Yeah, I think they used some Big Green Eggs as well as some others. I went to it twice and they had several different types of smokers running at the one that I went to.

It was a really cool fun course/day and I hope they bring it back again.

They used to have a BBQ Bootcamp that they did in the summer where you were able to attend a bunch of sessions and then have a huge feast of a variety of BBQ foods at the end of the camp. I haven’t seen them do this for the past couple of years though.

Any tips on how tight the burper should be? I had a lot of problems with this the last time too stuffing snack sticks.

I typically screw in far enough so that the burping plate (not sure what it is called) can go up and down about an 1/8". Is this not enough?

I daily only use ECA for Summer Sausage and I love it for that. I don’t like it as much in snack sticks.

I agree with what Kyle said above. I would wait to add the seasoning for all of the reasonings that he said.

I have ground and let my meat block sit overnight MANY times, but never mixed any of the seasonings until I was ready to mix.

cdavis Yeah, I just get crazy busy and don’t have time to go to my favorite forums. I am actually technically a Moderator on the Smokin-It forum, but haven’t been out there for awhile now either.

I still love my Smokin-It smoker, but have since been using my Grilla Pellet Poopers more than the trusty Smokin-It #3. I did use it this past weekend though in combination with my Grilla Chimp to get all of that country style sausage done and it worked great as usual.

The one tip that I will give you regarding the Jerky Dryer is to not put that on until your smoke phase is done because the excess air will just blow all of that smoke out of the cooking chamber and the excess oxygen will most likely result in your wood catching fire. I usually smoke for about 2-3 hours and then put the dryer on.

Hopefully this helps.

Another thing you can do when cold smoking to keep the liquid out is to fill/freeze 1 or 2 liter soda bottles with water. This keeps the moisture in the bottles and not in the smoking chamber.

Dave in AZ

Hi Dave, you can do jerky and sticks in the Smokin-It smokers and they turn out awesome. You just need to have/use a Jerky fan to remove the excess moisture.

I smoked 120 pounds of country style sausage through my smoker this past weekend and used my jerky dryer. You can buy the dryer from Smokin-It (that is what I did) or there are several DIY options on the Smokin-It forums as well.

Jonathon I will check the alignment over Easter weekend.

I don’t really use the stuffer that much. I would say 3-4 times per year. Probably around 300-400 pounds pushed through it per year.

What type of lube should I get? Any suggestions?

I will check on the piston rod as I can see where that could be an issue. This seems like a likely cause since I am not seeing any indication of gear damage.

I will take some pictures too.

We were processing at my parent’s house and I left the stuffer down there since I figured I just needed a new gearbox, and I won’t be back until Easter most likely. But, I am glad that I posted here before ordering the gearbox as your suggestions seem like they might help diagnose the issue prior to having to order any parts.

So, I will check all of these great suggestions that you have made and update this post with what I find.

glen I regularly apply white oil and/or silicone spray, but haven’t used any lube.

I did not see any caked-up lube when I was inspecting the gear box.

Everything looked great. The gears did not appear to have any bad spots and looked good from what I could tell. It just seemed like they were binding.

craigrice That is an interesting suggestion. I’ll have to check that, but it seems unlikely because the issue was still occurring when I took the piston off of the rack the issue still occurred.

I did some sausage processing last week and toward the end of the session, I noticed that it was becoming harder and harder to crank the plunger out of the tank.

I only use the fast crank to pull the plunger out of the stuffer and the other gears for stuffing.

But, it seems like the gears are catching and not running smoothly. It works much better but is still noticeable when stuffing, but is much more prevalent when removing the plunger with the fast gears.

I took the top off and checked out the gearbox and I cannot find any gears that appear to be damaged. There was a small little bit (really not that much) of metal dust on the gear housing.

I see that there are some set screws that I tried adjusting, but that just made the crank handle higher and didn’t seem to fix the problem.

To me, it just seems like the gears are not seated together as far as they should.

I just bought this stuffer on 11/2016, so I am guessing well beyond the warranty period, but should I really have to be dealing with gearbox issues this soon?

Are there any other possible fixes? Or is my only option to order a new gearbox?

I am going to send a message to Walton’s Customer Service as well but thought I would ping this group to see if you have any other suggestions.

Thanks,

NDKoze

This is interesting, because I am pretty sure that while Meatgistics didn’t get started until 2016, I was buying stuff from Walton’s several years before that.

Yeah, I used to ask a lot of questions to customer service before we had this community. You guys were always so helpful.

I have sent many people your way over the years especially via the http://www.smokinitforums.com/ product form (for Smokin-It Smokers) where I am a moderator.

Jonathon I just ran across this post again for some reason and remembered that there was supposed to be a “Care Package” or something coming.

Just kidding. You don’t have to send me anything. I have received much more value in knowledge since this whole thing started in 2016.

I don’t post a ton, but I do read quite a bit.

Thanks for all of the work that you guys do!

Just installed the app. I’ll be checking it out later tonight.

It’s awesome to see you guys always introducing new things and staying up-to-date on the trends.

When are we going to get the Wishlist option back, now that you have updated the site?

Thanks guys. I wondered if it wasn’t something like that.

I ordered one of each for the heck of it to see if I like one better than the other.

I watched a few videos (can’t remember if they were old or new) where the Walton’s guys were raving about the Ultimate Steak & Roast Rub.

But, I see that there is an Excalibur version and a Walton’s version?

So, I am just wondering what the differences are?

Which one do you guys like better?