New, frustrating, but still great

[Slydog]

I just bought a new pit boss vertical smoker yesterday and just want to give everyone that’s curious an insight on my experience just Incase they had the same experience you’re not alone. Opening the box it seemed like there was a lot of little dents in the smoker but nothing so bad that I was going to package it back up and send it back I’ll just live with it. I do wish put boss would package this thing better or maybe shipping would label it fragile and be careful with these things in the future. They are too heavy and the thin metal walls take damage easily. I got it put together and super excited of course I got a new toy. I start the prime and burn off and I get error code erH which is “overheating” in the manual. I let it cool off and try again. This time when it got up to 275° it threw erL code... that’s not in the manual.. so I call the service #.. sat on hold for a little bit so I hung up and try resetting the smoker again.. this time I kept the temperature at my cook setting and it worked, I smoked 7 hours last night and was happy with my results. Then I cleaned the smoker. This morning I wake up and want to throw the meat on early. Start up and the temp was roughly 250° before my erL code came back.. wth.. so I let it cool off again and try to reset again, nope, not this time. It won’t reset it keeps showing the same erL code. So I call the service line again this time I wait bc I don’t have a choice. I finally talk to the rep and he is very professional and willing to help me. He tells me bc of my issues that I explained he thinks it’s the control board. Must be bad and he will send me a new one ASAP. Sweet, however I’ve already prepped my meat and I’m annoyed. Who wants to spend this kind of money just to have issues immediately? So out of curiosity I go look for the control board this morning and would you believe the wire coming from the temperature probe came loose and is half hanging out of the connector.. well.. needless to say this thing works amazingly now so far I’m 99.9% sure that was the problem. So my rant is please freaking package these things better so other customers don’t have have to deal with the bs I dealt with just bc of a loose wire. However, now that it works I’m very happy with this smoker it’s a great product and I’m happy with the way my food turns out on it. Thanks and good lucks guys!

 

[K. Moslander]

Hey, I know exactly how you feel Slydog..nothing more frustrating than having everything ready and then a big ol monkey wrench gets thrown in there.. Glad everything worked out for ya

 

[MikeInFla]

yeah, I had a loose nut that fell off the auger. This caused the auger not to turn which made me think it had seized up. I called tech support and they were VERY helpful and stayed on the phone with me for a couple of hours. When I took the auger out it wasn't seized up and I noticed a nut had fallen off which connect the motor to the auger.

They sent me a new one but I was able to find the same type at Ace and I was back in business. The HARDEST part was trying to get the control panel reinserted into the hopper. That took me forever and they do not make it easy to put it back in. They do need to modify that to make removal easier but it has been running like a champ since and I've had it since Dec 2018.

Last weekend I purchased a Series-3 vertical smoker and got it assembled but haven't had time to cook on it yet. I assembled it and did the burn in and even cranked it up to 400 for the last 10 minutes and had no error codes. Will throw a boston butt on it tomorrow for probably a 8 or 10 hour cook! I have done them on my PD pellet grill but I am expecting better results in the Copperhead vertical.