Masterbuilt® 40-inch Digital Electric Vertical BBQ Smoker with Side Wood Chip Loader, Chrome Smoking Racks and 970 Cooking Square Inches in Black, Model MB20072918

This is my third one of these. Bought for my daughter this time. This is a very simple old school style smoker. I have been smoking food for over 45 years. I always used an old refrigerator, those of you who know, Know. I am a simple man. This little smoker is very well built for the price. The heating element is old style like old electric skillets used to be. They almost never fail. This smoker is sturdy, decent size for ribs, brisket and or pork butts . I use mine for smoked mullet. I dedicate a smoker to fish as any smoker you use afterwards will ultimately make every thing taste fishy. I highly recommend this smoker, it is a great brand and they stand behind their product. You can buy a 4 year extended warranty thru amazon for around 30 bucks . This is a game changer for those who worry about quality. When this one wears out after 10 years I will buy another. I love Masterbuilt products. Can't beat it for 163.00 in Amazon. This is 300 every where in my town at the big box stores if you can even find them during the winter.

I have purchased this smoker twice. The first one ran great for 3 years, but finally the heating element burned out. It's now in my garage awaiting warm weather so I can install the replacement element that I ordered online and will serve as a backup when the heating element burns out in my current smoker. The elements will burn out after a time, particularly when you use a smoker as often as I do (3 or 4 times a week year-round). Unboxing and doing the minor assembly required for this smoker is quick and easy. It took me less than 30 minutes. Spending more on an electric smoker with a window is a waste, in my view, because the glass quickly gets fogged with steam and smoke residue. Besides, you should be cooking to internal temperature with a good remote temperature probe instead of opening the door periodically (letting heat and smoke escape) to check on progress. Speaking of not opening the door while cooking, I'm a huge fan of this smoker's external smokewood loading feature that allows you to add wood without opening the door. Pre-heating the smoker is important in cold weather. Up to a 30 minutes may be necessary. Pre-heating is not so necessary during the warm/hot spring/summer/fall months if the outside temperature is above 60̊ F. In fact, there is a good reason to skip pre-heating entirely on really warm days (over 80̊ F.), as explained in the next paragraph. Of course, the Masterbuilt electric smokers rely on a electric heating element for heat. The element automatically turns off when the smoker reaches the target temperature you set. It then turns back on when the temperature in the cabinet drops several degrees below the target temperature. While the Masterbuilt smokers are pretty well insulated, they are affected by the outdoor temperature. You will find that the element stays on much longer during colder weather, so there is hardly ever a problem getting enough smoke in such weather. However, particularly when the outdoor temperature is over 80̊ F. or so, the element will not stay on as much, which can decrease the smoke production. I have two approaches to this problem: (1) In hot weather, I never pre-heat the smoker. I just put the meat in the smoker and start it "cold." This maximizes the initial smoke until the smoker gets to the target temperature, which can takes as little as 10 minutes in really hot weather if you're cooking at, say, 225̊. (2) Every once in a while if not enough smoke is being produced, I open the door for 30 to 60 seconds and let the temperature in the cabinet come down, forcing the heating element to come back on. This hardly ever results in extended cooking time because the temperature recovers pretty quickly, and if not enough smoke is being produced anyway, you're not letting out a lot of smoke. A lot of my meat smoking projects are under 3-4 hours, and I always use the Masterbuilt for those. I'm only tempted to fire up my Weber bullet charcoal smoker for longer smokes such as ribs and brisket. Tips for easier cleanup: Line the bottom tray of the smoker with foil and be sure to poke a hole in the foil to match the hole in the tray. Also, foil the water pan before every use of the smoker, which makes it super easy to clean. Try it just once without foil, and you'll be a dedicated water-pan-foiler thereafter! Also, get a protective heat-resistant mat to go under the smoker and protect your patio or deck because there will be occasional spills of grease no matter how careful you are. The photo shows my smoker in operation on Christmas Day 2020 -- doing a twice-smoked ham. If you look closely, you can see the clean smoke coming out the vent on the top right of the smoker.

It was very easy to put together with myself and my aide. We have cooked baked ziti, string beans and sweet potatoes the first day we got it. Absolutely love this product. He has named her Ma$. We added cinnamon, orange peels, and vanilla to the apple wood chips and the food is amazing.

First of all, the directions say it takes about 25 minutes to assemble. Don't believe a word of that. The only way it would take 25 minutes is if you have had practiced multiple times and used a few power assistance tools. Using just an adjustable wrench and a Philips screwdriver per the instructions, add about 3 hours. In another words, take your time and assemble carefully per the instructions. As you can see from the photos, it didn't fare undamaged from the shipping aspect. The shippers/FedEx dumps it off on your doorstep and escapes before you can get to the box. I was just hoping the internals had fared better. Once I got the box opened and its contents out, I could see that the backplane took some light damage to where a couple pop rivets 'popped'. For the price, I took the gamble that there wasn't more internal damage and this was just cosmetic. Of course the wife says to send it back after I spent the three hours assembling. I wasn't about to reverse the entire assembly process to do so. Follow the instructions on the initial curing process. My first venture was to do baby back pork ribs. I decided to follow a 2-1-1 hour, 250 degree, recipe process. You basically add more flavored wood every 30 minutes for the first couple of hours. Very simple to do. Oh, you just program your cooking temp and forget. No messing with charcoal/etc. and readjusting the temp. At the end of 4 hours, I had the best ribs I've ever cooked. They were so juicy and smokey. So if you want to venture into smoking foods, this unit is simple to operate, thus a good starter system for a low initial cost. Just pray that it survives the shipping. The box could have used some additional internal protection.

Since it arrived, in late May. I've managed to smoke 3 or 4 briskets. But only after switching to using pellets in stead of wood chips. Pellets burn just hot enough to add to the temperature. With wood chips, and the smoker set to 275 degrees (the maximum this can be set to), it would struggle to get to a temperature above 200. With 3 different ambient temperature probes, all of which were within a few degrees of each other... so I trust them more than the Masterbuilt builtin one. Once did the forbidden thing and tried wood pellets from a pellet smoker, in this one, the temperature managed to get to just above 230 degrees, set at 275. That's JUST barely above normal low and slow temperature of 225 degrees. Two of the briskets turned out very good, the other two? I couldn't get the smoker hot enough to get past the stall point at around 160 degrees fast enough, on wrapped in foil at the stall, the other in butcher paper at the stall. They both turned out extemely dry even spritzing every 15 minutes with apple cider vinegar and water. The temperature control is NON EXISTENT. The two that turned out good, were because I wrapped early, at 140 degrees and bypassed the stall at 160 to 170 altogether. BUT... that meant only around 3 hours of smoke infusion, reducing the already questionable smoke flavor even more. I'm smoking my final brisket on this smoker. Which I don't have one single prayer for. It stalled at 172 degrees, already wrapped, and stayed there for the past hour and half, finally just now rising to 174 degrees. The smoker is set at 275 degrees... and the top vent is closed down all I can close it to, and the ambient temp is only 198 degrees. I can already guarantee it's dry as a bone and tough as nails, but I'll pull the brisket at 175, to try to salvage it. I just can't anymore after this. Briskets cost too much to take the chance on having it ruined by shoddy workmanship. I have ordered a pellet smoker from one of the other brands of vertical smokers. and a smoke tube for pellets to add smoke flavor since pellet smokers are notorious for not producing as much. I can't, in good conscience, recommend this smoker. Absolutely not. And this is the second Masterbuilt I've had. The first one was ok, but it only had that electric skillet temperature dial on the side, and not removable wood chip replacement tube. So you had to open the door, take out the wood chip tray, fill it, and then open the door again to put it back in, losing every bit of heat.sa

Works well. Easy to clean and program.

This is My Second one, 1st one lasted 6 years and something happened to the internal thermostat, so I had to get a new one.

I've been using a Weber Smokey Mountain smoker for more than 20 years. I used to scoff at the thought of an electric smoker. My son got this Masterbuilt a few years, the analog with glass door version and loved it. I gave in and got the digital and no glass version based on his recommendation, he said the glass is not worth it since it gets dirty and you can't see through it and probably looses heat. This thing is a champ! Great, perfect, white smoke production even at 220 degrees. Outstanding temperature accuracy. I almost feel guilty because of how little I do now compared to the Weber. No trying to fiddle with the vents and charcoal door to get temp up or down. My only issue is that the little plastic tab on the vent wheel came off. No big deal. Cost wise, this will pay for itself in the bags of lump charcoal I won't need to buy. I really love this smoker, wish I converted years ago!