WSM and Plateau
 

A quick question, and this is probably for those that have had a chance to cook on different smokers. I recently "traded" my BWS Party (dont ask a long story and a bad move on my part) and started cooking on a WSM for home use. I have noticed that my Briskets and Butts seem to plateau more often on a WSM then it ever did on my Party.

Has anyone else noticed this ??

Mike, did you run a guru on the Backwoods? My WSM is predictable, but the meat isnt. Never know if a butt will hang and for how long. usually hangs about 160 for 90 mins then rises quickly. As long as i know this happens, its no big deal.

Only experience I have with the backwoods was cookin with 3eyz and he has all the toys from BBQ Guru. That was sweeeet!

Hey Beerguy, no guru just the standard Party. I hear ya on the meat not being predictable.... :)

No pics.......

I'm thinking that temperature is temperature and it doesn't really matter what you are cooking it on, if its 225 on a WSM, and 225 on the BWS (that you traded and I will end up with someday), or 225 on the Lang, I cant see where its the cooker that causes the plateau, most likely it is the piece of meat, like Beerguy said.
Honestly, I cant see where the plateau's are caused by the WSM, you must learn to adapt to your piece of cooking equipment. Maybe we can get together some day between 6am and 11pm and I will show you how to cook on a WSM.

Scott

Hey Mike!

The only two that I can vouch for is the WSM and my Spicewine, never cooked on a Backwoods....yet.

I haven't noticed much of a difference overall...but...I have had a couple of briskets and a couple of butts that never did plateau.

On both cookers.

The most recent one was a few weeks ago on the Spicewine when I had a brisket that went to 190 in about 5 hours but when I did the poke test, that thing was like a big chunk of rubber. I ended up having to take it all the way up to 213 before it would pass the poke test. Turned out really nice. Ended up getting 2 referrals from it so it must not have been too bad.

Just a thought, did you ever callibrate your therms on the BWS?
Wonder if you were cooking a bit hotter than you thought you were?

I doubt if that is the case, just a thought........

Just curious, water in the pan or dry?

Z,
I know Mike cooked with water in the water pan.

Scott

The most likely explanation is that every butt has its own cooking and plateau time. You just may hit a few longer time ones.

On the other hand, I have long suspected that radiant heat might affect the plateau time. I speculate that this is because radiant heat penetrates deeper than than the heat from convection. The BGE cooks a little faster than the WSM at the same temperatures and I believe this is the reason why.

I suppose it is possible that the new smoker radiates more heat than the WSM?

Do you have a WSM ?? :eek:

Correct, water in the pan.

Uh, yes I have a WSM.

Scott

Never had an issue with my WSM, but the radiant versus convection sounds logical. I also don't use water in the pan on the WSM, have used the sand mod and the clay pot mod. Don't know if either of those could be an issue. Suppose you could cook on the top grate and remove the heat sink and see if the plateu goes away.

I'll trade ya my smokey joe for your Lang?:twisted::redface:

I think this is evidenced by the faster cook times on a UDS cooking at the same temps as indirect heat cookers. As for why a Party would have more radiant heat, I don't know. That's not direct heat in the party.

Have travis call me, I'll explain it to him, and then he can school you on how to cook on a WSM. Or you could just get sfisch to help you out.:rolleyes: