CookShack upgrade

[grady in texas]

As mentioned on the Roll Call forum - I live in Houston and several years ago I bought a well-used Cookshack (Model 105 circa 1995) smoker when the historic downtown Houston Club closed/moved.  Unfortunately the motherboard died and replacements were pricey.

So today I swapped out the guts for a TA4 PID.  Haven't done the autotune yet but so far I thank it has great potential. 

BTW - This is a very helpful video that explains how to program the TA-PID



Old wiring in place

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• grady in texas
• Aug 10, 2016

Old wiring removed - see all the switches

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• grady in texas
• Aug 10, 2016

Testing the PID and probe in ice water

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• grady in texas
• Aug 10, 2016

New front - wish I had a good before picture - all those holes were mini-switches or push buttons.

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• grady in texas
• Aug 10, 2016

New look - she may get some paint!

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• grady in texas
• Aug 10, 2016

 

[wade]

Good looking mod.

I bought my Cookshack FEC-120 only a year ago and it has already gone through 4 versions of the motherboard. These were swapped out under warranty though and at last it seems to be working properly.

 

[SmokinAl]

Nice job!

Al

 

[grady in texas]

Bummer - Was set to do my autotune and first new smoke... but apparently in putting everything back together and moving it back outside I pinched one of the element lead wires (how did I miss that one?) and as soon as I turned up the temperature the SSR went poof.  Problem with everything being sharp stainless - no room for error.  And it popped the SSR (I heard it go) before it popped the fuse.  New one and a spare will Prime in next week.  Charcoal grilled ribs anyone?  Of course no one stocks a SSR on Saturday but Grainger's run $75-$175 LOL.  Grady

 

[grady in texas]

Popped the SSR apart and it's fried but boy there in nothing in there.  One itsy board.  Quite a contrast to the old school A/C - A/C original relay!

 

[redheelerdog]

Keep er going Grady, good luck on the new SSR.

Post some pics of the next smoke!