scared to smoke chicken

[the_batman_]

Im so scared to smoke chicken in my digital smoker the temature is not good  mabey goes to 201  not good enough for chicken in my books,  bradley has said everything is fine  element is hot,  could there be something wrong with the therastat,   why dont they build these units with a bigger element in them  750w or 1000w  it would solve so many issues with recovery time and if i want to smoke on a colder day as it is now i need to start the ribs at 6 am and hope they are done by 5pm   way tooo long,  wish i knew all of this before i spend my hard earned money on this smoker,  i may have gone with a differant one,  i was looking forward to smoking a turkey  but forget it,  i dont like to make oter people sick

[KyNola]

OK, apparently you have eliminated the element as being bad as it gets hot so let's look elsewhere.  Are you running your Bradley on an extension cord, particularly a long one with small wiring?  That can cause a problem.  Also, are you plugged into an outlet that has other large items running on the same circuit?  If the answer to either or both of these questions is yes, try plugging your Bradley directly into an outlet that has nothing else running on that circuit and see if it makes a difference.

Others will come along with more helpful information than what I can provide.

[classicrockgriller]

Have you checked your cabinet temp with another source
of temp gauge like an oven temp or maybe a maverick probe?

Could possibly be get a faulty reading from the digital control.

[the_batman_]

i am runnning a deep freeze on the same plug in, and as for the extenson cord i bought quit a heavy duty one, and it is only 4 feet long i have a oven thermomator in the unit as we speak,  i have it set for 250  and yet it is only reading 210 on the digital panel

[classicrockgriller]

Extention cord needs to be no longer than 15 ft and needs to be 12 ga.

I am thinking the deep freeze might be your problem.

Open the door to your Bradley and look at the back wall. Somewhere
around the 3rd shelf you will see a round sensor in the back wall. Put
a rack in that location and put your oven thermo on that rack. Compare
it to the Bradley read out.

You will need some time for both to come up to temp after you open the door.
Maybe 30 minutes.

[Wildcat]

Chicken gives off a lot of water. Make sure vent is full open and the smoker is protected from the wind.

[Habanero Smoker]

Hi the_batman;

Welcome to the forum. The following link will help you troubleshoot.
Bradley FAQ's

The freezer shouldn't be a problem, because that condenser would only kick on occasionally, unless there is a problem with the freezer that is causing it to run more frequently.

How many chickens were you trying to smoke at one time? If it is a big load, and the ambient temperature is cold, you may want to reduce the amount of chicken you smoke at one time. Also you can remove the chicken after the smoke has been applied and finish in your kitchen oven. Finishing chicken in this manner will also improve the skin texture.

If the chicken is too close to your sensor, that will give you a lower reading then the actual cabinet temperature. You should purchase a digital probe thermometer, so you can place the probe in a better location. Most members have purchased the Maverick ET 732, which is a remote thermometer, but there are less expensive probes on the market that are not remote and display accurate temperatures.

Same with the ribs, if you have too big of a load, your Bradley is going to struggle to get to its set temperature. If your ribs are spare ribs, they generally will take 7 - 8 hours for pull off the bone meat, and longer if you want fall off the bone. I never smoke/cook more then three racks of spare ribs at a time.

[Caneyscud]

Also make sure all the cords in the back are pushed in well.  On new machines they don't always seat well.  Also check if there is a faulty door seal.  Or maybe a full rack is blocking the heat from circulating.  Or maybe the meat is close to or touching the sensor.  Is the 201 CT with a full load, partial load, unloaded, with the burner on, early in a smoke, late in a smoke, has the door been opened frequently?  In my un-modded bradley 4-rack digital, there has been hours where the CT doesn't reach 210 and it still produces wonderful results - even after 4 years and many, many smokes. 

One thing to remember about the unit, is that it is a smoke cooker for making barbecue - it is not a grill or like your kitchen oven.  In it magic happens, and that magic can only happen when things are low and slow.  Cooking barbecue is a balancing act - and you upset that balance too much then you don't have barbecue - or at least not very tender barbecue.  Every single smoker  - big or small has "recovery time" when you open the lid/door.  My big ones get back up pretty quick - but you also need a vehicle to pull them, and they cost $1,000's compared to the $200 - $500 Bradley.  The big-uns have heat mass - the Bradley doesn't.  I'd bet that the meat don't care whether you cook at 210 or 250.  You take identical cuts of meat and cook one in the "normal" Bradley and cook the other in a heavily modded, big wattage, auber controlled Bradley - you won't taste one iota of difference.  The only diff will be the amount of time added to the cook because of the recovery!  Last spring I was doing 13 briskets (and 1 for me) for a ministry.  Somehow my alarm did not go off - on an overnight cook in a big smoker, I'll set an alarm for about every 1 to 1.5 hours to tend to the fire.  When I finally awoke, the fire had gone out the CT had gone down to 115 and was down for maybe 2 or 3 hours.  No prob. - started the fire and got it chugging along again.  Cook was probably only about an hour longer, and there was no difference in the product. 

[the_batman_]

Hi all  well i just heated the smoker up with just the racks in it along with an oven themomater  and set the temp at 250  watied about an hour and the temp on the digital read out said 221  and the themomater  said  248ish  so  the number on the read out is way way out,  is there a fix for this,  may reason for buying this unit is it had digital read outs.

thanks to all who are helping

batman

[classicrockgriller]

Hi all  well i just heated the smoker up with just the racks in it along with an oven themomater  and set the temp at 250  watied about an hour and the temp on the digital read out said 221  and the themomater  said  248ish  so  the number on the read out is way way out,  is there a fix for this,  may reason for buying this unit is it had digital read outs.

thanks to all who are helping

batman

I would give Bradley a call and tell them what you have found out.

There is no way I know of to recalculate the digital read out.

[Waltz]

The Bradley temperature indication is really pretty crap. I have the digital model but from what I read on this forum the original is not any different. Mine is usually the opposite to what you are seeing, the Bradley indicates higher than the actual temperature. I do not even look at the Bradley read-out now (it depresses me), I have an Auber PID controller and rely on it - the only mod I have done on my smoker.

[Wildcat]

No fix that I know of. Just use the oven thermometer or better yet get a Maverick. With the Maverick you can monitor the cabinet temp and the meat temp at the same time and it has an alarm.

[the_batman_]

anyone know where to get a maverick et 732 here in canada  are they sold in some stores up here or  do i order online

thanks

holy bbq batman

[classicrockgriller]

I know  www.yardandpool.com  ships to Canada.

[devo]

http://www.bbqs.com/temperature-gauges-maverick-c-16_49_111.html