Andy_27
Well-Known Member
I've scoured the net for reviews of Inkbird products but theres hardly anything out there. A few posts on forums here and there, but thats about it. I've got 2 Inkbird temp controllers, an ITC-308 and ITC-310 and both work very well. I have just bought an Inkbird IBT-2X BBQ Thermometer and used it yesterday for a brew and a BBQ with some steak and thought I'd write something hopefully helpful for someone.
The price of the Inkbird is pretty competitive. I got mine from ebay for $39.59 which included 2 probes. I got this particular one since I get excited about anything that connects to a phone and this app looked pretty handy. Opening the box, the actual unit is just a black box with a probe wrapped around it. The second probe was sitting in the box with the wire wrapped neatly but theres no facility to have them both installed into the unit and clipped away neatly. There was also a clip which holds a probe and clips to the grill grate inside a BBQ or smoker. Theres no batteries, so you need to have 2 x AAA on hand.
The instructions on how to connect it to a phone were simple, just search for the BBQ Go app or read the QR code and install. Open the app and click Start, turn on the thermometer and press the button again. Done. Theres only 1 button on the device so it's hard to go wrong. You can then select the temp units, alarms etc in the app.
The app is pretty handy and easy to use. The main screen lists the thermometer it's connected to and also both probes. If you only have one connected, the second readings are just blank. You can select time alarms and also temp and temp range alarms. Some presets are built in such as levels of done-ness for each type of meat.. eg: you can select beef and rare and the default temp is 49 degrees. With the temp range alarms, you can input a high and low temp so an alarm sounds if it moves out of this range. I found the pre installed BBQ Smoke was a bit low (102 - 110 I think) but it's easy to change it either way. I reset mine to 107-120. You can also add extra presets which I did for a mash with a temp range of 64 - 66. One negative is that it only measures in whole degrees. It would be much easier to use if the measurements were finer, but it's designed as a BBQ thermometer not a brewing one I guess. It made it a bit hard to set a range for a mash that was not sounding an alarm al the time. My above mash temp range was to maintain a temp of 65 I would have preferred to go half a degree either side.
The display on the unit is easy to read and simple. If you have 2 probes connected, the temps flash between each probe and the small one changes to a 2. The accuracy was pretty good and usually within 0.5 to 1 degree of my usual thermometer which seems pretty accurate given I hit by expected FG each time. The read time is also fast, only a few seconds. Range for the bluetooth was average and if walls or something were in the way, it really suffered. Just remember it is only bluetooth and not wifi which would give better range. I brew in a shed out the back and had to leave my phone outside if I went in the house for anything otherwise the alarm kept going off because it disconnected.
The mash went well with the alarm working to let me know to bump the temp up every now and then. One good feature is the graph you can see in the app of the temp. One negative of this though, is I wish you could zoom in and see the graph over a smaller temp range. It would enable a better view of what was happening. The graph you get isnt that detailed for mashing since it only moves a degree or so either way. It was really good for the BBQ though.
So after the boil and the wort was chilling away, I fired up the new ProQ smoker and got some nice thick ribeye's ready. I used the second probe now. Unfortunately, the probes have a rubber sleeve over the 90 degree bend where the cable joins on and this sleeve wouldn't fit through the temp probe hole in the smoker. It was easy to slid it off and down the wire though to get it through. I used the grill clip to hold one probe and put the second in the smaller of the two steaks as it would cook up to temp quicker. (It was about here where I was thinking I should've bought the 6 probe IBT-6X....)
I popped the lid on a set the range to BBQ smoke. I could easily see both temps on the app and the graph showed the steak coming from about 15 degrees internal up to about 55 where the alarm sounded and I pulled it off and stuck the probe in the second one.
Graph of the smoker heating up. You can see it start to plateau out.
And one of the steak probe. It goes a bit wild, I think I pulled the probe out and decided to put it back in for a couple more minutes...
Both steaks finished up with the alarm sounding again for the second one.
I found it's not a bad little unit. It's not perfect, but mainly I think it's because it is designed for BBQ rather than brewing. The features definitely shone when used in the BBQ environment, but the bluetooth range was still not the best. The features such as graphing and alarms are really good. I'll still use it when mashing for the alarm notifications to save me just guessing when to check the temp. With a couple of little improvements, this could be a really good all round thermo.
@inkbird is there any development in place for these items?
Cheers!
The price of the Inkbird is pretty competitive. I got mine from ebay for $39.59 which included 2 probes. I got this particular one since I get excited about anything that connects to a phone and this app looked pretty handy. Opening the box, the actual unit is just a black box with a probe wrapped around it. The second probe was sitting in the box with the wire wrapped neatly but theres no facility to have them both installed into the unit and clipped away neatly. There was also a clip which holds a probe and clips to the grill grate inside a BBQ or smoker. Theres no batteries, so you need to have 2 x AAA on hand.
The instructions on how to connect it to a phone were simple, just search for the BBQ Go app or read the QR code and install. Open the app and click Start, turn on the thermometer and press the button again. Done. Theres only 1 button on the device so it's hard to go wrong. You can then select the temp units, alarms etc in the app.
The app is pretty handy and easy to use. The main screen lists the thermometer it's connected to and also both probes. If you only have one connected, the second readings are just blank. You can select time alarms and also temp and temp range alarms. Some presets are built in such as levels of done-ness for each type of meat.. eg: you can select beef and rare and the default temp is 49 degrees. With the temp range alarms, you can input a high and low temp so an alarm sounds if it moves out of this range. I found the pre installed BBQ Smoke was a bit low (102 - 110 I think) but it's easy to change it either way. I reset mine to 107-120. You can also add extra presets which I did for a mash with a temp range of 64 - 66. One negative is that it only measures in whole degrees. It would be much easier to use if the measurements were finer, but it's designed as a BBQ thermometer not a brewing one I guess. It made it a bit hard to set a range for a mash that was not sounding an alarm al the time. My above mash temp range was to maintain a temp of 65 I would have preferred to go half a degree either side.
The display on the unit is easy to read and simple. If you have 2 probes connected, the temps flash between each probe and the small one changes to a 2. The accuracy was pretty good and usually within 0.5 to 1 degree of my usual thermometer which seems pretty accurate given I hit by expected FG each time. The read time is also fast, only a few seconds. Range for the bluetooth was average and if walls or something were in the way, it really suffered. Just remember it is only bluetooth and not wifi which would give better range. I brew in a shed out the back and had to leave my phone outside if I went in the house for anything otherwise the alarm kept going off because it disconnected.
The mash went well with the alarm working to let me know to bump the temp up every now and then. One good feature is the graph you can see in the app of the temp. One negative of this though, is I wish you could zoom in and see the graph over a smaller temp range. It would enable a better view of what was happening. The graph you get isnt that detailed for mashing since it only moves a degree or so either way. It was really good for the BBQ though.
So after the boil and the wort was chilling away, I fired up the new ProQ smoker and got some nice thick ribeye's ready. I used the second probe now. Unfortunately, the probes have a rubber sleeve over the 90 degree bend where the cable joins on and this sleeve wouldn't fit through the temp probe hole in the smoker. It was easy to slid it off and down the wire though to get it through. I used the grill clip to hold one probe and put the second in the smaller of the two steaks as it would cook up to temp quicker. (It was about here where I was thinking I should've bought the 6 probe IBT-6X....)
I popped the lid on a set the range to BBQ smoke. I could easily see both temps on the app and the graph showed the steak coming from about 15 degrees internal up to about 55 where the alarm sounded and I pulled it off and stuck the probe in the second one.
Graph of the smoker heating up. You can see it start to plateau out.
And one of the steak probe. It goes a bit wild, I think I pulled the probe out and decided to put it back in for a couple more minutes...
Both steaks finished up with the alarm sounding again for the second one.
I found it's not a bad little unit. It's not perfect, but mainly I think it's because it is designed for BBQ rather than brewing. The features definitely shone when used in the BBQ environment, but the bluetooth range was still not the best. The features such as graphing and alarms are really good. I'll still use it when mashing for the alarm notifications to save me just guessing when to check the temp. With a couple of little improvements, this could be a really good all round thermo.
@inkbird is there any development in place for these items?
Cheers!
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