About 40 pellets missed fire pot on first cook. Cookshack sent me a strange bracket to somehow prevent pellets bouncing over pot. Since my pellets were hitting before fire pot, I bent chute sides out to angle chute upwards. 2 pellets missed pot of over next 10# of pellets burned. Much better!
Next Problem: left door does not shut completely & I can not see why not. Hinges, door & spacing seems OK but it will not close flat.
Third problem: smoker is not stable @ 170 with Cookshack mesquite pellets & grill detonated, blew door & drawers open. First we thought kids had played, left door open. Had to dump hopper to get rid of fire in augur tube. Augur tube is now burned near black. Theory is fire died, fire pot filled, ignitor was switched on, fire started in pot near full, smoke density became combustible, fire grew to extend above pot, smoke burned explosively. We will not again leave this thing on without people watching it always.
Fourth problem: smoker is not stable @ 230 set point. Temperature ranges from 139 to over 360, again with Cookshack mesquite pellets. Set at 230, smoker was still feeding pellets above 300 F. That is a sorry controller. This would have been a sorry controller 30 years ago, worse today.
Yes I could set controller to compensate for current batch of pellets, then it would do near as well as a $15 controller of 1990. Maybe. FWIW, PG500 temperature indication does track my Maverick ET7 within 6 F when temperature is not rapidly changing.
I may put a $40 Chinese PID controller in my $1479 smoker as an upgrade.
Setpoint is still 230, temp is 191 falling, low temp augur run is 15, may see the door blown open again soon.
I do hope your PG500 experience is safer than ours. Brisket still just 152 F.
Original Post
