps that low you will get the flame blown out by the slightest breeze.
 
Where would I find one of these? Don't run it this low often unless doing fish or bacon which is only a couple times a year. Most of the time I think I'll be fine with temps. The foil made a huge difference in the temp and the smoke quality coming from the smoker. Once again thank you for the help!
 
soaking the chips for about two hours and putting them in a foul pouch has helped with the heat spikes
I would not soak the chips for low temps. It will take a long time for them to steam off the water before they actually start smoking.

I have seen some people put frozen bottles of water in their smokers to help drop the chamber temp.
 
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