Help -- Analog MES 30 questions

Hello People of SMF. Sorry for the lapse in postings...been busy.

OK, so I switched to wood chunks to see what happens and YES, I definitely get smoke. But I still can't get smoke at low temps.

Here's what I've been doing (remember, she's an analog).....I pre-heat the MES (with water in the pan, without, with sand, etc...doesn't seem to matter) on HIGH until I get the thing smoking. Internal temps have gone over 400, but normally it's around 350 (with no protein in it).

But now I have to get my temp down. I turn the knob to LOW....and the power light now goes off. Which I understand; the smoker thinks, correctly, that the unit is too hot.

Here's the rub: With the power set to LOW and the MES toggling power on and off to maintain that LOW setting, the MES won't produce enough heat to combust the wood. I think it's taking too long to drop the temp, and the wood stops smoking from the element being off for too long.

Do any of you guys have a good method for dropping the heat in your MES, without losing the combustion powers of the heating element?? Or maybe you guys don't preheat it on HIGH....maybe medium to get the smoke rollin'.

Thanks as always!

mike

Sadler, that thing looks SICK! You power sand it??

And yeah, I've now worked with my MES30 enough now that I get consistent results. It just takes a little bit more baby-sitting then what I was planning on. A AMZNPS is definitely on my want list.

sadler850 said:

 
Here is what it looked like before and after Primed.

Yes, I power sanded, primed, and painted it with 900 degree caliper paint.

Click to expand...

Add that to my to-do list as well.....custom MES! Nice work