Thank you for making this video!! I am getting ready to buy the Cyberq this week ( I want to be able to run to the store or monitor it at work while the family is at home if needed). The adjustments of the top vent and the Pit Viper have been bugging me as most videos do not explain how to set the dampers much, so thank you for doing that! I am excited to be able to do a brisket or pork butt overnight and finally get some sleep. I have the Big Steel Keg 5000 and I will admit that getting the dampers set exactly right to hold temps has been a real struggle for me. I know it is operator error but the ease of this is very appealing.

Just got my Kamado today!!

I just bought a used Akorn for $150. Its in good shape. I am very excited to use it. I am also very blessed to have so many awesome how-to videos on the akorn. I will be picking up some fresh ocean fish filets tomorrow to cook!

@SmokinSteve

4 жыл бұрын

Good deal ... the Akorn is a great smoker/grill. It will serve you well and make a lot of good eatin’ for you and the family. Enjoy & Smoke On!

@blake_229

2 жыл бұрын

$150 is a steal!

I’ve been using a digiQ for years and years on my ceramic BGE’s and Primo cookers. I now own an Akorn 20” and a 14” Jr. to travel with and take on the boat.and will use it on them as well. Absolutely a must have tool if you are addicted to bbq.

@SmokinSteve

6 жыл бұрын

Sounds like you got you a bunch of cookers .... nice. I'm thinking about stepping up to a ceramic. Looking into the Primo Oval .. looks interesting. Do you have a favorite?

@hardtruth2039

6 жыл бұрын

SmokinSteve I had 5 green eggs and then switched to primo, long story. But I know George the owner of primo and he made me some deals years ago and I love the fact that they are made in the USA. I still have a primo xl oval and an 18” primo kamado and like them but know that they will over time crack due to heat stress over time. Does really affect their performance and can be replaced under warranty. I like the Akorn grills because they travel well and the lid isn’t heavy like a ceramic. Happy Qing. Oh yeah my favorite has always been the primo oval XL. The Kamado Joe 24” is a nice grill but the 24’ round cookers have a shallow top and I didn’t care for that.

@SmokinSteve

6 жыл бұрын

Hard Truth I would love to do some reviews on the Primo on my channel and show a bunch of smokes using the Primo. I’ll have to try to get a hold of them. Gotta love the fact they’re made in USA

Looks good. I have the flame boss for my kamado.

@SmokinSteve

6 жыл бұрын

Chyron Green It’s all good. Nice to set it & forget it 👍

Thank you Steve for your videos. I just received my DigiQ yesterday and plan to smoke ribs today. Do you keep the top and bottom vents barely open when you are starting the fire or do you leave them both wide open as you normally would for a certain amount of time? Thanks.

@SmokinSteve

5 жыл бұрын

I just leave them wide open long enough to make sure the coals are lit and won’t go out. It’s kind of trial by error thing, these things require such a small amount of air to maintain temps that you may have to just find out what works best for you. I would recommend setting it up for a lower temp than what you are actually shooting for and wait and see where you wind up and then make necessary adjustments from that point. Good luck and have fun with it.

Getting excited about mine arriving this week.

@SmokinSteve

3 жыл бұрын

Nice! Have fun with it ... a lot of good eats coming your way soon!

nice vid buddy. cheers

Would have loved to see your choice of wood and setup of charcoal.

@SmokinSteve

3 жыл бұрын

I just pour in charcoal, I generally put enough in to fill it up because when the cook is over you simply put the fire out by closing all the vents. That way you can reuse the remaining coals. The wood chunks are kind of put in various places in the pile with some being placed down into the pile. The idea is to keep smoke rolling so you need to spread wood out to smoke as the coals continue to burn down into the pile.

Hey Steve, nice videos. I too have the Akron, and have used lump and minion method and heat shield to attempt low and slows at 225. But, its been a real pain for me to dial in the bottom/top vents to close to a set it and forget it setup to maintain say 220 to 250. Have you been able to make vent settings to say smoke overnight? I did not want to go to the powered air/temp controllers unless absolutely necessary. Your thoughts please? Thanks.

@SmokinSteve

6 жыл бұрын

Hi Mike..... I have had pretty good luck with low and slow just using the top and bottom dampers. I normally go with 250° and it hangs right in there with small fluctuations in temps which only require small bumps to the dampers. If you're wanting to do an overnighter and want to try to get some sleep I suggest using a remote Thermometer with an alarm on it that you can set for both high and low temps and will alarm if it goes either way. I would advise this even if using an auto controller ..... there is always a possibility of something going wrong and temps drifting off and if that happens you want to know about it so you can make your adjustments. Good luck with it

@mikeinpcola5543

6 жыл бұрын

Thanks Steve, its cool to kick the tires with another Akorn owner. So couple more questions please...do you find lump charcoal to perhaps have inconsistency in burning and getting consistent temps (and fires going out even) when such a small amount of the fuel is required to be/stay lit during a 225 session? Also, have you ever tried to simply use only one vent to control air flow...as in leaving bottom vent wide open and controlling with top only, or is that too much air flow? Changing both vents to me is like one foot on the gas and one foot on the brake. Thanks again.

@SmokinSteve

6 жыл бұрын

Mike Hamlin I’ve always had very good luck with lump charcoal and will never go to briquets. I’ve never had the fire go out after getting up to smoking temps and always use both dampers to control temps as shown in the videos. As long as you’re letting Air in and out there should be air flow across the coals to keep it lit. If you overshoot your temp and close vents to get your temp down then you stand the chance of sniffing out the lit coals. Hope this helps. If you follow my videos on temp control you should be just fine.

Steve great video. To maintain 240° with the digiq, how was your top vent set? Thanks

@SmokinSteve

5 жыл бұрын

Top vent was opened just a tiny bit, a little larger than the little circle

@davidpearson5013

5 жыл бұрын

@@SmokinSteve thank you

The blinking numbers would drive me crazy

Hey Steve. I have the Akork and a CyberQ Cloud. We are getting into bbq season. I need some advice if you can help. Sometimes I can get everything dial in perfect but only after I over shoot the temp. I fired the Akorn up recently and over shot the temp to 305. I was looking for 250. As I am waiting for the temp to come down the fire goes out and the fan was blowing at 100%. I fired it up again and it went to 450. It took 2 hours to get to 250. Once it did everything worked flawlessly. Any advice on how to start the fire and get the temp to slowly rise? Thank you.

@SmokinSteve

5 жыл бұрын

Sounds like the cyber q is blowing too much air. There is no limit on the cyber q as to the amount of air that enters the damper of the smoker. It is either on or off and the fact that the Akorn only needs a small amount of air to get up to temps makes me think that this may be the case. The Digi Q has its own damper and you can limit the amount of air that enters the damper of the grill. Some of the air is restricted from entering from the built in damper on the Digi Q. .... I think I would try to get it up to desired temp by manually adjusting dampers and then maybe use the Cuber Q to maintain, but even with that being said the Akorn just needs a tiny bit of air and the Cyber Q is either full on or full off. I am rambling here a bit, but I hope this all makes some sense.

@darbycarpenter3032

5 жыл бұрын

Hey Steve. Thank you for the advice. I think I have the problem solved. I have been literally practicing starting up the Akorn. Hopefully this may help others as well. I use the Weber chimney starter to start the fire. I also forgot about the damper on the fan as I had it wide open. Soooo these are my results. 1. I use the Weber chimney to fire up the Akorn. I was filling it all the way up with the CyberQ damper wide open. Solution. Fill the chimney to the first hole. Just start with a small amount of lump charcoal. After it is burning well dump. Add about twice as much charcoal on top. 2. Put the CyberQ damper on half and the top of The Akorn setting on just barely number 1. The temp comes up slow like it should Thanks Steve again

Where did you get the adapter for the pit viper from?

@SmokinSteve

5 жыл бұрын

The DigiQ and the adaptor came from www.bbqguru.com/ole

I purchased a temp controller for my Akorn Kamado (not a DigiQ) and I noticed that when the fan kicks on, the temp in the grill actually drops (??). This is causing an issue, because the fan over-stokes the coals, then when it kicks off, the temp rises to a much higher temp. The blower fan on the model I have is 12 CFM. (I had the top vent open only the littlest amount and was trying to maintain a temp of about 250 deg.) I looked on the website for the unit and there was no troubleshooting assistance for this issue. Any suggestions?

@SmokinSteve

4 жыл бұрын

I have found that the blower may put out too much air and it tends to get grill too hot. The Akorn doesn’t need much air at all to maintain 250°. Some of the temp controllers have a damper on them to restrict the air flow when the blower is on which would help the over heating problem. If yours doesn’t have a damper maybe you can rig up something to restrict the amount of air that enters the grill from the blower. It is definitely a learning process and you may be better served just relying on the Akorn Dampers alone. I have always had good luck with damper control. Good luck with it and I hope this has helped a bit. Every situation is different it’s just a matter of figuring it out. It’s all related to the air and the dampers

@johnnyg507

4 жыл бұрын

@@SmokinSteve Thanks for the tip. I was just surprised that the blower actually made the temp go down, but I suppose it could be an airflow issue -- too much air. The fan on the unit is 12V DC, and I have a small low-voltage DC motor controller that I can hook in line with it, so I might try that and see if turning the fan down/slower will fix the issue. I'll write again and let you know what I find out! I agree with you that the Akorn is pretty darn air tight and for the most part, I can get by with the dampers. But, I just feel like I have to babysit it throughout a slow cook. It can tend to be breezy here in the upper Midwest; the wind changes directions and starts blowing in my lower vent more and in not too long, temp raises above ideal... I adjust the dampers, then the wind shifts or drops out, and now the temp drops below ideal. I have even felt that if my grill is in direct sunlight, it seems to have an effect on the temp (but not 100% sure on that one-- maybe me being over analytical :-D) Anyway, that's really the reason I have been trying to tune-in a temp controller. i want to set it and be able to do other things around my house without coming back to find my grill has dropped or jumped temp significantly since I last tweaked the dampers.

@johnnyg507

4 жыл бұрын

@@SmokinSteve I wanted to post an update in case it would be helpful for anyone else. I did purchase and put in the low voltage controller I mentioned in my other reply (was less than $5 on Amazon ... i'll put the link below)... that seemed to do the trick!!! I tested it and the temp went up gradually as desired. I still need to practice using the temp controller, because as you have noted, it seems to be a rather fine line between regulating the temp on an Akorn and temperature spikes due to *too much* air. I have seen people (via KZread) use their temp controllers to start or get their grills up to temp, but the couple of times I have tried that on my Akorn with my temp controller, it has resulted in an overheated grill and seems to take a long time to come down to desired temp. www.amazon.com/ALEDECO-Voltage-Motor-Speed-Controller/dp/B07P2BLG2L/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=aledeco+Low+Voltage+Dc&qid=1570738913&sr=8-3

@leecampbell2477

4 жыл бұрын

my party q adaptor does not fit my Akorn

I guess I can't see the usefulness of this device unless it helps you to stop the dreaded overshoot when you first fire up the grill. If it can do that reliably, it might be worth the cost.

@MrColbrot

5 жыл бұрын

get the tip top temp

I have had one for several yrs, USELESS, the fan will not work.

@dank9288639

4 жыл бұрын

what do you mean

steve, i love your vids, but i gotta tell you....tower fan and damper control...the acorn takes care of itself... all those gadets are just not nessassary ...cheers bud

@SmokinSteve

5 жыл бұрын

Tom Marsh I agree, they do take care of themselves, but there are several who struggle with there temps for one reason or another and this may be a solution for those who have problems holding their temps.

@beasthunt

5 жыл бұрын

Disagree. My Akorn can never keep temp. Ever. The closest it came was using a Tip Top Temp once.

@SmokinSteve

5 жыл бұрын

Wow, I’m surprised to hear that. I never have had any problems with temps and holding temps with the Akorn. You must have some air leaks or something going on that’s not normal. As long as you’re making proper damper adjustments, temperatures should be manageable.

@beasthunt

5 жыл бұрын

@@SmokinSteve I'm not sure. I've had it for about 4 years now and that dern thing is murder to keep at temp. I'm going to replace all of the gaskets and just ordered a few new parts for her.

@MrColbrot

5 жыл бұрын

@@beasthunt whats your biggest issue. the tip top temp works perfectly provided you dont over shoot.