For yesterday's burger cook, I decided to entertain myself by using my CyberQ Cloud to control the fire at 375 for the cook. But after I started my TumbleWeed and was going to assemble the controller, I got very confused. I took my probes out of their storage box and found all three meat probes, but instead of a pit probe, I found this strange object that looked like a meat probe that had been cut off:

I finally realized that the alligator clip had come off the pit probe. I looked all through the storage box and around the cooker, but no clip. Since the fire was starting, I didn't want to dig in the lump or the ashes below. I remembered that BBQGuru had replaced my pit probe when the old one died a few weeks ago and I was miraculously able to find the old one in the garage.
I had never realized the clip comes off the probe. I'm often lazy and in shutting down the cooker after a cook, I will remove the pit probe by pulling on the lead several inches above the clip so as not to grab the hot part. I guess that route is now out. I'm also very disappointed in myself not to have noticed the missing clip when I wound up the probe to store in its box. Anyway, the cook went on as planned with the old clip on the new pit probe.
But I really liked that the new probe had a slightly larger clip that attaches better to my fat grill grates. So today I decided to go fishing for the old alligator clip. Of course, I started in the wrong spot. First I dug around in the ashes below the fire basket, but no clip. That's a hard region to get a hand into in my cooker, but fortunately I had vacuumed out ashes not too long ago, so there wasn't much ash to fish through. So it was time to open up the cooker, remove the grate and fish through what was left of the lump charcoal. And I found my alligator!

From now on, this thing only gets taken off the grill using my PitMaker heavy gloves if hot or the next day after the fire is out. I'm hesitant to take a pliers and tighten the clip around the probe, but if anyone has done this without harming the probe, please let me know.
I finally realized that the alligator clip had come off the pit probe. I looked all through the storage box and around the cooker, but no clip. Since the fire was starting, I didn't want to dig in the lump or the ashes below. I remembered that BBQGuru had replaced my pit probe when the old one died a few weeks ago and I was miraculously able to find the old one in the garage.
I had never realized the clip comes off the probe. I'm often lazy and in shutting down the cooker after a cook, I will remove the pit probe by pulling on the lead several inches above the clip so as not to grab the hot part. I guess that route is now out. I'm also very disappointed in myself not to have noticed the missing clip when I wound up the probe to store in its box. Anyway, the cook went on as planned with the old clip on the new pit probe.
But I really liked that the new probe had a slightly larger clip that attaches better to my fat grill grates. So today I decided to go fishing for the old alligator clip. Of course, I started in the wrong spot. First I dug around in the ashes below the fire basket, but no clip. That's a hard region to get a hand into in my cooker, but fortunately I had vacuumed out ashes not too long ago, so there wasn't much ash to fish through. So it was time to open up the cooker, remove the grate and fish through what was left of the lump charcoal. And I found my alligator!
From now on, this thing only gets taken off the grill using my PitMaker heavy gloves if hot or the next day after the fire is out. I'm hesitant to take a pliers and tighten the clip around the probe, but if anyone has done this without harming the probe, please let me know.
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