New guy here from Oregon

[RyderB]

Hey everyone,
My name is Ryder and I live in Mosier, Oregon. I have a MES 40, 3rd gen I believe (it has the vent in back right, the weird tiered water pan but no wifi and no glass door) and the Masterbuilt slow smoker attachment. I smoke a lot of venison summer sausage and snack sticks (usually 10-15 lbs at a time) and got tired of the temp swings and hotspots. I found this site because I did a lot of googling trying to solve those issues. I ended up getting an auber PID which has helped with the temp swings and tonight I flipped the heating element to try to alleviate hotspots and make the heat more central. I need to run to the hardware store tomorrow to get some heat shrink to go over the spade connectors from the element to finish the job. I'll replace the OEM spade connectors while I have it open since one of the little rubber terminal boots turned to dust when I touched it.
Anyone else have a new model MES and have any tips on getting even heat throughout the smoker? It sucks to have to rotate racks and lose 10-15 degrees internal temp in snack sticks each time. Theres a ton of good information on this site so thanks for that!

 

[normanaj]

Hello from RI.

Lots of MES owners here including myself.

On my 30" Gen 2.5 the vent is on the left so with the element in its stock position I get very little variation in temps from side/side and front/back but I do get some from the top to the lowest rack/water pan. I also have a newer 30" model with the vent on the right side and there are some temp differences from side to side but for me this really isn't an issue as I have both units to use.

Both are wired for PID use so it's easy enough to use the Auber on either and same with the mailbox. Though on rare occasions I wouldn't mind using both at the same time, another mailbox setup is cheap enough but investing in a second Auber is a little more costly.

 

[Compulsive Smoker]

Welcome from PA!

I don't have any info for you, but you've come to the right place! Lot's of good folks willing to help here...