MES40 heat question

[mitchk]

I purchased a MES40 with window from sam's club and did a couple different smokes with it and love the thing.  I'm currently about 7 hours into my first summer sausage smoke and as you might see from some other posts, I'm having trouble keeping my AMNPS smoker going so I loaded my chip tray with some pellets and I can see the heat rod under the tray is red but the chips aren't smoking? before I never had a problem, but I was doing chicken and had the smoker was set around 220, right now its set at 160, is this the reason the chip tray isn't smoking?   Is there a minimum temp I need to have it set at to get the chip tray to smoke?   I'm using the pellets I purchased with a AMNPS and they worked great before at the higher temp.

 

[al truistic]

There is no minimum temperature needed for them to work.  I got 10 hour of smoke out of my AMNPS with it unplugged with an outside temperature of 40 degrees.  It is all about the air flow.  My first few smokes were outside and a little windy and I had no problems.  The one time I used it under the carport my AMNPS went out a couple of times, and I attribute that to no airflow around the unit since nothing else had changed.

I am going to be working on modifying an old computer fan to keep some air moving in the box. 

 

[mitchk]

I'm sorry I didn't specify very well, I was talking about the MES40 heat unit, not the AMNPS.  The temp is holding fine and the heat rod is glowing below the chip box, but with the temp set at 160, the pellets aren't smoking in the heat box.  

 

[roadkill cafe]

This thread might help you some. http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/113289/mes-40-lowest-smoke-temp

Steve

 

[mitchk]

RC, you are the man today 

.. You seem to be answering all my questions during this all day trial and error smoke. 

 

[mike johnson]

temp too low to ignite the pellets. use your amnps.

 

[mitchk]

Would you guys recommend removing the tray completely?

 

[roadkill cafe]

Some do, I don't.