MES - Need More Smoke

Where are the 3 air intake holes located?

In the vent on top of the unit

OK. Am trying this now. Half full chips, vent wide open. Should the chip loader be in the load or dump position, or does it matter? How long should it take to get to ash? Temp is 225.

From the post above it should be in the dump position.

Sorry. So many posts I missed that.

Regarding the position of the chip tray loader, according to the MES Manual:



Air once it passes through the holes is available for combustion, it doesn't matter if the tray is up or down. However you might get slightly better combustion if needed with the tray in down, maybe because the combustion process draws some air, and obviously it has a more direct path with the tray down.

Personally I have always turn the loader back up. I think there is a safety issues here. I looked at the inside of my tray at the holes and there is quite a bit of what looks like carbon build up, yet there is nothing like that in the rounded bottom of the tray. So by turning the tray back up (rem the holes are mounted in high impact plastic), it may keep the heat from being too excessive and frying that plastic. I'm not sure. Obviously the Mfg / engineers felt it was important to turn the tray back up or they wouldn't have addressed it in the manual.

I have had mine for almost a month now and am going through the same smoke issues.

I have noticed that if I loaded up the tray I would actually get a decent fire inside the chip tray. Is this normal?

The ribs I did last weekend I tried leaving the loader in the unload position, and it seemed to work well. But to keep from having a small fire in the chip tray I tried using less wood each time I added. But then I would only get smoke for about 15 minutes.

If possible I would like to see pictures of how much smoke is coming out of peoples upper vents while smoking. I have been using apple and pecan with a sweet rub on the ribs and corn. But the corn always has more of a smokey flavor than the ribs.

Could that be because of the mild woods I am using? Or just not enough smoke??

Sorry.... I may have been passing on bad info. I've always left it in the unload position and had never encountered any problems.

Are you using a 30" or 40"?
Is yours with the new smaller smaller wood chip holder (not the loader) that the chips are dumped into?

It is hard for me to comment on the 30" since I only have a 20 month 40". From reading MES posts for almost 20 months, the most complaints about chips burning properly is with the 30". There is a lot of speculation as to why, one reason the heat element heats up the cabinet so fast the element does not stay on and keep the chips burning. I'm not sure that is the reason, 30" owners would know. It could be how close the chip holder tray is to the heat element. Mine is almost touching and the chip holder is warped from the heat.

Some possible solutions might be.
• Start with a few dry chips, if you preheated your MES you should have smoke in 2 to 3 minutes or less. When I say a few chips 6-10 small chips. Once the those chips are going wait about 5 minutes and add another small batch. In 20 minutes or so you will have a hot bed of chips and hot ash inside the chip holder tray. From that point on combustion shouldn't be a problem and you can add more like a half cup of chips. Personally I found in my MES the sweet spot is like 8 to 10 chips. Even if it is dark I can tell when the amount is right, the smoke smells great, it is sweet and no bitter smell, in the light it will be that TBS. Even if you decide to use soaked chips start the smoke with dry to get that hot bed of ash and chips. Wet chips usually only take another min. or two to start smoking. I switch to chunks after I get the chips going, no more than 2 or 3 chunks at a time. However chunks are not necessary, I use them to try and get an extra 20-30 min. of smoke time before adding more wood. Using 10 chips at a time I have to add chips every 30 min.

• Get a tin can and start a few briquettes, use 1 or 2 hot grey briquettes with the wood chips to get them going. Some MES owners swear by the use of briquettes, and say it adds a smoke ring on the meat as a bonus. I did the briquette thing for several months and the smoke ring only happened a couple of times, since I had no issue getting chips smoking I hardly use briquettes.

• Preheat your MES. Set the Controller to 270º and when it gets close start your smoke, quickly add the boiling water, add your meat, throw in the chips. That tray will be hot enough to start those chips for sure. Yes the manual says preheating isn't required.

How I got into preheating my MES. In the summer, temp recovery and getting up to temp hasn't really been an issue. When outdoor temps started dropping, the recovery times on the MES started increasing. But I noticed that after 3 or 4 hours in a smoke, recovery was always pretty fast 5 to 10 min. Even when the ambient outside was around 40º and once or twice colder (sacramento doesn't get below 40º very often). The only thing I could think of was all the metal was thoroughly heated, and the insulation was also storing heat. So during this time of year I preheat for at least 2 hours, and 45 min. to hour when the temps are warmer. I have kept notes and if I preheat to 260-270º , the temp drops to around 195-205º and 5 to 10 minutes later the temp as recovered to my desired 220-225º. If I only preheat to 225º depending on ambient, after meat is loaded the controller temp drops to 160-175º, it could take 1 to 2 hours to get to 225º.

PignIt, you didn't pass bad info, you just shared what you honestly been doing. And from all the posts I have read of yours it works fine, as you are turning out great Q. As I said keeping the chip loader in "unload" may provide better drafting which could result in better combustion, either "unload" or "load" position provides the necessary oxygen. (When I start a fire in my fire place *has insert, and I put the kindling down, I start with 2 large pieces one on each side the kindling pile in the direction of the door to the exhaust, instead of across the opening, which I use to pile the bigger stuff on once the kindling is going good and strong. If I put those 2 pieces one in front of the kindling pile and other in back, it blocks the air flow, yes it will burn if everything is dry, but it takes longer. I hope this isn't confusing.)

I just got the new 40" from Sams's Club.

I will try preheating and see how that works for me. I am looking for somewhere to get chunks locally (Anaheim, CA) to give them a try and see what happens.

The last smoke I did the chips had no problrm starting, I was just worried about the fire in the chip tray.

Thanks for the info.....

Just use less chips or soak them first, plus turn the load handle to "load", should solve the problem. It is truly amazing how little chips are necessary to produce the necessary smoke to properly flavor meat inside an MES.

I just got the 40" model and smoked some ribs.  They turned out good but it seemed there was not smoke hardly.  I kept adding chips and after the 4th time I looked in the box and there were big black chunks in there like they did not burn all the way.  S I emptied it and added more.  Shouldn't it be all burned to ashes?    So if I set the temp to 225 and the temp hits 225 the light goes off.  Does this mean the burner shuts off also so then the chips wiil not burn and I would not get any smoke?  This is what seems is hppening.  So how is it going to smoke if the temp is at 225 or above and the element is turning off?  Just trying to understand how this thing works.  

Thanks,  there is a lot of good info here.   Greg

So I am having this problem also. I am set-up correctly with the tray, pre-heated, using dry chips and still no smoke. If I put a small blower outside than i do get a nice smoke but it is not what I would call TBS. I put a Butane torch inside the chamber from the chip tube and as soon as it gets in it goes out due to lack of oxygen. I do not want to have to set a blower outside for a smoke but there is no oxygen in the chamber at all. Thoughts?

UPDATE:

Just got off the phone with Masterbuilt and got pretty much the same answers as everyone else. She told me my unit was doing exactly what it was supposed to do and that it was supposed to be more of a steam than a smoke. I asked her why they called it a smoker than and told her if I wanted steamed for I would have bought a crockpot. She said that it was supposed to created blackened chips and not create ash. She also said to empty the chipbox prior to loading new chips. i questioned her as to if that defeated the purpose of having the chip tube and she said that the tube and loader was only to provide the correct amount of chips. Getting a little frustrated here as I do not want a high priced smoker and could have got a WSM for not much more.

Start with just a few chips and preheat it to 270*.  10-15 mins after it's going add a few more chips.  Then about 30 mins later add some more chips.  It should be kicking out good smoke by the time it reaches 270*.  If not, then you might have a faulty unit like bear did.

Hope this helps.

littleg said:

UPDATE:

Just got off the phone with Masterbuilt and got pretty much the same answers as everyone else. She told me my unit was doing exactly what it was supposed to do and that it was supposed to be more of a steam than a smoke. I asked her why they called it a smoker than and told her if I wanted steamed for I would have bought a crockpot. She said that it was supposed to created blackened chips and not create ash. She also said to empty the chipbox prior to loading new chips. i questioned her as to if that defeated the purpose of having the chip tube and she said that the tube and loader was only to provide the correct amount of chips. Getting a little frustrated here as I do not want a high priced smoker and could have got a WSM for not much more.

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Very interesting response.  Don't know how to respond to the first quote about steaming but my 30 inch old style MES burns the chips, pellets and chunks to ash.  I only emply my wood tray prior to smoking but can smoke hours and hours as long as I add wood and the heats not too low.
 

Bass Pro said they would take it back. Thinking I might take it back and get a propane smoker. Tough decision but it just hasn't worked right the 3 times I used it and I did all the research and even spent time with guys in the chat trying to get a good smoke.

I am just trying to understand ho this works readin gthe temperature.  If I set it at 225 and the temperature stays there then the element never comes on to burn the chips to smoke.  I noticed yesterday that the unit was turning off and on because the temp would bounce from like 222 - 227.  Ao it wasn't a constant smoke even though the ribs turned out good. But I thought you only snoked the first few hours and I was adding chips al the way to the end.   So the question is if the unit reaches temperature 225 does that mean I will not get anymore smoke? 

littleg said:

Bass Pro said they would take it back. Thinking I might take it back and get a propane smoker. Tough decision but it just hasn't worked right the 3 times I used it and I did all the research and even spent time with guys in the chat trying to get a good smoke.

Click to expand...

Sorry to hear that you have to take it back.

 

blacknsilver said:

I am just trying to understand ho this works readin gthe temperature.  If I set it at 225 and the temperature stays there then the element never comes on to burn the chips to smoke.  I noticed yesterday that the unit was turning off and on because the temp would bounce from like 222 - 227.  Ao it wasn't a constant smoke even though the ribs turned out good. But I thought you only snoked the first few hours and I was adding chips al the way to the end.   So the question is if the unit reaches temperature 225 does that mean I will not get anymore smoke? 

Click to expand...

That's why you heat it to 270 first -- to get the chips burning really well.  Once they get going you just have to add a few when the smoke starts going down.  They will burn just fine at 225.  That's where I had mine set during the 5-hour smoke that I mentioned.  I was using soaked chips, too.  It takes some practice to get the hang of it.

Also, you could use something like the A-MAZE-N smoke generator and not have to worry about it at all.  I'm planning to get one to make things easier and for cold smokes, too.