Preheating

The way I do it, is by putting a handful of pellets in the fire pot and then put the smoker on 180* for 6-8hrs and then set the hold temp at what temp I'm wanting to cook at. At a comp I let it go 1hr, at home usually around 45 minutes before putting cold meat in.

If I'm not doing a two stage cook, I set at the temp I want and let it warm 45-60 minutes.

There is no rule that you can't moderate your temps on over shoots be fanning the door. One swing drops the temps about 6*, two swings drop the temp about 10*. Probably more info than you asked for, oh well!

Cal,
Those "swings" are pretty scientfic!

But it is amazing how little things like that can work better than the modern electronics.

Unless I'm intentionally 2 staging briskets or butts, I just set the desired temp, wait 15 minutes and go.

Cal & MaxQ,
Thanks for the info!

Saw this on a T-shirt
" I'd Rather Die From Eating Too Much BBQ
Than From Eating Too Few Brussel Sprouts ".

Me?

I put the meat in and off I go.

Don't walk away until the temp stabilizes. You want to make sure the fire is working, etc.

Not hard and fast rules.

I put cold meat in and set for a lower temp to let it take on more smoke.

I've also prestarted it at contest to make sure it's all well and good and then it's running at my temp by the time I put meat in.

Try both and see what works for you.

In the winter, I put the meat in before going to bed, set the alarm for start time, go out and push the start button and go back to bed. Sometimes I sit up until I smell smoke then go to bed but so far everything is perfect.
By the way, that's why I liked the CookShack electrics. I put them on a timer so I wouldn't have to wake up early.

I'm in the Pacific NW and the temp in the early morning and late afternoon is chilly. I find warming my FEC 120 to 180-190 is beneficial.
I give it 10 minutes to get up to around 110-130, everything warms up, dirty smoke exits the unit and I scrape of gunk from the previous cook when it's loose and can scrape easily. I give it another 5 minutes to reach 180-190 then I'm a smoken.

The fire on start-up is intense and that intense bout of heat in the unit might not be best for a piece of meat - internal smoker oven could be hot like a grill on high causing the meat proteins to unnecessarily tighten up preventing additional juices from getting locked in later in the cook. Probably a negligible difference, but still.

But I don' think of it as a "warming up" period, I think of it as a "getting ready" period...clean, scrape, clean smoke, beer.