Hello everyone! After about 9 months of waiting, I finally received my Model 3 to 3D conversion kit. I am so happy that Steve offered this option to previous owners of the Model 3. I feel like I have a new smoker!!
I did my conversion last weekend and it went very well. I would not recommend it unless you are comfortable doing DIY projects, and have a good drill/bit as well as a rotary tool. The conversion took me about 1.5 hours, but I was taking my time. There were a couple portions of the upgrade that I found challenging:
1) The Solid State Relay was shipped separately, and was not mounted on the heatsink as the instructions stated. Attaching it was simple, and there was a tube of thermal paste included. I have done this plenty of times, so the lack of instructions was not a big deal to me, but this should have been more clear in the instructions.
2) The new cord that we supplied did not include a new cord grommet, so the existing one needed to be reused. The instructions were not very clear on how to remove the existing grommet, and I ended up nearly ruining it. Even though it was cracked and chewed up from my prying with a screwdriver, it went back in fairly secure.....no issue.
3) The replacement smoker probe is not specifically designed for this application, and is modified with the use of a 1" nylon spacer. Of course, I either lost the spacer, or it was not included, but I was able to find something I had on hand as a replacement. These replacements are two .5" ABS spacers....hopefully this ABS will have adequate heat resistance.
4) I used a Dremel to cut out the hole for the SSR. I went through about 8 cutting wheels to do the job....make sure you have plenty on hand!
5) Lastly, Steve mentioned before I ordered that it is possible that some of the holes that hold on the top may need to be redrilled (FYI - The new top fits fairly well, but it is not perfect). In my case, I need to redrill the top four holes, as they do not line up. Drilling in stainless steel is not easy, but I was able to get this done fairly accurately. My issue now is that these holes need to be threaded. I tried some SS self tapping screws, but this did not work. I just ordered some taps to see if I can thread this myself.
If you are planning on doing this conversion, feel free to reach out if you have questions. I am curious if anyone else had to redrill some holes, and how they were able to get screws in to secure the top.
Happy smoking....
-Mark
