So I want to give a personal experience review of my
Masterbuilt gravity 800. I’ve seen a lot of up-and-down reviews of this smoker, and I have to say I’m kind of confused at peoples results. I’ve had mine for about a year and a half. And I use it frequently. I will say that what made me choose it was I needed a bigger smoker and the price I got it for was absolutely amazing, I had a small, electric master built chest style smoker, which I hated because of temperature inconsistency.
So end of season for grills and outdoor stuff. Walmart had all of the smokers and grills on clearance. On the website, not so much. But in store they were marked down amazingly. Now most of you know they are like $800 smokers. They had it on clearance for $220. The only one they had left, however, was a floor model, and it was missing the griddle. It had everything else. And it was already assembled. (Huge plus in my book.) I talked to the associate and with it being a Floor model and missing the griddle. I ended up getting it for $78 after tax. I’m not kidding. It was the best deal I think I’ve ever gotten on anything.
So now about the smoker itself. It did take a little bit of getting used to simply because I’ve really only ever grilled on charcoal and propane. Mostly propane. I watched several YouTube videos on how to appropriately use it and best practices. One thing I noticed is that you lose a lot of smoke out of the gravity chimney where you put the charcoal. On one of the videos I watched there was a guy that put a small metal plate over the opening before putting the lid down over it. Fixed it no problem. I don’t have the metal plate so I used six layers of aluminum foil. I have no smoke leak anymore at all. (I have never replaced the aluminum foil.) Next I noticed that I got a lot of smoke, exiting the cooking area around the sides. You should lose some smoke out the back, but not all the way around. Kind of defeats, the purpose of trying to smoke meat. I found a roll of felt stripping with adhesive on the back that is meant for high temperature use on grills. So I put it down both sides and around the front. That solved that problem and have had no issues with it melting or anything of that nature. So now that the wasted smoke is all taken care of I can say that I have had no issues cooking on it. It keeps a very even temperature and I have never had a flareup. When smoking, I use the tent, heat distribution plate instead of the wide-open one. I think that it separates the heat better and there’s no direct heat coming out for flareups. I have smoked whole chickens, sausage, baby, back ribs, spare ribs, and brisket. Everything comes out juicy and wonderful. (still working on the brisket.) If you have to add additional charcoal to the chimney then the only thing I would tell you is make sure the bottom door is closed as well as the grill area. Open it add your charcoal and close it. Don’t waste time. Occasionally you’re gonna want to put more wood in the ash collection bin. Once again, keep everything closed and open it put your wooden and close it quickly. Don’t waste a bunch of time. Your temperature will stay even. I have cooked hamburgers and steaks on it at high temperature. Roughly 500° to 700°. I really haven’t had any issues there either. I do have a propane/charcoal grill that I use. It has two lids. One side is propane and one side is charcoal. I typically do use that on my quick cooks just simply because it’s easier. Now regardless of the price that I paid for it, I love this smoker. Did I get a “smokin” deal? Yes I did. But that doesn’t influence how well it works. And I have no issues with the contact button things either.
Remember, this is just my experience. Everybody has their own experience and opinion. This is simply mine.
