Automated Meat Cooking with Smokey Mc Smokerson

Depending on where you live, summer is coming to a close, somewhere on the horizon, or near-continuous for those that live close the equator. Either way, it can be a great time for “smoking and bbq’ing.” If you can accomplish this with the help of a homemade Raspberry Pi Zero W smoking rig, all the better!

This build by HackersHub uses an old oil barrel for the structure of the smoker, held upright with a grate on the top, and a fire basket on the bottom. An externally-mounted fan pushes air in as needed and thus regulated heat generation by the coals. The Pi Zero W and custom PCB that controls the rig is attached closer to the top of the barrel on a mount made out of a cut up “old home cinema set.” This leaves the electronics mostly bare, but actually looks like a pretty good way to construct mounting hardware with limited tools.

Thermocouples measure relevant smoking temperatures, and this data is used by the Pi to control the fan in response. User interface for the smoker is via a Blynk app, which shows the current smoker temperature versus the target, as well as meat temperature, it’s target, and just how much time is left before the feast is ready!

Code and hardware info is available here, and there’s even a setup wiki if you’d like to create your own!