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QMaster Lite ATC - Thoughts and opinions


valve90210

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16 hours ago, valve90210 said:

That looks great, will be interesting to see how well it works. what happens with the ash in your kettle?

Sadly I can't do the same on my kettle as the bottom where the ash collector is and where the air inlet is, is a 3 inch hole... I'm wondering about just drilling hole and mounting the fan adapter on the side bu opposite where the coals would be, I probably wouldn't even need the snorkel type thing I've designed as I think the fan blows hard enough to push air all the way to the coals...

Scott, the Ash should fall to the bottom of the bowl. The elbow feeding the air in, by accident is the same level as the bottom of the grill, so the as is below the air feed. Also the elbow helps steady the charcoal rack. When I placed the charcoal on one side, it tips the rack as all the weight is on one side. The elbow helps to stop the tipping.

Did a run last night and the results were pretty good.

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17 hours ago, valve90210 said:

 I'm wondering about just drilling hole and mounting the fan adapter on the side bu opposite where the coals would be, I probably wouldn't even need the snorkel type thing I've designed as I think the fan blows hard enough to push air all the way to the coals...

That's how I set up the PartyQ, SnS & DnG, and how I intend to use for the Qmaster.  Be careful, though, to make the hole where it doesn't interfere with the vents in any way

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37 minutes ago, Smokin Monkey said:

Scott, the Ash should fall to the bottom of the bowl. The elbow feeding the air in, by accident is the same level as the bottom of the grill, so the as is below the air feed. Also the elbow helps steady the charcoal rack. When I placed the charcoal on one side, it tips the rack as all the weight is on one side. The elbow helps to stop the tipping.

Did a run last night and the results were pretty good.

I had the exact same issue with the charcoal rack  on my el cheapo kettle. I ended up putting 5 nuts and bolts through the body all round to support it, which seems to work really well.

That's really handy re the elbow. Good to hear it ran well yesterday.

 

4 minutes ago, Liomer said:

That's how I set up the PartyQ, SnS & DnG, and how I intend to use for the Qmaster.  Be careful, though, to make the hole where it doesn't interfere with the vents in any way

As luck would have it on my kettle there aren't any vents in the body, the air inlet is in the middle of the bottom along with the ash collector.

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  • 2 months later...

I'm looking at picking one of these up too. I've got an older style weber kettle (with the 3 vents at the bottom, not the one touch - pictured below, not mine but the same!). Does anyone know which adapter I need from those available at http://www.allchinas.com/lite/ ? I'm thinking the E adapter can probably be screwed into one of the 4 holes? Not sure what the thread size is though.

More generally, do you guys think these ATCs are worth their price tag? I'm pretty decent and keeping my temps around my target, but it requires a bit of running up and down my stairs to adjust the vents (every hour or so I suppose, but it means I'm pretty much always looking at the temps). I'd love just to set and forget these smokes so I was hoping this would enable that. 

IMG_5107.jpg

Edited by Ret
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Hi Ret, I do not think that Adatper E will fit those holes. The thread is a 3/4 inch thread. Adapter D would be more appropriate. use a long spring and pass it through two holes on Kettle then through two holes on adapter to keep it tight to the body.

These are pretty reliable, just check probe calibration every now and then. Test in boiling water to read 100'C Do not immerse the probe totally only 25mm, or water could get in and cause havoc.

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Thanks @Smokin Monkey. I've ordered one of those, my xmas present but who knows how long it will take from China! Keen to get a mains adapter for this, don't suppose you're able to check the voltage/ampage of the supply you have for the lite?

What prevents ash from falling from the chamber into the fan?

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  • 3 weeks later...

Received my Lite yesterday, coincidentally on the day I had planned to smoke some ribs. It was pretty straight forward to hook up to my weber kettle. Overall pretty happy, but are a bit surprised by the big swings in temperature. With the Qmaster set to 220 it keep the temp between 220 and 272 deegrees. 272 is a little hotter than I wanted it. Opening the lid caused big spikes which I suppose is to be expected. Also probably a factor, I chose to smoke on what was apparently the coldest day of the year - may have been why the temps cooled so quickly? Maybe on a warmer day the cooling period would be longer. 

Is there anyway to have it cut the fan off earlier? I'd rather it come on more often, but for less time. This would result in smaller, but more frequent spikes. Ideally I want to keep the temp between 225-250 (ie a range of 25 degrees, not 50). 

Screenshot_20171228-184950.png

Edited by Ret
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Don't have any photos from the cook unfortunately. The BBQ is a bit leaky, but no more than any other Weber kettle I wouldn't have thought. I did notice when the Qmaster was blowing, a fair bit of of smoke was escaping between the lid and the BBQ. I had the vent on the top mostly closed, by opening this a little (which would result in less positive pressure) I'm guessing it would prevent this from happening, but I understand you want this pressure in order for the fan to work effectively. I had all vents other vents completely closed.

Given it was so damn cold outside that weekend, I didn't spend much time keeping an eye on the LCD on the Qmaster. I was mainly watching the pit probe (Inkbird IBT-2X, bluetooth) from the relative comfort (and warmth) of my home. It didn't help that I had the Qmaster in Celsius and the pit probe in Fahrenheit as I was having to use a converter to compare the two. I changed this half way through. I did notice a fairly big difference between the Qmaster temp and the pit probe, even though the probes were in the same spot. I have subsequently calibrated both in boiling water and both were reading the same +/- 1 degree, so not sure what was going on then.

In any case, I can see based on  that graph that the fan was coming on when it should have @ ~220. I did change it at various stages, which is why the graph shows the fan turning on at different times in the first few hours. The problem just seems to be that it is staying on for too long? For comparison, do you have a graph of any cooks you've done with the same unit? I'd be interested to see how big your swings are.

Edited by Ret
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Wang has advised me to try these settings - P=5,I=0,D=2.

Also said the fan should be under the coals. Think I'll buy an elbow join to connect it to the BBQ so ash doesn't fall straight down into the fan workings. Will post again when I have had another go with these changes. 

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17 hours ago, Ret said:

Wang has advised me to try these settings - P=5,I=0,D=2.

A bit of an aside... When I was in my 20s and first started working in the computer industry... (Yes they did have computers then!), WANG was a big player in the mini/mainframe market. I was programming for Coutts bank at the time and one of the machines that seemed to go wrong regularly was the Wang. We all had a snigger every time we called their technical support as, being an American company, they called it "Wang Care". The American voice at the end of the phone would answer "Good morning Wang Care, How can we help you?"

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On 1/2/2018 at 2:47 PM, Ret said:

I did notice a fairly big difference between the Qmaster temp and the pit probe, even though the probes were in the same spot. I have subsequently calibrated both in boiling water and both were reading the same +/- 1 degree, so not sure what was going on then.

I have noticed the same with my Qmasterlite. Testing in boiling water both my Qmaster probe and an Inkbird probe were showing 99/100C but in the bbq with them next to each other the Qmaster was a good 10 - 15C lower than the inkbird.I had to set the Qmaster to 110C to get the pit temp to be around 120C. I have also had quite big temp swings which I think has been exacerbated by opening the lid. The sudden temp drop kicks the fan off and the gradual reheating of the chamber (which I knew would get back up to my desired temperature nicely) meant the fan stayed on for a while thus causing super the coals to get far too hot and give me big temperature swings.

I'm contemplating a manual switch on the fan so I can manually turn the fan off when I need to open the bbq for whatever reason and then switch it back on once the temperature has gone back to where it was. I'd also use it at the start of my cooks to keep te fan off while the coals establish themselves as the first time I used the Qmaster the fans were blowing like mad at the start when the coals were building temperature which led to them being far too hot and massively over shooting once the fans stopped...

I'm sure it's just a case of practice making perfect when it comes to using these things...

Oh and btw I used the recommended settings you mentioned on my last cook and still had big temp swings though as mentioned I think this might have been due to the lid removal etc.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Has anybody used or go one the powerbanks with any of their models?  and are they a viable option instead of the power adapter? and would 4 high mAh fully charged batteries last an 8 hour cook. (I would be surprised if they didn't) 

I am a vaper and have literally dozens of 18650 batteries, and this would be a more viable and preferable option than running a 10 meter extension lead up to the ProQ from the house. Everytime I wanted to use it.

I take it the lite would be more than suitable for a ProQ Elite than the more expensive senior? 

Also do you end up paying Custom duties on import and if so how much?

Thanks

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Easy question first, I have bought four units separately, and paid no custom tax.

Second to easiest, the QLight to run the ProQ Elite, 10 CFM blower included, would be ample.

Batteries, not used 8 AA batteries as advertised on the website. I ordered a rechargeable battery similar size as a Laptop power adaptor. 

Reading a bit about batteries. These are figures are examples only. If you wire 8AA batteries (1.5 v and 500mah) in parallel  this will give you 1.5 v and 4000mah.

If you wired six in series, this will give you 12 v and 500mah. 

If you then wire 8 banks of 8 parallel wired batteries in series this would give you 12v and 32000mah.

 

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Thanks for the reply. Can I take it the WSM adaptor is the one to go for the ProQ Elite. My only concern after a decent cook, ash can come out of the bottom vents. So I assume that may mean the ash getting into the fan possibly. But if it blows air, I suppose the fan may keep the ash away from its workings?

The powerbank is an extra and uses rechargable 18650 batteries http://www.allchinas.com/lite/ at the bottom of the page description. But it appears to still want an electric charge. to power it. I can see why the power could be needed to recharge the batteries if they are low. But if you are having to use an electric charge with fully charged batteries. Why not just use the UK adaptor.instead of the powerbank? Maybe I am misunderstanding what it does and fully charged batteries on their own should drive the fan, which would be my ideal scenario.as i have plenty of 18650 3000+ mah batteries with 35 or 40A ratings and the power lead allows the powerbank to be a battery charger as well when not in use.

 

 

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Yes the same adaptor as the WSM would fit your ProQ. Think I have mentioned this before, you will need some thing to hold the adaptor to thr ProQ. Looking at the adaptor, my suggestion is a long spring similar to below.

26FB8361-E82B-40E3-8CF5-E55C9B7C5747.thumb.jpeg.5b0c799b3c9f75ef51d856c1143bc2cd.jpeg

Pass the spring through two holes of the ProQ then use the hook ends through the two holes of the adaptor.

I can not see ash getting in to the fan. If it happens, get a tin can cut top and bottom off and use this as a shield. This would also direct the air to charcoal if it’s placed for indirect cooking at the other side of fire bowl.

 

Yes I think you would need to charge the batteries separately with that. Look in Maplins they should have the battery holders. And the solder a connector to the wires?

 

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The air blower connection that I got with the IQ-110 5 or 6 years ago works well with all of the curved bowl smokers that I have. The components are very simple...

  1. A steel dog/cat bowl
  2. A long threaded rod with a wing nut fixed to one end
  3. A spring loaded fixer (available as plasterboard fixer from B&Q

A hole is cut in the centre of the bowl that fits the barrel of the air blower
The bowl is pressed against the curved smoker body over one of the air vents
The spring clip is pressed through one of the air vent holes and open inside the smoker body
The wing nut is tightened until the bowl is clamped tight against the smoker body

5a68d56314b87_IQ110Outside.thumb.jpg.69fbfede7a51906c3aa0060103eaccd6.jpg5a68d56124d96_IQ110Inside.thumb.jpg.dca711fc735719adb2c9e128f7d18ee8.jpg

As you can see, this one has been used many times over the last 6 years on my Weber Kettles and ProQ

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  • 2 years later...

So had first trial today with my qmaster lite on my 47cm WSM and certainly not plug and play as I was hoping. All bottom vents closed and in order to stop it going completely out of control I had the top vent pretty much all the way closed too.

Target was 225f and qmaster would report circa 218-245, thermoworks smoke reporting 212 to 250 (270 before I pretty much shut the top)

I'm concerned I now have a 22mm hole which installed in line with the STD vents hat is pretty much always open as no one way vent on the fan as I jjust have the STD adapter it came with.

Should I have drilled the hole lower? :-(

Settings are as per I've read on other threads so all good there.

Maybe I need to address all the small leaks that are around but based on today's swings I could control better just using the vents. The other issue is how to extinguish easily as I can't close that 22mm hole off like I could on the original ones.

This might sound like a negative post but it's just the facts to try and get some help- I've been smoking for a few years now and i know perfection takes a little time to get right. 

Any pointers appreciated....

Stu

 

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12 hours ago, Stu said:

So had first trial today with my qmaster lite on my 47cm WSM and certainly not plug and play as I was hoping. All bottom vents closed and in order to stop it going completely out of control I had the top vent pretty much all the way closed too.

Target was 225f and qmaster would report circa 218-245, thermoworks smoke reporting 212 to 250 (270 before I pretty much shut the top)

I'm concerned I now have a 22mm hole which installed in line with the STD vents hat is pretty much always open as no one way vent on the fan as I jjust have the STD adapter it came with.

Should I have drilled the hole lower? 😞

Settings are as per I've read on other threads so all good there.

Maybe I need to address all the small leaks that are around but based on today's swings I could control better just using the vents. The other issue is how to extinguish easily as I can't close that 22mm hole off like I could on the original ones.

This might sound like a negative post but it's just the facts to try and get some help- I've been smoking for a few years now and i know perfection takes a little time to get right. 

Any pointers appreciated....

Stu

 

Pictures, Stu we need pictures to see how you have set up.

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