Old BBQ07E with minimal smoke

[Smoke]

First time poster and new owner of a hand me down old BBQ07E Traeger. This one has I think has the original Traeger controller with no cooldown setting or probes. Just a dial with Off, Smoke, then various temp settings.

Something I notice is that it does not generate much smoke. I’m using the Traeger Cherry pellets, but plan to switch to the B&B Championship Blend. I’ve smoked with a friends fairly new Traeger and his smokes a LOT compared to mine. His seems to cycle in heavy smoke/light smoke and back and forth. Mine in comparison is almost alway barely any smoke (other than the initial startup). And the things I smoke on it frankly don’t have a decent amount of smoke flavor.

I wonder if it has something to do with the old controller? Maybe not an advanced algorithm? Or the pellets? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[Marc5868]

Lots of Reddit posts about small amounts of smoke with the Traeger. Typically the temps around 150 seem to be the sweet spot for smoke with Traegers. Tonight was my first cook on a new unit and I had "0" zero smoke on the chicken and when I tasted it, again no or maybe a faint hint of smoke but nothing like I get with my stick burner. Many people suggest getting a small wood chip box and starting the chips to smoke before you put in your meat or fish. Personally, my smoker/grill was a gift or I would have spent a few hundred to get the super smoke button on the next model up from mine. However, my research for the last two weeks does show my style of smoker/grill with billowing smoke on some YouTube videos. I am going to try with a brisket in a couple of days and I am guessing with the fat rendering I will see more smoke than I did today. I will try to remember and post an update to this once I tried the brisket.

 

[Smoke]

I’m wondering if I can replace the controller with a newer version if it will get better. I will try the 150F range next time and see how smoke generation is. I recall reading that the higher the temp, the less the smoke, and that makes sense.

 

[Murphy's Law]

I have a Pro 780 with a D2 controller and I don’t get a lot of smoke. Not sure what you’re after but pellets just don’t smoke as much as a a stick burner, for example.

 

[drich]

First time poster and new owner of a hand me down old BBQ07E Traeger. This one has I think has the original Traeger controller with no cooldown setting or probes. Just a dial with Off, Smoke, then various temp settings.

Something I notice is that it does not generate much smoke. I’m using the Traeger Cherry pellets, but plan to switch to the B&B Championship Blend. I’ve smoked with a friends fairly new Traeger and his smokes a LOT compared to mine. His seems to cycle in heavy smoke/light smoke and back and forth. Mine in comparison is almost alway barely any smoke (other than the initial startup). And the things I smoke on it frankly don’t have a decent amount of smoke flavor.

I wonder if it has something to do with the old controller? Maybe not an advanced algorithm? Or the pellets? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[drich]

First time poster and new owner of a hand me down old BBQ07E Traeger. This one has I think has the original Traeger controller with no cooldown setting or probes. Just a dial with Off, Smoke, then various temp settings.

Something I notice is that it does not generate much smoke. I’m using the Traeger Cherry pellets, but plan to switch to the B&B Championship Blend. I’ve smoked with a friends fairly new Traeger and his smokes a LOT compared to mine. His seems to cycle in heavy smoke/light smoke and back and forth. Mine in comparison is almost alway barely any smoke (other than the initial startup). And the things I smoke on it frankly don’t have a decent amount of smoke flavor.

I wonder if it has something to do with the old controller? Maybe not an advanced algorithm? Or the pellets? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Son bought this old Traeger at a garage sale in 2008. The controller has as been replaced but it works flawlessly. Not sure what your model is but his setting are similar to yours. He cooks on most months of the year with his. We had 3 racks of baby backs Sunday. His does generate a lot of visual smoke but everything has a great smoke flavor and smoke ring. Bottom line you might try replacing the controller it fairly inexpensive and fairly easy to replace. Hope this helps.
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