Yoder Smokers Community Forum

This is my procedure for starting up a Yoder pellet cooker:

1. Clean all ash from the burn grate and firepot
2. Verify that the burn grate fitment in the firepot is correct
3. Open the pellet hopper and verify there are no foreign objects, blockages or water damaged pellets
4. Fill the pellet hopper with pellets and close the hopper lid
5. Plug the power cord into the cooker (never leave your cooker plugged in after use)
6. Open the cooker’s lid
7. Flip the power switch to the “ON” position
8. Verify the firmware version flashes on the display immediately after flipping the power switch
9. Verify that I hear the fans are running and that they have come up to speed
10. Hit the “START” button
11. Verify that I hear pellets dropping into the burn grate
12. I wait until I see and hear an active fire in the burn grate. You can see the fire by looking down past the hopper end of the heat diffuser or HMS plates.
13. Close the lid and walk away for 30 minutes

As you can see, this is pretty straight forward, and easy to do. Notice I did not change the set temperature away from the default of 350 degrees. I leave the default, because I want to quickly heat up the metal mass of the cooker. I also want any residual oil and grease to burn off prior to putting on anything to cook. I also use this temperature to kill any cooties that may be lurking.

After 30 minutes, I come back to the cooker for the final steps:

14. I open the lid and use a grill brush to give the grates a once over (both top and bottom sides on the upper grate)
15. I use a clean rag or paper towels to wipe the latent “gunk” off the grate surfaces. I find that this can add a bitter taste if left on the grate.
16. I set the temperature I want to cook at on the controller
17. I load everything I am cooking into the cooker
18. I close the lid and let the cooker do the work

Here I will give you some advice; If you are cooking pork butt or brisket, you do not have to, and should not, open the cooker lid again for at least 5 or 6 hours…For ribs, 2 or 3 hours…for chicken, 1 ½ to 2 hours, of course, all depending on your selected cooking temperature. The idea here is to only open the lid when absolutely necessary, to preserve the cooking environment, shorten the cooking time, and use less fuel for cooker temperature and cooking environment recovery, to get the best results possible in your cooking endeavors.

Now I will confess that I do check the cooker periodically, without opening the lid. I make sure that the cooker is still working, that the display shows the temperature, and I always stick my hand in the pellet hopper and play with the pellets, well, actually I even out the pellets so they are able to flow into the auger. For safety, you should never leave your cooker unattended while it is in use.

This is a great post. It should be a sticky in the Best Practices section.

Great info. I wasn't aware I needed to leave the lid open until ignition. Thanks.

One big thing to take away from all of this is let the cooker do it's thing. Don't try to mess with it, don't worry what the controller reads the temp as, just set your temp and trust the cooker, AND leave the lid shut! If you need a project or something to do while you are doing a long cook to distract you, do it. Just trust the Yoder and all will turn out great. The less fiddling, the better.

Having the lid open is a verification issue not a necessary step. I always start mine with the lid down.

Cleaning the ash out after every cook is a PITA. However, I learned if I don't do it, my YS640 usually won't start.

So during shutdown do you leave the door open or closed? thanks

YoderJase wrote:So during shutdown do you leave the door open or closed? thanks

Per the manuals: viewtopic.php?f=49&t=153

"The cooking chamber door must remain closed during the cool-down cycle. Failure to do so can cause burn back in the hopper."

Lots of good information in the manual(s)...

I just joined today and already I've seen that I need to tweak the way I start my Comp 640. I do leave the door down when I start up, I can usually hear the pellets ignite and I do leave the door down when I hit the shut-down, now if I can just master a few other techniques I'll be off to the races.

Hey Herb, I do know it says in the manual to unplug your cooker when not in use or just before startup, but if the outlet it is plugged into is on a switch would that suffice instead of unplugging it every time?

greasemonkey wrote:Hey Herb, I do know it says in the manual to unplug your cooker when not in use or just before startup, but if the outlet it is plugged into is on a switch would that suffice instead of unplugging it every time?

Yes it would work fine, with one exception. The ground is not switched, so the cooker would still be grounded to the house earth ground. Depending on where the cooker is located, this may allow the cooker to be the item closest to earth ground for lightening.

LeftSeat wrote:Cleaning the ash out after every cook is a PITA. However, I learned if I don't do it, my YS640 usually won't start.

I can't recommend the diffuser with the trap door enough. So easy to remove two grates and the door to access the burn grate, Proly takes about 45 seconds to do it and be ready for start up.

If I am going to smoke at 225 what's the benefit of letting the smoker start up and go into maintenance mode at 350 before setting the temp to 225?

sbacpo wrote:If I am going to smoke at 225 what's the benefit of letting the smoker start up and go into maintenance mode at 350 before setting the temp to 225?

We suggest this to heat up the entire metal mass of the cooker to stabilize and normalize the temperatures in the cooker quicker.

Very helpful information. Thanks for sharing

I only add one more small step. I take a small handful of pellets and place them on the igniter. I never have to wonder if it is going to start or not.

Its coming up on my 5 year birthday for my YS640, and I thoroughly enjoy having it.

I only have done a couple of "mods' to it. I drilled out one of the temp ports and installed the newer version. Much easier to use if I am using my Chef Alarm. I also had a guy cut my top rack in half, so I can use a half rack or full rack if I need it. I had him weld a brace and feet so it slides just like the full rack.

Lastly, I just put the flame magnetic wrap on the comp cart. I just HAD to have that !

"If you're lookin'...you ain't cookin!"

AWESOME POST YODER_HERB! Thanks....really helpful. Especially since I picked up my YS640 just yesterday!

Just bought a Yoder Smoker, this is the best pellet smoker that I owned. The information is really helpful to me. Thanks for sharing!

Just got my new 640 up and running
This was a vey helpful thread, really appreciate the build quality of Yoder!

Very helpful thread for newbies.
Thank you
Obsessed with my new 640s and happy about it!