Yoder Pellet smoker

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texacajun

Meat Mopper
Original poster
Feb 23, 2010
236
17
Wichtia KS
This weekend I stopped by all things BBQ. I saw there new Yoder pellet smokers. This thing is heavy duty for sure. They have two model so far.

Yoder Smokers YS480 Pellet Grill  

Yoder Smokers YS640 Pellet Grill  

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They look very well built, I will be interested to see a few user reviews once a few get out there.
 
I watched the two Youtube videos on the YS640 and the thing is built like a tank at 350 pounds. Definitely looks a lot sturdier than all the other pellet poopers on the market anyway. Any idea what the price tags for both units will be?
 
My .02 is that I would not limit myself to a single dicipline on smoking.  I know there are lots of folks who love the pellets but to me it is just not my cup of tea. I want to be able to use more than one source of smoke
 
I watched the two Youtube videos on the YS640 and the thing is built like a tank at 350 pounds. Definitely looks a lot sturdier than all the other pellet poopers on the market anyway. Any idea what the price tags for both units will be?
I have the prices at work. I will get them and post them tonight.
 
I have a Traeger and I call it my "glorified oven". LOL! It certainly can't touch the good old wood burning smoker. I have a cheap Brinkman and love, love, love it! Totally want the Lang 48 though. I also have the MES 40. The Traeger is really good at one thing that I like and that's doing the chicken breasts. I can fit 20 bigguns on there and keep in on the smoke cycle for 30 minutes then crank it up to 325F and 30-40 minutes later they are done. No messing up my indoor oven either. I only paid $500 for a $1,500 unit so I can live with it. That Yoder does look like a tank though!
 
I tried to buy a yoder summer before last. called the guy direct cuz would save several hundred over buying it through Cabelas. He made the old Next week promise over and over. Finally after about 2 mounths of this I found a Horizon Ranger at BPS that was a twin to what yoder had. went to BPS with a trailer, bought it and took it home the same day. The guy from yoder called aboout a month later and said he would be up and deliver my smoker......I said....Keep it!    Not that it had any problems with quality, but his customer service left alot to be desired.
 
Ok the prices are

1099.00 for the YS480 that's the 480 Square inch one grill dimensions are 20 x 24

1299.00 for the YA640 that's the 640 Square inch one grill dimensions are 20 x 32

cooking temp range is 180-600 degrees

18 pound hopper capacity.

steel gauge is 10 on the cooking chamber and 14 on the hopper and cart.
 
The price of the YS640 is definitely about right for a grill of that quality, but I think I’m gonna hold out and go with a Mak 2-Star General hopefully sometime in the near future. From everything I’ve read online, the Mak seems to be the only pellet pooper on the market that’s really pushed more as a smoker than a grill. It seems to me that other manufactures push their units more as grills that can smoke after the fact.

I’ve also read that Mak grills are built to produce more smoke than other manufacturer’s units so that’s another plus. I’d be using a pellet grill 100% of the time as a smoker anyway. Again, the YS640 looks amazing, but with most people complaining about the lack of smoke flavor from pellet poopers to begin with, I think I’ll have to go with a Mak.
 
I have been cooking on the Yoder YS640 for a couple weeks now. Its a stout built cooker and the temp across the grate is extremely consisitent. Pellet cookers are great due to ease of use but they don't lay down the smoke like a stick burner. I really like the Yoder YS640 much more so then the other two pellet cookers I owned. It puts out some great BBQ!  That said I am also shopping for iether a Yoder Cheyenne or Wichita. I also can't seem to get rid of my old cheap GSOM. The pic below is about 5 hours into a smoke I did one week 1 week ago. The pulled pork was awesome.

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Wingman,

I've watched all of your videos of the YS640 from SmokingPit.com and have really enjoyed them. I'm trying to learn as much about pellet grills as I can and it seems that you just may be the person I've been looking for. When I ask pellet grill owners about how smoky their end results are I either get no answer at all or they just say that the pellets give the meat a unique wood fired taste.

Does that mean there's absolutely no smoke flavor at all? I noticed in your apple pork butt video that the YS640 didn't seem to put out much smoke at 225 degrees, but how would you rate the overall smokiness of the finished butt on a scale of 1-10? Sorry for all of the questions, but I hope to be a future pellet grill owner and I just want to make the right choice. Take care.
 
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Well my answer will be of course my opinion but I would say about 50% the smoke roughly. You will get smoke flavor. The pellets you use do make a difference. I burn BBQr's Delight and have done so in my Traeger Texas and Whole Hog pellet cookers. Branch Creek pellets are also good. I don't like the Treager pellets. Again this is my opinion.

Pellets will put out the smoke but here's the deal... The pellets burn hotter and cleaner. Pellets also burn hotter producing less smoke at higher temps. One trick is to smoke your products the first hour @ 170-190 degrees then take it to 225. This will lay more smoke on the meat. With the pellet poopers, you don't have a hunk of wood in there slowly burning up. Instead the pellets are dropped a few at a time so the bulk of the smoke is generated as they start to burn and tapers off as they burn hot. You will notice that the pit will smoke pretty good then it clears up then soon starts smoking good again.

There are pros and cons. The way these things work they control the burn by Auger on for a short duration then the auger is off for a set duration. This allows the temp to be controlled  fairly consistent. This consistency is very nice. Kind of a set it and forget it thing. Having a hopper that holds 18 lbs. of pellets allows you to literally not attend to the thing for quite some time. They are also very easy to start and come up to temp very quickly. You will never get bitter tasting food either do to creosote particulates. I don't care if it's your first smoker ever... The pellet cookers burn that efficiently.  Another nice feature of the pellet cookers is they force air over the burn pot and circulate it around in the cooking chamber like convection cooking.

With stick burners, you have to spend some time figuring out getting an efficient fire. You will spend time maintaining it. Not bad though. I sometimes enjoy standing out there fiddling with fire. Once you figure it out you will smoke amazing meats. I have smoked some of my best smokes on the pellet poopers but I still have a place in my heart and taste buds for meat cooked on a wood fire. So I'm going to look into another wood fired pit as I mentioned above.  From my perspective this is a relaxing hobby and I can own more then one. :-) I hope this helps you Cabin Fever. 
 
Wingman,

I really appreciate your input on the subject. I've owned just about every type and brand of smoker you can think of and I've never been completely satisfied with the results. I mean no disrespect to owners of the following units, but with my Cookshack and MES, I either got no smoke flavor at all or an unbearably strong and off-putting creosote flavor that made what I smoked almost inedible. On the other hand I always had tasty results with my offset, but I didn't care for tending the fire every hour or so (though I can understand why a lot of folks enjoy it).

With that said, I'm glad you mentioned that pellet grills/smokers do offer pretty decent smoke flavor after all when used correctly. I still haven't completely ruled out the Yoder YS640 in favor of a Mak, but which unit would you prefer when it's all said and done? Also, is there any way you could do a quick video with the YS640 set only to smoking temps (150-200) so we can see how much smoke it can really put out? If that's too much trouble then don't worry about it. Just thought I'd ask. Thanks again for all of the info.
 
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Sure, I will try and get to it within a couple days. Also, with the Yoders and the Louisianas they have a fairly good sized fire pot so you can cheat. Warm it up with the cooking racks and drip pan out so the fire pot is exposed. Put a big chunk of hardwood in each side of the burn pot just before you you throw your meat on. This will give you additional smoke for the first 30 - 40 minutes or so. I like to put on a couple chunks of Mesquite when I do chicken with hickory pellets.
 
Wingman,

Enjoyed your posts with Cabin Fever. I noticed in your earlier post that you were looking at the Yoder Cheyenne or Wichita model. I bought the Wichita model last March and have really enjoyed it. Haven't missed to many weekends of smoking something. Been real pleased with the results. It took a little tinkering with making adjustments with fire control and how to properly add wood so you get that thin blue smoke everyone is looking for. With help here on the forum I've gotten better. They were pretty pricey for me but they will last a lifetime. Being close to Wichita, Ks I can go into their store room and look at the different models that they have on display. When I was in the market I started looking at electric smokers. Something kept drawing me back to the offset smokers. I guess the thing about tending the fire, even though it is more work, appealed to me. I decided on the Wichita model because of its size. You can pack a lot of meat into one. They have a second shelf that removable that is nice to have when needed. They are extremely well built and heavy. The last time I was in their store, if I remember right, they have added a second thermometer to this model. They have one located on the exhaust end and now added one near the firebox end.

2 things I would recommend, which you probably already know, is I would get the convection plate to help even the temps out and secondly I would add a charcoal basket. The charcoal basket that I have I ordered from Horizon. The Horizon smokers are almost carbon copies of each other since both owners (Horizon and Yoder) worked at the old Oklahoma Joe's. I didn't see where Yoder smokers made charcoal baskets, maybe they have them now. The addition of the charcoal basket really helped my fire/smoke control. I'm still learning as I' m relatively new at this type of smoking meat. But hey, I've had fun on this journey. This forum has helped me a lot. I see you are from Tacoma. I don't know what kind of shipping costs would be tacked on ordering from Wichita. Are there dealers close by to you that sells them? Anyway if you have any questions regarding the Yoder Wichita model I'd be more then happy to give you my 2 cents.
 
Coacher72 I really appreciate your info on the Wichita. I have been leaning that way. I plan on the heat management plate, counter weight and the second shelf. I didn't know about the charcoal basket. If they don't offer it, I bet Don Cary could build them as an accessory. Getting it here will be no problem. I also plan on coming to Wichita in the spring and it would be cool to meet some of you guys who live in the area. The plan is to go down and do some cooking with the Don and his crew at All Things BBQ. Grant Campbell the author of Dark Side BBQ blog out of Derby KS is cooking on a YS640 as well. I will be meeting him when I'm in the area.

Gotta love this forum. Allot of great folks! Allot of great information!
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Sure, I will try and get to it within a couple days. Also, with the Yoders and the Louisianas they have a fairly good sized fire pot so you can cheat. Warm it up with the cooking racks and drip pan out so the fire pot is exposed. Put a big chunk of hardwood in each side of the burn pot just before you you throw your meat on. This will give you additional smoke for the first 30 - 40 minutes or so. I like to put on a couple chunks of Mesquite when I do chicken with hickory pellets.
Thanks for the tip!  
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Wingman,

Glad to help out. The one thing I did not get on mine was the counter weight. I tried to save a little money by not getting it. It hasn't been a problem not having it. Let us know when you're heading this way next spring. I might have make my way to All Things BBQ and try some yours and Don's BBQ 
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Cabin Fever, I uploaded a video that demonstrates the smoke output at different temps. My deck is up high and over looks the city and waterway so the gray sky in the background washes the smoke out a bit. So I Opened the door a couple times. then the smoke got me hungry as heck so I stopped shooting and ran up to the store and got some chicken to throw on. Man it turned out good!

 
Wingman,

Thanks for taking the time to shoot that video. As always, it's greatly appreciated. As I mentioned before, I'm just trying to learn as much about pellet grills/smokers as I can before I take the big "plunge". So far the only two I would consider are the Yoder YS640 and the Mak 2 Star General.

I know Mak recently released the 1 Star General for almost half the price, but I really think I'd miss the cold smoking box of the 2 Star if I went that route. On the other side of the coin is the Yoder YS640 which seems amazing by all accounts and the reasonable price tag doesn't hurt either. Decisions, decisions...
 
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