Just stopped by and I see a bunch of MES threads and I have to say I figured out shortly after I purchased mine that they are basically a pile of junk, or at least the electronics are a pile. Right off the bat I had problems with the control unit, thermal cut off switch and meat probe. I ended up purchasing a PID, rewiring the unit to remove the control unit from the equation and after the second thermal cut off switch started acting up in the middle of a smoke I took it out completely and wired around it. The chip burner sucks and the water pan is of on use.
Currently my MES is just the smoker box, heating element with shield and bottom catch pan, all the rest of the water pan sheet metal and smoke tray is removed. I place a cookie sheet on a bottom rack just above the heating element to deflect any direct heat and pipe in the smoke through the chip burner hole via a mail box mod.
My smoker works great now but if I had know what I know now I would have been better off making or purchasing an insulated box, installing a heat element and deflectors where they would be most beneficial instead of purchasing an overprice pile, gutting it and purchasing more stuff to make it run.
Currently my MES is just the smoker box, heating element with shield and bottom catch pan, all the rest of the water pan sheet metal and smoke tray is removed. I place a cookie sheet on a bottom rack just above the heating element to deflect any direct heat and pipe in the smoke through the chip burner hole via a mail box mod.
My smoker works great now but if I had know what I know now I would have been better off making or purchasing an insulated box, installing a heat element and deflectors where they would be most beneficial instead of purchasing an overprice pile, gutting it and purchasing more stuff to make it run.