New MES Bluetooth Digital smoker

I would get the Sams model + 3 year squaretrade warranty for $360.  Seems like a good deal to me.  However, I didnt want to bother with cleaning the window so I went with the Cabelas model.  It was $350 last week and has a 1 year warranty (and you can get it lower with discount gift cards / coupons).  Very energy efficient too.  I dont think I will ever used all 6 racks but the options are great to have (prob placement etc).  The summer is nearly over.  Get smoking!

VFL57 said:

Thank you for your insight. I'm not sure which 40 inch smoker to get- the 6 rack or 4 rack. I know Sams Club has the bluetooth 4 rack with the black coating on the outside for $329 which is over $100 cheaper than what Bass Pro has but bass pro says it's stainless and has 6 racks. The thing I want to know is if Sams Clubs is just cheaply built and if there are any reasons not to get the Sams Club model, or if it's just a really good deal. I also would like to know if the 6 rack and 4 rack models have the same cooking space and just less room inbetween racks on the 6 rack model, or if the 6 rack model is actually bigger and can cook more food. As far as weights and sizes of meats go I typically buy my meats at Sams Club but don't really know off the top of my head what they typically weight. For the ribs I'm either doing spare ribs or St. Louis or maybe a combination of each. It really depends what I can find on sale. As far as the cooking temps I'm a beginner and have to learn that because I have no clue and haven't had a chance yet to look for advice on that yet on this forum. I don't even know what the temp should be. The more and more I think of it though I might be better off getting 2 MES 40's and use one for the ribs and one for the butts or whichever meats I decide to do since the cooking times will be different. I plan on serving everything at the same time and shredding the butts and doing pulled pork sandwichs. Thanks for the cooler tip. Would I be better off shredding the pork right after it comes off the snoker and put it in an aluminum tin with foil over it or is it better to wrap the butts whole until I am ready to serve and just shred right before serving? As far as wood chips go I plan on getting an AMNPS and using the pellets. If I have an AMNPS do I have to use wood chips at all during the process, or are just the pellets ok? Sorry for all the questions like I said this is all very new to me but I'm excited to learn and hopefully make great food! Thanks again!

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Get the one at Sams. A 3 year warranty there is $30 and since Masterbuilt only offers a 90 day warranty, I would get the Sams 3 year warranty as that only amounts to $10 per year. Also the one at Sams comes with legs and rollers on the  legs which is another $50 value and the one at Bass Pro doesn't have this feature.

The two Smokers are idential same size inside and out with the difference being that the one at Bass Pro has 6 shelves and less space between shelves. 

Brickguy221 said:

Get the one at Sams. A 3 year warranty there is $30 and since Masterbuilt only offers a 90 day warranty, I would get the Sams 3 year warranty as that only amounts to $10 per year. Also the one at Sams comes with legs and rollers on the  legs which is another $50 value and the one at Bass Pro doesn't have this feature.

The two Smokers are idential same size inside and out with the difference being that the one at Bass Pro has 6 shelves and less space between shelves. 

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Thank you! That's exactly what I wanted to hear because I'll most likely buying 2 of them and didn't want to spend the extra money at Bass Pro if the one at Sams was the same size.

mummel said:

I would get the Sams model + 3 year squaretrade warranty for $360.  Seems like a good deal to me.  However, I didnt want to bother with cleaning the window so I went with the Cabelas model.  It was $350 last week and has a 1 year warranty (and you can get it lower with discount gift cards / coupons).  Very energy efficient too.  I dont think I will ever used all 6 racks but the options are great to have (prob placement etc).  The summer is nearly over.  Get smoking!

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Thanks for the insight. Speaking of probes do you guys recommend a certain one? I saw mention of the Maverick 733. Is that the one I should get or would I be better off with something else? Also if I get 2 MES 40's that means I also have to get two seperate probes as well right? Thanks again for everyones help I really appreciate it!

VFL57 said:

Thank you for your insight. I'm not sure which 40 inch smoker to get- the 6 rack or 4 rack. I know Sams Club has the bluetooth 4 rack with the black coating on the outside for $329 which is over $100 cheaper than what Bass Pro has but bass pro says it's stainless and has 6 racks. The thing I want to know is if Sams Clubs is just cheaply built and if there are any reasons not to get the Sams Club model, or if it's just a really good deal. I also would like to know if the 6 rack and 4 rack models have the same cooking space and just less room inbetween racks on the 6 rack model, or if the 6 rack model is actually bigger and can cook more food. As far as weights and sizes of meats go I typically buy my meats at Sams Club but don't really know off the top of my head what they typically weight. For the ribs I'm either doing spare ribs or St. Louis or maybe a combination of each. It really depends what I can find on sale. As far as the cooking temps I'm a beginner and have to learn that because I have no clue and haven't had a chance yet to look for advice on that yet on this forum. I don't even know what the temp should be. The more and more I think of it though I might be better off getting 2 MES 40's and use one for the ribs and one for the butts or whichever meats I decide to do since the cooking times will be different. I plan on serving everything at the same time and shredding the butts and doing pulled pork sandwichs. Thanks for the cooler tip. Would I be better off shredding the pork right after it comes off the snoker and put it in an aluminum tin with foil over it or is it better to wrap the butts whole until I am ready to serve and just shred right before serving? As far as wood chips go I plan on getting an AMNPS and using the pellets. If I have an AMNPS do I have to use wood chips at all during the process, or are just the pellets ok? Sorry for all the questions like I said this is all very new to me but I'm excited to learn and hopefully make great food! Thanks again!

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The best source to ask about Sam's Club and Bass Pro MES models would be @Bearcarver here on SMF. He has posted that many problems with MES smokers seemed to come from users who bought that at Sam's Club during a certain period of time. This preceded when I joined SMF.

My own bias is to not buy from Sam's Club but that is a good deal on a MES 40 BT model. It only has 4 racks but it does come with the optional legs. For $150 more you could buy the Bass Pro model with no legs but with 6 racks. More racks give you more flexibility but only if you will regularly smoke large batches of meats. If you buy your smoker without legs or a stand your choice is to either kneel down to futz around inside the smoker or to buy the legs or a stand or use something you already have to sit your smoker atop of. I use an old children's card activity table for mine. I have a MES 30 but if you have the funds definitely go for the 40".

As for build quality, my understanding is that MES smokers are built in several different Chinese plants with varying degrees of quality control. There are always good and bad batches coming out of any Chinese factory so sometimes the quality of the product you receive can depend on the luck of the draw. However, Masterbuilt does provide very good customer service.

I recommend that if you're just starting out, buy ribs of the same type: all spareribs or baby backs or St. Louis. Different cuts of ribs cook differently and your goal is to have all racks finish with the same quality of smoke, taste and doneness at the same time. Other guys may disagree with me but that's my opinion based on baby backs and spareribs/St. Louis (St. Louis style is just trimmed spareribs) come from different parts of the pig.

You really have enough money to buy TWO MES 40s? Quite a few guys have 2 or 3 MES's. But if you plan to do both butts and ribs in the same smoker, you place the butts inside very early in the morning to finish by your planned dinner time. You would put the ribs in about 4-5 hours before dinner so that they and the butts finish at the same time. For pulled pork, you let it rest for 30 minutes wrapped in foil or in a cooler and then pull the meat apart. Here's an article on one cook's method: http://amazingribs.com/recipes/porknography/perfect_pulled_pork.html

From what I've read the AMNPS will work fine in the MES 40 BT. You don't need to use wood chips if you're using wood pellets. However, for one smoke I used both. I was smoking some baby backs and I wanted to try mixing pecan and apple woods. I had apple wood pellets but only pecan wood chips so I used the AMNPS and loaded the pecan wood chips into the wood chip holder in my MES 30 Gen 1. Honestly, I really couldn't tell any taste difference but the ribs came out tasting very good. Since that time I've ordered every wood pellet variety that I think I'll need from Todd Johnson at http://www.amazenproducts.com/. The quality of all the products he sells is outstanding and he provides among the best customer service it's been my pleasure to receive.

VFL57, I understand that the bad ones from Sams were Generarion 1 Smokers and the incident that was mentioned in another post happened a few years back. So far, it seems most everyone loves the new Bluetooth Smokers from Sams, including myself.

As for the 6 shelves that the ones at Bass Pro has, it is very-very rare that anyone needs or uses 6 shelves plus there is less space between the shelves on those Smokers. 

If you buy 2 smoker from Bass Pro, you will be spending $150 more each, for a total of $300 more if you want legs with rollers so that you don't have to get down on your knees to put food in and out of the smoker as well as any cleaning of it you might do. The beauty of having the Smoker on legs and rollers is that you can easily move it around whereas if placed on tables or boxes or etc, you can't easily move it around. Personaly, it doesn't matter to me which you buy as it isn't my money, so I  am just throwing some things out there for you to think about before you buy a Smoker.

Brickguy221 said:

 
VFL57, I understand that the bad ones from Sams were Generarion 1 Smokers and the incident that was mentioned in another post happened a few years back. So far, it seems most everyone loves the new Bluetooth Smokers from Sams, including myself.

As for the 6 shelves that the ones at Bass Pro has, it is very-very rare that anyone needs or uses 6 shelves plus there is less space between the shelves on those Smokers. 

If you buy 2 smoker from Bass Pro, you will be spending $150 more each, for a total of $300 more if you want legs with rollers so that you don't have to get down on your knees to put food in and out of the smoker as well as any cleaning of it you might do. The beauty of having the Smoker on legs and rollers is that you can easily move it around whereas if placed on tables or boxes or etc, you can't easily move it around. Personaly, it doesn't matter to me which you buy as it isn't my money, so I  am just throwing some things out there for you to think about before you buy a Smoker.

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Thanks for giving more info on those defective MES smokers, Brickguy221. I also agree that 4 racks are enough but for some guys more and bigger is better so who am I to argue? But I only use 3 of my 4 racks anyway and have never needed to use more. Had I known about the optional legs when I bought my smoker I would have added it to my purchase. But as I said I've got that small table which suits my needs. As for the guys who own 2-3 Masterbuilts, typically they started with the MES 30 Gen 1 and then upgraded to newer models while keeping their old ones.

I purchased my 2.5 MES 40 in smoker from Bass Pro. It comes with 2 back wheels and a handle, but no legs. I think the Sam's Club one has the 10 in legs and back wheels. When I purchased mine, my local Sam's Club did not have them in stock yet. So...I opted to add the Masterbuilt 18 in stand and I mounted the smoker on it, and also installed 4 casters to be able to move it anywhere in my backyard.
1. I like the 40!in model, even though I would probably never use the 6 racks at the same time. (Not that much space between if all 6 in there).
2. I probably would have purchased it at Sam's if available - and less expensive.
3. I like the mobility I have with the stand and wheels, although it was a pain you know where for this old man to install the casters.
Dennis

dennispfaff said:

I purchased my 2.5 MES 40 in smoker from Bass Pro. It comes with 2 back wheels and a handle, but no legs. I think the Sam's Club one has the 10 in legs and back wheels. When I purchased mine, my local Sam's Club did not have them in stock yet. So...I opted to add the Masterbuilt 18 in stand and I mounted the smoker on it, and also installed 4 casters to be able to move it anywhere in my backyard.
1. I like the 40!in model, even though I would probably never use the 6 racks at the same time. (Not that much space between if all 6 in there).
2. I probably would have purchased it at Sam's if available - and less expensive.
3. I like the mobility I have with the stand and wheels, although it was a pain you know where for this old man to install the casters.
Dennis

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• dennispfaff
• Aug 6, 2015

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I have 2 Smokers ... an old 40" Generation 2.0 that I am going to sell as soon as the weather cools enough to clean it up (heat index currently 105 to 110 every day)  and a new 40" Bluetooth 2.5.

My old Generation 2.0 is mounted on a stand like Dennis shows above and I too installed 4 casters like he did. As soon as I get the old Generation 2.0 cleaned up, I plan to mount my new Bluetooth on the stand it sits on and take the legs from the Bluetooth and mount them on my old Generation 2.0.

Thanks for all the advice guys. I'm definately going to get the one from Sams Club. I really don't have the extra cash to get 2, but I'm having a big party with 75 people or more that I will have to feed and I just don't think a single MES 40 would be able to hold enough food that I have to cook for it. Maybe I'm underestimating the food it'll hold though. If I get two I would definately hope I would be able to fit it all though. The other thing is I was looking at other types of smokers before seeing this thread about the MES 40 and all the smokers I liked were all even more expensive than 2 MES 40's combined so not only would I be getting 2 smokers I'd be saving money by getting the MES 40s opposed to the other smokers I was looking at.
Does anyone have any suggestions on which probe or meat thermometer I should get? I saw mention of the Maverick 733 earlier in the thread but that was it. Also what are the best pellet flavors to use for boston butts and ribs? Do I mix different flavors together in the AMPNS or stick to one flavor at once? Sorry if these questions are stupid like I said I'm brand new to the smoking world and I want to learn as much as I can. Thanks again!

I would recommend the 733.and any flavor pellet will be fine. It's just a matter of personal preference

For the guys that own the new MES 40 BT & AMPS, you may want to cast your vote here:

http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/232596/any-issues-with-your-mes-40-bt-amps#post_1446214

I picked up 1 MES 49 from Sams today. I'm going to get another one tomorrow. I have a few gift cards that I didn't know what to do with and Sams Club said they would accept them so it works out great for me. I also ordered 2 AMNPS's from Todd as well as some pellets. I found a cheap heat gun on amazon after watching a video on this forum about how to light the AMNPS and keep it lit and I also bought 2 smoker covers I found really cheap, 2 Maverick 733's, a pair of silicone heat resistant gloves, and a set of bear claws. Amazon also is giving me 6 months to pay it off with no interest so that's nice and the total was about $200 with most of it coming from the Mavericks. I know I need to get a self igniting propane torch and I'll get one of those at Lowes or Home Depot because they were cheaper there than on Amazon. Is there anything else you guys can think of that I'll need? Also do you have to "season" the smoker before its first use and if so what do I need to do? Thanks guys!

VFL57 said:

I picked up 1 MES 49 from Sams today. I'm going to get another one tomorrow. I have a few gift cards that I didn't know what to do with and Sams Club said they would accept them so it works out great for me. I also ordered 2 AMNPS's from Todd as well as some pellets. I found a cheap heat gun on amazon after watching a video on this forum about how to light the AMNPS and keep it lit and I also bought 2 smoker covers I found really cheap, 2 Maverick 733's, a pair of silicone heat resistant gloves, and a set of bear claws. Amazon also is giving me 6 months to pay it off with no interest so that's nice and the total was about $200 with most of it coming from the Mavericks. I know I need to get a self igniting propane torch and I'll get one of those at Lowes or Home Depot because they were cheaper there than on Amazon. Is there anything else you guys can think of that I'll need? Also do you have to "season" the smoker before its first use and if so what do I need to do? Thanks guys!

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Wow!!---Sounds like you're Jumping in with bot feet.

As for seasoning an MES, I would just follow the short instructions in the owners' manual. Nothing to it. No need to spray anything in it.

Since you're going to be using MES units, here are a bunch of things you can do in Step by Step form:

Just click on "Bear's Step by Steps".

Bear

VFL57 said:

I picked up 1 MES 49 from Sams today. I'm going to get another one tomorrow. I have a few gift cards that I didn't know what to do with and Sams Club said they would accept them so it works out great for me. I also ordered 2 AMNPS's from Todd as well as some pellets. I found a cheap heat gun on amazon after watching a video on this forum about how to light the AMNPS and keep it lit and I also bought 2 smoker covers I found really cheap, 2 Maverick 733's, a pair of silicone heat resistant gloves, and a set of bear claws. Amazon also is giving me 6 months to pay it off with no interest so that's nice and the total was about $200 with most of it coming from the Mavericks. I know I need to get a self igniting propane torch and I'll get one of those at Lowes or Home Depot because they were cheaper there than on Amazon. Is there anything else you guys can think of that I'll need? Also do you have to "season" the smoker before its first use and if so what do I need to do? Thanks guys!

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Good choice. I assume you meant the MES 40 in Bluetooth model. As far as the torch, I recommend the "Bernzomatic TS8000KC Premium Torch". It sells for $49.97 at Home Depot, and refill tanks are $9.95.
Dennis

dennispfaff said:

Good choice. I assume you meant the MES 40 in Bluetooth model. As far as the torch, I recommend the "Bernzomatic TS8000KC Premium Torch". It sells for $49.97 at Home Depot, and refill tanks are $9.95.
Dennis

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I use basically the same head, but I use the Green or Blue tank---Not the Map gas.

Also---I like to use the Fatboy tanks, because they don't fall over easily when I stand my torch on my porch railing.

Bear

I'm throwing this in the thread in case you are on the fence about buying a new MES with or without the legs or a stand. You can make one cheap with just a couples pieces of aluminum channel, aluminum plate with hole, a welder & old crawfish boiling pot & your good. I looked at the stands by MB they looked thin & wobbly & we're still short but I'm also 6'2". I had enough of the leakage from the undersized drip tray so I drilled a hole in the pan made some indentations to create a funnel affect then put the pot underneath to catch the dripping without anymore overflow. Little Velcro strips some black skirting problem solved. Except my 40' 2nd g just took a crap so like many I'm researching on where to waste my money next. I'm hoping the newer boxes are the same dimensions. And for a cover I ordered one off Amazon that was from MB but only $20 & it fit fine & protected my unit decently under full oversized porches. It's thin material but works.

dennispfaff said:

Good choice. I assume you meant the MES 40 in Bluetooth model. As far as the torch, I recommend the "Bernzomatic TS8000KC Premium Torch". It sells for $49.97 at Home Depot, and refill tanks are $9.95.
Dennis

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I guess I am a "cheapie" ... lol 

I bought this "cheapie torch" at Home Depot and it has worked great for me so far 

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Bernzomatic-ST2200T-Butane-Micro-Torch-330194/100564678

Bearcarver said:

Wow!!---Sounds like you're Jumping in with bot feet.

As for seasoning an MES, I would just follow the short instructions in the owners' manual. Nothing to it. No need to spray anything in it.

Since you're going to be using MES units, here are a bunch of things you can do in Step by Step form:

Just click on "Bear's Step by Steps".


Bear

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Thanks I appreciate that!

dennispfaff said:

Good choice. I assume you meant the MES 40 in Bluetooth model. As far as the torch, I recommend the "Bernzomatic TS8000KC Premium Torch". It sells for $49.97 at Home Depot, and refill tanks are $9.95.
Dennis

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Thanks I'll definately check it out!