I hope this is the right place to post this, if not, could one of the mods be kind enough to put it in the proper spot.
I'm writing this mostly to give answers to questions that I've been asking over the years. I'm an American living in Japan, got into smoking about five or six years ago, and I've always struggled to find information about things that are available here, and whether it's worth it to invest in importing equipment from the states.
So after a year or two of my DIY flowerpot smoker, which worked... so-so at best, I got an ECB, but Japanese charcoal is made with a different cooking style than the stuff available in the US. This fall, I finally found an digital MES-30 #20071117.
Japan runs on 100v A/C electricity, not 120 like in the US, so I was concerned that I might need to buy a power converter. I'm in Osaka, which, along with the rest of western Japan, runs on 60hz, while Tokyo and the north run on 50hz, so I don't know if this information will hold up there.
Got the smoker, plugged it in using a 1500w, 125v, 15amp non-grounded (two prong) extension cord. Grounded (3 prong) cords are generally not available here, and all the tools in the hardware store, from hammer drills to table saws, seemed to have two prong plugs. It powered up and I was able to set the time and temp according to the directions. With no water in the pan, I put one probe of my Maverick thermometer in through the top smoke vent, about even with the top rack, left the other hanging off the balcony rail, and set the smoker to 275F (maximum). The Maverick read an outside air temperature of about 58F, and the smoker was able to achieve its maximum temperature in under 30 minutes (I wandered off and watched TV, but remembered to check at about the half hour mark).
The smoker's thermometer indicated 275, once popping up to 279, but the Maverick was running about 20-25 degrees higher, at one point going up to 306. While an accurate reading would be better, this indicates that the lower voltage in western Japan isn't a problem for this machine.
Once the first couple hours of break-in were done, I filled the chip loader with half a cup of dry hickory, per instructions. It took quite some time for the chips to begin to smoke, I'd estimate around 15 minutes. These were the larger, US-sized chips, not the tiny ones sold in most Japanese home centers for stovetop smoking. When I later cooked with the smoker, I had trouble getting smoke at 225, but that's for another thread.
Bottom line: If you're in western Japan and thinking about ordering or bringing an electric smoker from the US, it will probably work. Of course, you'll pay between 50% extra to double the US store price when your shipping is figured in, but that's one of the many decisions we have to make out here.
Hope this helps, please let me know if you have any questions and I'll do my best to answer them honestly.
-val
I'm writing this mostly to give answers to questions that I've been asking over the years. I'm an American living in Japan, got into smoking about five or six years ago, and I've always struggled to find information about things that are available here, and whether it's worth it to invest in importing equipment from the states.
So after a year or two of my DIY flowerpot smoker, which worked... so-so at best, I got an ECB, but Japanese charcoal is made with a different cooking style than the stuff available in the US. This fall, I finally found an digital MES-30 #20071117.
Japan runs on 100v A/C electricity, not 120 like in the US, so I was concerned that I might need to buy a power converter. I'm in Osaka, which, along with the rest of western Japan, runs on 60hz, while Tokyo and the north run on 50hz, so I don't know if this information will hold up there.
Got the smoker, plugged it in using a 1500w, 125v, 15amp non-grounded (two prong) extension cord. Grounded (3 prong) cords are generally not available here, and all the tools in the hardware store, from hammer drills to table saws, seemed to have two prong plugs. It powered up and I was able to set the time and temp according to the directions. With no water in the pan, I put one probe of my Maverick thermometer in through the top smoke vent, about even with the top rack, left the other hanging off the balcony rail, and set the smoker to 275F (maximum). The Maverick read an outside air temperature of about 58F, and the smoker was able to achieve its maximum temperature in under 30 minutes (I wandered off and watched TV, but remembered to check at about the half hour mark).
The smoker's thermometer indicated 275, once popping up to 279, but the Maverick was running about 20-25 degrees higher, at one point going up to 306. While an accurate reading would be better, this indicates that the lower voltage in western Japan isn't a problem for this machine.
Once the first couple hours of break-in were done, I filled the chip loader with half a cup of dry hickory, per instructions. It took quite some time for the chips to begin to smoke, I'd estimate around 15 minutes. These were the larger, US-sized chips, not the tiny ones sold in most Japanese home centers for stovetop smoking. When I later cooked with the smoker, I had trouble getting smoke at 225, but that's for another thread.
Bottom line: If you're in western Japan and thinking about ordering or bringing an electric smoker from the US, it will probably work. Of course, you'll pay between 50% extra to double the US store price when your shipping is figured in, but that's one of the many decisions we have to make out here.
Hope this helps, please let me know if you have any questions and I'll do my best to answer them honestly.
-val
