Newbie 750 or 900 Element Help

[bradleyincleveland]

Notching is complete. The process was not hard at all, I used a mounted grinder, angled the ceramic till I got basically a half moon on each side. Found the perfect high temp eyelit which is for #8 stud if anyone is looking for it at your local hardware store.

My reflector is due to arrive tomorrow, but I don't know if I will have time after work the next few days to complete. To be continued....

[thepro8]

Oh yeah and what type of wire connection to "jump" it from the other element? What gauge wire as well 14?

The jumper wire does have to be high temp because it is exposed to the high heat of the cooking chamber.  I stopped by a mom and pop appliance repair store and asked the guy if they sold it.  He gave me a foot of it free.  I believe it is 14ga. 

Once you go higher than the single factory 500W element you should bypass the temp control because it was not designed to handle the higher output.  I think I remember someone posted that he did not bypass his and did not have a problem but I wouldn't do it.  I installed an Auber PID controller by following another how-to guide.

I know your smoke generator box is different but here's how I installed mine:

Can you post what guide you followed. your setup looks nice!

[TedEbear]

Can you post what guide you followed. your setup looks nice!

It's a "how-to" guide from the Bradley users recipe site:  PID Controller

[bradleyincleveland]

As I'm in the process of completing this mod, how will this work without the fan mod? Do any of you run dual elements without the fan? Does it burn food if left on the bottom rack? Just wondering if it will be essential to add a fan.

[Habanero Smoker]

I have the parts for the fan, but never installed the fan. You are only going to burn the food on the bottom rack if you badly overcook it. The extra heat from the elements is not that extreme while it is brings your cabinet back up to it's set temperature that it will burn your food.

If you don't rotate the trays during the cooking time, the food on the bottom rack, and that near to the back wall will cook much faster than the food on the higher racks.

[Orion]

Bradleyinc,

HS is on the money. The fan is usually something we add if one comes handy or we want to mod a little more. Follow HS's cooking recommendations and you will be fine. Will you grace us with some pics of your mods?

[Toker]

I have the dual elements myself and i rarely use the fan anymore.

[bradleyincleveland]

Thank yoy all for the advice. How long does it take to reach 225 for you under normal conditions? Just so i'm setting this up properly I have the digiq2. I take the blower input from th raptor and connect to digiq. Next i hook up small box to smoke stack. Lastly long cord from smoke generator goin to digiq2? Still do not need to disable temperature control from OBS somewhere?

[Habanero Smoker]

I use to use a Digi Q plus Raptor to control my Bradley. Since the Raptor cycles the power on and off, if you plug the generator into the Raptor it will interfere with the feeding of the bisquette; more than likely cause a jam, and your bisquettes will not burn properly.

So that there are no mistakes, I'll go through each step. You will also need to have a power strip, and a computer power cord.

With the temperature probe(s) already plugged into the DigiQ, connect the wire from the blower input into the Raptor. Place the temperature probe inside the cabinet, in the area you want to control the temperature. I generally place mine below the bottom rack, where no juices from the meat will drip on the probe.

The smoke cabinet gets plugged into the back of the Raptor, and the Raptor then gets plugged into an outlet. To do this you will need to replace that short jumper cord that goes from the cabinet to the generator with a computer power cord (NEMA 5-15P to IEC320C13). With that cord you can plug the cabinet into the Raptor. Hookup the power cord to the DigiQ, and plug that into an outlet. The generator will have to be plugged into its own socket, so a power strip comes in handy.

You do not have to disable the heating control on the BS611, the power to the elements is controlled by the Raptor. Though from what I have read on the forum, you must turn the heating control to on for the bisquettes burner to work.

Turn on the generator first, then turn on the DigiQ, and you should be up and running.

When using the DigiQ/Raptor disable the ramp mode, if you don't you will extend your cook times. Also set the overshoot to its lowest setting. It's been awhile since I've time how long it takes to bring the cabinet up to 225°F. Of course a lot depends on the ambient temperature, and wind conditions.

[bradleyincleveland]

Habs,

Thank for the detailed reply with instructions! That is exactly what I needed. The only question I have remaining is why can't I use the two orginal cords that came with the OBS? Use the short jumper to connect the cabinet to the raptor, then the raptor to socket.  Then the cord from the smoke generator to socket? I'm not at home right now so I'm thinking this through in my head without looking at the smoker.

[Habanero Smoker]

I haven't seen the short jumper cord on the new original, but sometime back; at least 8 years ago Bradley switch the jumper cord that connected the cabinet to the generator from NEMA 5-15P to IEC320C13 to an IEC320C13 to IEC320C14 type of cord.

If the newer models come with the common computer power cord that can plug into the back of the Raptor, then use it. If that short jumper cord is a IEC320C13 to IEC320C14 cord, the male end of that cord will not fit the female socket of the Raptor.

[bradleyincleveland]

Habs,

Once again you are correct! I was not at home and when I did get to look at it, the connections will not work. Computer cord connected, but it was too late last night to fire it up. Will be seasoning the unit today, and ribs tomorrow! Perfect day to test the dual element, only high of 30 today! Pics to follow as Orion requested.

[bradleyincleveland]

Well she is seasoning as we speak! Cannot thank everyone enough on here. With the temps in the 30s I'm very pleased that I decided to go with the dual element over another method (not knocking those by any means).

So one last setup question, is it safe to leave the smoke generator on during the entire cook even though I will not have anymore pucks after the first couple hours? I'm assuming this would just be a waste of energy heating it with no pucks advancing? I ask this because if I place an overnight cook in right before bed and leave the generator on. I leave the temperature dial on "off" setting on the smoke generator since the DigiQ is controlling the temp (hopefully this is what I should be doing?).

Also as I am watching the DigiQ now I am seeing large drops from 206 and back to 225 every so often. I am not sure if this is due to the pucks dropping in the bowl or if my DigiQ was used to and "learned" how the temperature swings were in my Weber Smokey Mountain? Or does it have something to do with the wind and outside temp today around 35?

[bradleyincleveland]

I'm also noticing that when I open the door for a period of time the smoker temp is overshooting quite a bit (went up to 260). It comes back down, but I sm wondering if I should leave the "open lid" feature on. There are only two settings off and on on te digiq that I know. So I eithier have to be very quick with opening and shuttinf or I am going to have overshooting problems.

[Habanero Smoker]

It doesn't matter if you leave the bisquette burner on or off. Often when I would empty the bowl before going to bed for a few hours, I often forget to turn off the bisquette burner, and it would be on for the whole cook. If it is left on the DigiQ will factor in the heat from the burner, so no extra energy should be used.

The wind can be a factor most of the time, but in this case the DigiQ is must likely auto tuning itself. With the Guru products, they auto tune themselves during each cook. If used on the same equipment, the auto tune time shortens quite a bit. When I used mine, I would see +/- 10°F fluctuations during the preheating, then it would zero in.

I had to turn off my "open lid". It seemed with my Bradley, it would cause my cabinet to over shoot by as much as 20°F; if it was on. When I used the DigiQ for my charcoal burner, I would have to turn the "open lid" feature on. It is something you may have to play with, because since I purchased mine they have come out with many versions of their software, and change the algorithm they use to control the heat, so your DigiQ 2 may function a lot differently than mine.