Humphrey's Pint Operating Tips

I had the advanced airflow system on mine. Had it about halfway closed and temps were only 25 degrees different from top to bottom. Also it takes a bit to warm up the pit. It can take up to an hour or so even with a fan. I have a 10 cfm auber that worked just fine. Got the pipe adapter for it and had no problems.

Quick insights.

I light and preheat mine with a weed burner using lump and let the weed burner bring the interior temp up to about 175-200. I leave the fire box door open, the ball valve and top vent open all the way, until I'm about 25 degrees below my target temp. I then close the ball valve to about the 8 o' clock position and close the chimney so it's 3/8"-1/2" open. Close the fire box door.

It'll usually rise up to about your desired temp. If it settles a little low I open the valve to 7 o'clock. Usually I'm about 30-40 minutes in at this point. I generally run the valve at 7 o'clock open. If it overshoots a tad just be patient. I usually put meat on after it's hit temp and stabilized. If I add water to the pan I do it after it's at temp and add HOT water to the pan. I also always use foil full size kitchen pans for easy cleanup.

My damper on the inside is exactly where I received it. I think 2 and half of the holes are open. I seem to get about a 20-25 degree difference across the grates top to bottom. The top grate will be hotter than the lower grates. I put chicken or anything I want to cook hotter on the top grate.

One thing I've noticed and haven't seen mentioned is the temp, with the valve at that 7 o'clock position, seems to maintain the temp at whatever temp you get the fire to originally. It seems to maintain 250, 275, 325 or 350 without moving the valve. Hope that makes sense. If I get the cooker to 250 it keeps it at 250. If I heat it to 350 it still seems to hold 350 with the valve in the same position. Others may chime in with a different experience.

So far I'm using it as it came. I've started 4 times to order a Digi-Q but I like just letting the cooker do it's thing so far.

It LOVES to run at 250-275. If you want it to run hotter you will have to pay a little more attention to it and it will run through the lump faster. Longest cook so far was 12 hours on about 2/3 of a load of lump. Can't remember the temp as it was a mixed cook where I change the temp midway through.

I know one thing. You will love it.

Hopefully some more owners will chime in. I'd be interested in hearing their experience.

If you want more temp differential from top to bottom you can open up the inside damper in the rear. The more holes you uncover the more temp differential you will have.

Also there is a Humphrey's facebook page you can request to join. Good info on there.

Long post

I received my Down East Beast a couple weeks ago. I ordered thru Kevin at Northeast Professional BBQ Smokinit. Very easy process. I'm a newb at using an insulated cabinet. So take my comments with that in mind. I have done at least 7 cooks so far, probably more.
I have not messed with the interior exhaust. I just adjust the timing of when I place different items into the smoker so far.
My Flame Boss 100 controller came a few days after I started using the DEB.
Using the Flame Boss, the DEB over shoots the set temp by 50* every time. The DEB takes a very long time to come down in temp. Typically 1 hr 45 mins. So I set my temp that 50 * below what temp I want to cook at. Takes 30 minutes on average so far to get to temp once the hot coals are added to the coal basket.
After loading meat and stabilizing for around 2 hrs. I reset my temp to the real temp I wanted to cook at. This has worked fairly well. Wide open 2" intake all lump max temp was 425* which I ran for 3 hrs just to test. No meat.
Like mentioned, for me lump burns faster than briquettes. Every time. I've used a combo of both a few cooks, most of the lump is burned up where the briquettes are half used. I find that a bit weird compared to other cookers I have or use.
I plan on opening the interior exhaust full and use just the top exh flap and see how things work for me. But I wanted to get a full understanding of the original design before experimenting to much. I'll get there.
I haven't used any water or firebricks etc. Haven't found a need yet. All the food has comes out excellent as is. I don't plan/see on ever using water, PIA to me. If I need the heat sink, I'll try firebricks. I do cook year round!
Temps are pretty even thru out the smoker. The highest grate of food using a dip pan below each grate of meat will cook a bit faster than the next grate down. Not by much, just noting. That is what I have experienced so far.
I have only had to rotate food once so far. That was racks of pieces of fish, and being fish. Varying in thickness etc. If that makes sense. The outer sides/edges of the grates are a touch hotter than the middle of the grates. Again not by much. Just noting.
It is nice to have the extra grates to use drip pans under different types of meats. While the cooker is loaded.
I have made 3 new grates and plan on making more. Just personal preference. I have a total of 7 grates from Humphrey's. For some foods I prefer non-expanded metal, rod/bar type. With a handle. Not the ones offered by Humphrey's. Just different. Modified Weber grates actually.
One thing I would have preferred is a different design on is the ash pan to come out with the coal pan ( like another brand cabinet smoker out there). And handles mounted on the coal pan. It is heavy and not easy to grab/hold. I made a handle for mine. Again personal preference.
You will have ashes out in front of the cooker every time you pull out the coal pan. Just the nature of the beast. The ash pan does get all the ashes from the coal pan inside the smoker.
I'd expect you will really like yours when you get it.
Anyway, that is my experience so far. Hope it helped.

Some good points. After my first cook I ran to the restaurant supply store and bought a full size bakers sheet pan. Anytime I'm loading charcoal, emptying the basket or basting/removing meat it sits in front of the cooker. Keeps things neat and safer.

My cooker is on a wood deck under a pergola where we had a hot tub so keeping coals and juices off the wood is necessary.

RatSass said:

Some good points. After my first cook I ran to the restaurant supply store and bought a full size bakers sheet pan. Anytime I'm loading charcoal, emptying the basket or basting/removing meat it sits in front of the cooker. Keeps things neat and safer.

My cooker is on a wood deck under a pergola where we had a hot tub so keeping coals and juices off the wood is necessary.

Click to expand...

I use a oil drip pan from an auto parts store. It is bigger and cheaper than a sheet pan. I can fit the charcoal box and a chimney at the same time. I did get the idea from other Humphrey owners so I can't take credit for it.

I don't have the Pint, but I own the Down East Beast, and have cooked on it for almost 4 years. I will say that I am extremely happy with my purchase and love to use it just as much as the day it first arrived. I used to have a collection of smokers, but after using the DEB for a few months, I parted with them by giving them to friends and family members. I did keep my Weber grill for cooking steaks and grilling chicken, I kept a Camp Chef propane smoker to use as a holding oven when I cook for large crowds at my VFW, American Legion, or at my Church.

It takes roughly 45 -50 minutes to come to full temperature. Once it's there and you adjust the pinwheel intakes, it holds temperatures like a rock.

As far as internal exhaust settings, I left it right where it came from the factory. I do however keep the outer exhaust at 50% where the manufacturer suggest to have it during cooking. It works so well that I have never found a need to tinker or adust it in any way, shape, or manor.

I would suggest that before you purchase any type of pit controller that you learn to use your pint without any gadgets. Once I leaned the basics of the Down East Beast, I then upgraded to BBQ Guru Digi-Q II. Not because I needed to, but rather because I wanted piece of mind while I sleep like a baby through the night. If I were younger I might enjoy checking on the smoker several times throughout the night. But once I crossed into the upper 60's, it's just not that much fun anymore, I cherish my sleep.

I see where someone poster earlier that their PID controller overshoots, that is not a function of the cooker, but rather the controller. I can tell you that the Digi-Q II has an anticipatory algorithm and it continually adjusts airflow so that it doesn't overshoot the set temperature by more than 10 degree in the beginning. Once we are past that point it doesn't vary by more than 1 or 2 degree for the remained of the cook.

Also the internal temperature are relatively equal as well. I have the drop-in water pan because I did not want to lose any cooking space. The water pan hold about 3 gallons and holds consistent temperatures in the cooker. Depending upon my shelf spacing for the cook, it only varies a degree or or two between shelves, and about five to eight degree from absolute top to absolute bottom. But the DEB is a tall smoker and I attribute the consistent temperature to using the water pan as the manufacturer designed. There is no moisture build-up in the cooker as the downward airflow exit right above the water pan taking any evaporated water with it.

In my experience the DEB cooks hotter longer with lump charcoal. I prefer to buy Cowboy Lump in 8lb bags. One bag will give me a 14 hour cook with enough red-hot coals to add more charcoal if needed. I also use Stubb's briquettes in the DEB, but I also buy KBB on sale, and although I do use them in the Weber, I have used them in the Humphrey's. With KBB, you wind up with a lot more ash to clean-up but it does work and the burn time when compared to lump is diminished.

The DEB is well insulated and very fuel efficient. It uses the same amount of charcoal whether I cook one pork but or 10 pork butts. I also use a full sized disposable pan under my last rack of meat just to keep the water pan clean. While the water pan is stainless and will clean up easily, the foil pan is just easier to handle and move around. I usually rinse the disposable pan out and clean it several times before deciding to discard it.

With the use of the A-Maze-N pellet smoker the DEB makes an awesome cold smoker with lots of shelf room, it also allows me to hang 50 pounds of sausage, lots of pork belly for bacon, and lots of room the hang hams.

My DEB seems to like to run very well at 250° - 275° without any effort. I have noticed that when I go to a higher temperature when cooking turkey, that fuel consumption is increased.

I wish you the best on your new smoker, and congratulations on selecting a well made smoker. Kevin and Chad will be more than happy to answer your questions, so don't be afraid to give them a call, even if you think it's not an important question, they will have an answer.

.

I really have no need to mess with my Pint since the original setup I ran works exactly how I want it.

Internal Advanced Airflow gate open about 20%, exhaust stack open about an inch on the corner.

I use the T-Maze and have the slide out pan, no water, fire bricks in the pan.

I put a few handfuls of lit charcoal in the back right corner of the basket, shut the doors and turn on the CyberQ to desired pit temp and put the meat in much of the time early so it catches more smoke at lower temps and no sync later.

I really have zero issues with mine running it this way and my temp ranges are about 25 degrees top to bottom, with the probe in the upper rack area. Pleased as punch all the time with this setup.

Curious Mad Man - When you say disposable tray under last rack..you got a pic of one of those?

I also have a DEB just purchased in June up the road from Chad and Team Humphreys. It was the best part of moving to Maine!!

Thanks if you can do and any other comments or tricks are always appreciated!!
Jim

Kbunk said:

Curious Mad Man - When you say disposable tray under last rack..you got a pic of one of those?

I also have a DEB just purchased in June up the road from Chad and Team Humphreys. It was the best part of moving to Maine!!

Thanks if you can do and any other comments or tricks are always appreciated!!
Jim

Click to expand...

http://www.samsclub.com/sams/bakers-chefs-aluminum-foil-steam-table-pans-full-size-15-ct/200079.ip

I had the time and decided to experiment

This is with the DEB not the pint.
Outside temps in the 20's. Wind chill in the teens.
[FONT=&quot]This is my experiment/results with my Down East Beast. Testing/learning “how even” the cooker is from top to bottom etc. Your results may very.[/FONT]
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[FONT=&quot]First I ran my DEB with the interior exh at the factory setting, the top exh at 50% open. No water pan, no trays. Just cooking grates and 2 temp probes. One probe, center of the grate near the top of the cook chamber. The other probe, centered near the bottom of the cook chamber. I wrote down temp readings typically every 15 mins on average. After stabilizing the smoker temps. At 1 hr, the upper probe was 9* higher than the lower probe. With the factory settings.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Next, I opened the interior exh to full open. The top exh still at 50% open. Once stable, the top was 4* higher than the lower probe. Next I opened the top exh to full open. Less than 15 minutes later and for the next hour the temps were dead even top and bottom. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Next test was with food and a aluminum full hotel drip pan under the food. A 3 hr cook. After getting to the set temp and stable I added the drip pan and meat. 2 lg chickens. They filled one grate. I almost went with separate grates for each bird. Both almost did not fit on one grate. This test was with the interior exh at wide open and the exterior exh at wide open. Where I had dead even temps in earlier testing.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] At 30 minutes into the cook, the Lower probe was 24* higher! So I closed the top exh to 50%. I expected slowing down the air flow would more equalize interior temps. This ended up raising the lower probe temp to a differential of 60* higher than the upper probe within 15 minutes. I reopened the top exh to full open but the temp difference of 60* never changed during the rest of the cook. At this time I do not know if the temp differential would have stayed at 24* or not with the top exh at wide open. The temp difference not dropping could be due to being an insulated cooker and cook time left involved. The rear chicken cooked a bit faster than the front chicken. Not by much.
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[FONT=&quot] Before reaching my required internal temp. A difference of internal temp of 10* between the 2 birds. Similar sized birds. The birds showed no signs of more heat on the bottom vs the top of the birds. As the temp probes showed the cooker at. They turned out great as usual.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Next test was with the interior exh at the factory setting, the top exh at 50%. This was a shorter cook 1.5hrs required. Smoking a full hotel pan full of nuts. Once the cooker was stable, during the whole cook the lower probe temp ran 20* higher than the upper probe temp. Similar cook temp as above.
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[FONT=&quot]I would think/expect that heat coming from the coal box area is heating the chambers separation plate and is having the effect of higher temps in the lower part of cook chamber from that heat. The 2 different test show quite a temp difference when the interior and top exh are at factory suggested settings. Verses wide open. I had much better flow with both at wide open. A lot less restriction.
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[FONT=&quot] Recovery temp is very fast with either exh setting.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]I myself do not believe having a heat sink either water or fire bricks would change the results all that much to end up with even heat from top to bottom. Which everything I have read states is typically the case. Just my theory/experience. A heat sink in a cooker is for maintaining a stable temp. And being that the heat sink is above the coals, it will continue to hold the heat created from below.[/FONT]
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[FONT=&quot]Take from my experiment what you will. I just know I haven’t completely figured out all nuances of this DEB as of yet. All my other smokers/cookers took a lot of time to dial in what I wanted/expected. And I plan on doing the same with the DEB. So far, it is a great smoker. And all the different foods I have smoked so far have came out excellent. [/FONT]

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I am a newb pint owner. I've had it now about 6-7 weeks. There is very good input above and will try not to duplicate feedback other than to say I'm very happy with my purchase as well. I ran my first sub 30 deg cook yesterday and the cooker performed excellent, stable temps all the way through.

I have been using royal oak lump lately and prefer it so far over stumps. I generally cook at 250-275 and Agee that this temp range runs well. I have cooked a turkey and ran it at 350 with no problems as well.

For my setup, I have not changed the airflow settings since coming from the factory. I've had the exhaust full open but will try running at 50% after reading the input above. I have a slide out water pan and use a foil pan inside it as mentioned to help with cleanup. After I light a fire, I will add some hot water from a tea kettle to the pan, about an inch deep. I have not had a need to use more than that so far. I use cyberQ to help with temp control and just figured out how to get the wifi setup correctly. This was more of a struggle that I expected but there was a fair amount of operator error on my part....

The product produced off this cooker has been very good so far. I used to have a 22WSM. On that cooker, I always needed to wrap my ribs to get good color and tenderness. On the pint, I've stopped wrapping and find that the ribs stay moist, color is perfect, tenderness is very good, potentially not as good as wrapping but still more practice needed. I will post some pics of the ribs I cooked yesterday later today so you can see for yourself.

Hope this helps and enjoy your purchase! I was really leaning towards a stick burner but having an insulated cooker and wanting to cook year round living in NH, the Pint has been a great fit so far.

HI again! Pics below on the ribs I mentioned plus of the new Pint! I love this thing....:biggrin1:

One other note. If you have not made the purchase yet, I would highly recommend getting the angled legs as an option. They make the pit very easy to move around plus raise the working hieght of the cooker which makes easy access for checking and loading not the fire box and cook chamber IMO.

Kbunk said:

Curious Mad Man - When you say disposable tray under last rack..you got a pic of one of those?

I also have a DEB just purchased in June up the road from Chad and Team Humphreys. It was the best part of moving to Maine!!

Thanks if you can do and any other comments or tricks are always appreciated!!
Jim

Click to expand...

These are available at Restraunt Depot, Costco, BJ's, and Sam's... very common item.


http://www.webstaurantstore.com/cho...table-pan-medium-depth-10-pack/999FS7800.html

stanukenas said:

Thanks for the pics Looks great. I did get the angled legs as I will be wheeling it from the garage to the backyard for use. I also got the drop down side table removable water pan and a couple of other options. Did you find the probe ports being a big help? I oredered 2 with mine wasnt sure and just figured better to have and not use than not have and want.

Click to expand...

That sounds great! Yes, I like having the probe port and you could probably run four wires through it without much trouble. Having a second port is not a bad option.

Since my last test I have completed at least 6 more cooks. On recommendation from Kevin at Northeast Professional BBQ that I needed to have some kind of heat sink. I added 4 fire bricks into an aluminum pan and placed that on the bottom of the cook chamber. That right there stops the bottom area of the DEB from heating up faster than the exh coming down thru the unit. Ending up with on average a 6 deg spread between top and bottom of the smoker. This is with the original interior exh setting and the top exh at about a 3/4" open.
The upper grates typically cook a bit faster than the lower grates as you can see here where I have 8 center cut ham steaks all about the same size/thickness. This is a few hours into the smoke. I ended up pulling the ham steaks as they got done and also rotated the grates to try have them end up all done around the same time. It only took 30 minutes longer to get them all done to where I wanted them.

The Flame Boss sometimes does not over shoot the set temp by more than 8 degrees since adding the fire bricks. Sometimes it still overshoots by 50*
I have to suggest either using sand, firebricks or water as a heat sink. But really it is to keep the lower area from heating up from the coals below before the whole smoker can come up to temp.

If anyone is interested in the grates I made using 3/8" round stock on the sides for strength, along with shortened 22 inch Weber type grates.
I can slide the grates out and there is no flexing/bending. The grates stay in place and hold as much food as you can fit on the grate. Also the wire handles allow me to pull out the grate with food and a grate below it with a drip pan with one hand. I can't do that with the original grates. ( too many hand surgeries) This stops the dripping of grease/food/sauce etc when a grate is slid out when messin with the food.
Anyway, I hope this helps someone. It is an awesome smoker. If your on the fence. Jump off and get one.

My grates are the same width as the Humphrey's originals. The photo just makes it look wider.