Good looking birds.
I bet the stuffing does better with a longer cook time at 250F.
And I agree on the brining; once you've tried it, there's no going back.
...I had smoke at 10 minutes, and reached 320 at 50 minutes in. Funny thing is, that was the max. I even bumped the Auber up to 335, but it maintained 320. Could this be the limit of the 1200 w element in the 3? Hmmm... Not sure, but I'll find out....
Not sure what the limit is on the #3, but it is definitely more than 450F.
Attached is a graph of a test I did with my bypassed #3.
Plugged it straight in to power (not the auber) and unplugged it when it hit 450F. I used the auber and the wall-mounted probe to measure temps.
Strange it wouldn't reach target temp.
More "I" should get rid of the offset.
I've seen strange behavior with PID's when there's a large offset between target value and actual value for a loooong time. The integral value builds and climbs as a result and leads to overshoots, but you've experience the opposite effect. I'm curious.
I guess you could try adding some more "D" and see if that helps.
The overshoot I mentioned above may be coming, just outside of the cook time.
My plan is to use the attached graph to determine he amount of time it takes to get the smoker up to desired temp. Then set the auber to 999F for that length of time as a first step, then return to regularly scheduled programming.
I wonder if the auber flushes its memory when it moves from step to step. If it doesn't, my 999F plan may create some issues.
I need to test this plan soon. I just used all of my frozen leftovers to make some Brunswick stew.