Masterbuilt Smokers (Bear’s Thoughts & Findings)

[lunatics]

I have one more to ask you about. This one has vents on both sides and looks like the 2.5 inside. What do you think? I'm leaning to this one because of the vents.

Masterbuilt 30 in. Digital Electric Smoker with Bluetooth and Broiler in Black MB26073519 - The Home Depot

Get an essential and ultimate addition to your home with the help of this Masterbuilt Pro MES Bluetooth Digital Electric Smoker.

www.homedepot.com

I recently purchased one of these and cannot say I would recommend it so far from my experience. I have an old MB 30" electric smoker, I am not sure of which model and generation it is as MB is terrible with their naming/numbering scheme and my old one was so much better. Felt like it held temp better, created smoke better and felt like it was better constructed. This new one I have feels more cheaply built, feels like it doesn't hold temp as well and I notice the outside of the unit gets significantly hot where as my old one you would tap on the side of it, it feels solid, never heated up and you could touch it without any issues etc. This new one gets very hot on the outside and if you tap on it it just feels hollow as if there's no insulation or anything to help keep heat in. I am worried with how well this unit will perform in cold weather. Also my meat probe died the first time I turned the unit on to use/season it.

That being said, the one positive thing I can say about this unit is the broiler is a nice feature. I question how long it will last but it's been nice the couple times I made wings.

I need to do a few more cooks on this unit but I am already in the process of looking into trying to salvage or restore my older one which was left outside by friends and ruined. Currently everything inside is rusted out and full of mold but I am hoping I may be able to salvage it as this new unit does not compare and sadly I did not know any of these things until I got home, built it, seasoned, it and tried cooking in it and too late to return it. In hindsight I am regretting not looking into replacing my grill+smoker with a pellet grill or one of these new charcoal ones.

I have mostly been lurking on here but I wish I saw Bears posts earlier about his older models he is looking to get rid of before I invested $300 into this newer model which has been fairly disappointing Nothing worse than feeling like you wasted a decent chunk of money you can't get back..

 

[Bearcarver]

I recently purchased one of these and cannot say I would recommend it so far from my experience. I have an old MB 30" electric smoker, I am not sure of which model and generation it is as MB is terrible with their naming/numbering scheme and my old one was so much better. Felt like it held temp better, created smoke better and felt like it was better constructed. This new one I have feels more cheaply built, feels like it doesn't hold temp as well and I notice the outside of the unit gets significantly hot where as my old one you would tap on the side of it, it feels solid, never heated up and you could touch it without any issues etc. This new one gets very hot on the outside and if you tap on it it just feels hollow as if there's no insulation or anything to help keep heat in. I am worried with how well this unit will perform in cold weather. Also my meat probe died the first time I turned the unit on to use/season it.

That being said, the one positive thing I can say about this unit is the broiler is a nice feature. I question how long it will last but it's been nice the couple times I made wings.

I need to do a few more cooks on this unit but I am already in the process of looking into trying to salvage or restore my older one which was left outside by friends and ruined. Currently everything inside is rusted out and full of mold but I am hoping I may be able to salvage it as this new unit does not compare and sadly I did not know any of these things until I got home, built it, seasoned, it and tried cooking in it and too late to return it. In hindsight I am regretting not looking into replacing my grill+smoker with a pellet grill or one of these new charcoal ones.

I have mostly been lurking on here but I wish I saw Bears posts earlier about his older models he is looking to get rid of before I invested $300 into this newer model which has been fairly disappointing Nothing worse than feeling like you wasted a decent chunk of money you can't get back..

I had 2 Gen #1s, one Gen #2, and 1 Gen #2.5.
They were all great, but the Gen #2 because it wasn't designed right, with the slanted Drip plate in the bottom.

Two of my MES 40s were still available until today.
That one that you brought home, assembled, seasoned, and tried could have been taken back, if that's all you did with it. If you didn't like it, you should have contacted them.

Bear