Reply to "Forget The Factory Dial Readings!"

I too was not happy with the cooking times in my Smokette, I finally contacted Customer Service, they had me to some tests. They sent me a new thermostat. I installed it did some more tests, really didn't see that much difference, I also did a little modification to the thermostat mounting. With a load a meat it seems to work much better. All that information you can find by doing a forum search.

But the point of when it is done, its done, makes a whole lot of difference if you are doing a rare prime rib, versus a butt or brisket that once it reaches 190-200 can be held, chilled, frozen, reheated any number of ways with virtually no loss in quality. With the prime rib you are also dealing with about a 100 degree difference between the CS set temperature and the pull temperature. When you are running within 10-20 of the pull temperature there are going to be a whole lot of variables that are going to effect the cooking time, part of it is the CS, part the meat(s), part the operator and what he expects, the list goes on and on.

The nice thing about a Cookshack if you just open her up and let her rip, it is still virtually impossible to ruin, or even significantly foul up your results. Try to get that consistently with some other smoker.

That is why the vast majority of us will never waste our money on any other brand, from a 008 up to a SM 350 or a FEC 750.