Weston Food Dehydrator Machine for Beef Jerky, Fruit Leather, Herbs, Dog Treats, Vegetables, Meats, BPA Free, 10 Slide Out Drying Racks (75-0201-W), Tray, Ultra Quiet Fan, 10 tray

I purchased this dehydrator to use side-by-side with my Nesco. You can view my review for the Nesco for additional info on that one. The main reason I went for having a second one was because I make different flavors and didn't want to make them at the same machine, getting the aromas mixed up. Here's my take:First and foremost, IF YOU ARE USED TO A DIFFERENT DEHYDRATOR, keep an eye on the timing with this one. This is a very powerful machine, which is a great thing! But if you're used to something that is not as powerful, keep that in mind. The first time I used this dehydrator, I calculated that, if my Nesco took about 3 hours, this one would probably take about 2. When I checked after 2 hours, my beef jerky was crispy like potato chips. It's not bad, but not the end product I was looking for.PROS:- Very fast drying- Huge drying area, approx. 10 sq ft- Nice looking for a dehydrator, doesn't look bad on the counter, even if it's huge- Set up is nice, don't need to remove the top and the trays can be removed individually because they are not the wall of the dehydrator like the Nesco trays are.CONS:- Pricy compared to the Nesco I use. Although the Nesco comes with only 4 trays, you can purchase additional ones and the total price for the Nesco, plus two 2-tray sets, comes up to about $70. And after I calculated the drying square footage, I realized that the Nesco with 8 trays has about the same drying area as this one with 10 trays.- For some reason, and this may be user-related and not really an issue with the machine, I can't make the jerky leathery with this dehydrator. It seems to go from raw and soft to crunchy, which is not necessarily a bad thing, and I actually make a flavor that I prefer crunchy, so it's all good. But when it came time to get another one, I went back to the Nesco.- You can't use fewer trays like you can with the Nesco that has a minimum of 4 and can be extended to 8. So, if you're making a small batch, you still need to have all the trays in.- It is really huge, but then again, all dehydrators are...- The back part of the trays gets ready much faster than the front, which makes sense since the fan is on the back. But I wish the trays sealed better on the front so the air would circulate more inside the machine, instead of going out the front. Basically, I feel like it could be better engineered here.- You can pull the trays out and prepare them on the sink, but because they have to to back into the file-cabinet like structure, you get lots of drips on the counter where the machine sits and the front of the lower trays as you slide the new tray in.Again, this is a very good machine and I would probably love it if I didn't have a different one to compare to. As you will see on my Nesco review, the Nesco has its own issues as well. They are just issues I'd rather work with than the issues I have with this one. And for the flavor of jerky I make that's nice crunchy, I would never use the Nesco dehydrator, this one does a better job.I guess what I'm trying to say is that each dehydrator from the two I'm comparing here has some advantages and some disadvantages. You should do your research and figure out which one would work better for your particular use. For example, if I were buying this to make fruit chips, I wouldn't think twice before getting the Weston dehydrator. The Nesco wouldn't make the chips as nice and crispy as this one.Enjoy!

I found this dehydrator by watching several videos on YT and this item came highly recommend. I watched a few videos with this dehydrator and it seemed to work well and big enough to fit a lot of fruit and veggies along with the dehydrating time. When I purchased and received this dehydrator I was very impressed with the size, color and how easy it was to set the dehydrator for fruits and veggies. My first batch was strawberries, I was able to fill the entire dehydrator with 2 huge batches of strawberries. The time it took was about 24 hours and they were ready. The strawberries were nice and crisp and tasted delicious that we all ended up eating it while watching a movie instead of popcorn.I purchases a few books on how to make dehydrated food and I learned that humidity plays a huge roll. Depending on where you live and how much moisture is in the air, the longer or shorter it takes to dehydrate. We live in Florida and the humidity is very high so it took our strawberries to dry much longer than usual. We just kept checking on them every few hours to see if they were ready. So, the time to dehydrate all depends on what you are dehydrating, how thick or thin it is and the moisture in the air. As we worked with it, we learned how long it will take to make different fruits and vegetables. We tried out a lot of different fruit and vegetables and everything we made came out delicious. Also, we used parchment paper for some fruits.This is a medium sized dehydrator and it works very well. I would recommend this item for sure and it is really good for beginners. The buttons on top help you set the temp based on what you are making. So, it is very simple. We are very pleased with item and ended up purchasing 2 of them.

Ordered unit, had it over-nighted (thanks Amazon Prime), was delivered with great packaging and looks like it suffered no ills in shipping.I opened it up, plugged it in and turned it on for an initial test to see that the unit was working.The dehydrator turned on, and got hot, but was making a lot of vibration type sounds from the motor, and didn't seem to be moving any air.I stopped the unit, took out the trays, and looked in at the fan assembly to find that the fan blade was not attached to the motor shaft, instead it was floating around freely in the metal protection cage at the back of the unit. The "C" clip that was supposed to hold the fan blade on the shaft, was sitting in the bottom of the unit.I ordered this half expecting to modify/change/upgrade parts over time, but I wasn't really expecting it to be dead on arrival. However I was not about to waste time and money sending it back and getting a different one, this was an easy fix, so I decided to fix it.The VegiKiln is really easy to take apart and work on, 6 or so screws on the back, pulls out the whole fan and heating assembly, a few more takes off the protective cage around it.I was able to pretty quickly put the fan back on the shaft, and the "C" clip on top holding it in place correctly, and get it all back together.It now seems to run great, and is pretty quiet, but given how easy it is to change stuff on this thing, I already have some ideas to make it even quieter, and possibly more efficient.Before putting food in it, I would let it run at full heat for a while, then turn the heat off but leave the fan on for a while. Like anything that gets warm, it will put off some smells when its brand new.I am surprised how quickly I filled 5 of the 6 trays with my "little first test batch" (bananas and apples).Food dehydrators are extremely basic, there is no reason they should cost anywhere near $200+.This unit is closer to reasonable in price, and has nearly all of the benefits of its more expensive competitor.If I payed $240 for one, it better not ever have a problem, at $90, well hell I can probably fix / replace / upgrade just about any part in this thing for next to nothing, and its super easy.I will be putting this thing through the ringer over the next couple weeks, if anything else crops up, I will update my posting here.I feel like 4 is a little high for a product that didn't work as delivered, but assuming you don't have that issue, this is an excellent machine.This would have gotten 5 stars if it weren't for the quality control on my unit.