Product Description

Monitor the temperature of smoked meats from up to 100 feet away! Wireless receiver with LCD beeps and flashes when smoked meat temperature surpasses programmed temperature or if smoking chamber temperature falls out of programmed range. Receiver features count up/down timer, back lighting, belt clip and stand; transmitter has food probe wire, smoking chamber probe wire and stand/hanger. Can also be used with grills and ovens. Includes 4 AAA batteries.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #4027 in Lawn & Patio
• Brand: Maverick
• Model: MVK-ET-73
• Dimensions: 3.00 pounds

Features

• Remote, wireless smokehouse/meat thermometer
• Monitor smokehouse/meat temperatures from 100 feet away
• Can be used with oven or grill; batteries included
• Alarm sounds if temperature drops too low or jumps too high
• 4 by 2-1/2 by 1 inches; imported

Customer Reviews

Works fine for me
I cannot comment yet on the probe issue as the other reviewer wrote. I have done 4 smokes with it over the past 2 weeks, and it works fine so far. I use the Weber Smokey Mountain Cooker, a.k.a. the Weber "Bullet".

I really like not having to keep going out and checking the temps on the cooker. I can be elsewhere (like inside watching the game), watch the monitor and relax.

The temperature seems to correlate well with other thermometers I have. I stopped using my instant read thermometer.

The alarm function works well. You can set temp alarms for the cooker and the meat, both minimums and maximums. If the temp goes outside of the range, then it will ping you. Since my cooker runs cooler, I set my lower alarm temp just a bit lower than my desired cook temperature. So if it really does lose temperature, then the thing pings me. This avoids getting intermittent pings when the temp hovers right at the lower end. It also has a timer, which is helpful.

Four things I would change if I could:

1. The cable lengths are OK, but they could be longer. For my cooker, I usually have a little side table beside it. But some people might find the cables just a bit too short.

2. The so-called "belt clip" on the receiver is weak. It fell off my belt 2-3 times, so now I don't clip it on.

3. The box in which the thermometer comes isn't so great for repackaging. If you don't use the box again, this isn't a worry. If I was designing it, I would not make everything so compact. Maybe that's why the first reviewer's probe went bad, trying to cram everything back in the box.

4. The manual is only OK. I am pretty tech savvy, so it wasn't too much of a problem to figure out what it was trying to explain. But some might find it lacking.

But I'd recommend purchasing it, especially if you are more than just a novice smoker.

Disappointed
I have owned this thermometer for just under a year, used it maybe 10 times and the meat probe no longer works. I called Maverick and they said the probe is burned-out and must be replaced, for twelve bucks! They said that this is about the normal life of a probe.

The transmitter and remote do work well, but you will have to replace the meat probe often.

Only way to overnight for five years running
I bought this from Amazon five years ago, and have used it for 3-4 cooks each year over the last five years. It has performed flawlessly for the entire period and I can only recall having to change the batteries once in that time. When cooking a large brisket or pork butt overnight, I drop the lid probe in the open vent of my Weber smoker, hang the transmitter on a nail in my deck railing, set the low and high alarms in the receiver on my nightstand at 225 and 250, and go to sleep. Depending on how well I've judged the amount of fuel needed and set the vents, the receiver will beep me awake once or twice in the wee hours of the morning to make adjustments. That sure beats getting up every hour to check it before I got this little gem. I also use the food probe alarm later in the cook to let me know when it's done.

I hand wash the probes after each use to keep them shiny, and it continues to read as precisely and consistently as ever. My nightstand is only 10 feet from the transmitter, so I'm not exactly pushing the range (which is perhaps why I haven't needed many new batteries). But I'm pretty pleased that after five years, it works just as well as the day I got it, and has allowed me to get a lot more zzzzz's on the long cooks.