BBQ Guru/Backwoods Help

[bechetti19]

Hi everyone,
A friend of mine and myself went in on a Backwoods G2 Chubby recently and ordered the BBQ Guru DigiQ as well. We both have only smoked on gasers but we grill with charcoal so we are somewhat familiar with charcoal. We ordered the Guru due to working slightly different schedules so we could essentially set it and forget it while checking on it periodically. We have tried to do 2 dry runs on it and have been unsuccessful at maintaining a temperature at 225. Our setup is loading lit charcoal in the back left corner of the pan (near the damper with the guru blower) and putting unlit charcoal in the rest of the pan. Both dampers are closed to the fire box and the chimney is open. We put water in the water pan about halfway full. We clipped the pit probe on the grate and set the guru and 225. The blower works and it stops once it gets near 225, however the temperature continues to rise very high. Does anyone have any suggestions as to why this is happening or what i am doing wrong or could fix so i can get a steady temperature?

Thanks!

[Jon Solberg]

Can you close the chimney down some? I dont have a backwoods but sounds like its getting to much air to stop the climb maybe.

How does it do without the Guru?

What temp does it want to run at naturally?

[Jerod Broussard]

Doesn't the Guru have a plate that you can set to only allow so much air to the guru??

I would prefer to have the fan on the other end of the fire box. I like the idea of the charcoal burning towards the fan and leaving ash behind, and not having so much air blasting the charcoal up close.

And I agree with Jon Solberg to maybe closing the chimney a little to reduce the draft. I do that on my kettle.

[PaulstheRibList]

Try making a fuse, and stacking the charcoal in a line around the outside, leaving the inside empty. If it's getting too hot, it means too much fuel is getting lit. The fuse eliminates that. Do a couple more experiments, starting with charcoal 2 wide, 2 high, and adjust to more charcoal if it won't get hot enough.

On your startup in the water pan, start with hot water.

[Rfuilrez]

It's probably also a good idea to do some runs without the controller to find out where your damper and chimney settings need to be for it to run at the temperature you want. A controller can only do so much to control the fire. If too much or too little air is getting in and out a computer isn't going to be able to do anything. As you've seen, once the temperature is above the set point, there isn't anything it can do to bring it back down. It's essentially not under control at that point.