New guy here! Couple questions.

[ScottsGT]

After years of smokin' on a charcoal side burner, it rotted out and had to go the curb. So I picked up the little #2 after my Masterbuilt I ordered arrived damaged and I started reading about all the problems with the MB.  Smokin' It came highly recommended on some smoking forums and I see why!

Yesterday I loaded up 3 racks of ribs for my first smoke after a 5 hour seasoning Friday afternoon.  2 racks were baby backs and one was St. Louis ribs.  Temps were around 220, but the baby backs came out just shy of pork jerkey. The St. Louis ribs were perfection!
Any tips on the baby backs you can offer?  Should I have opened up the smoker and foiled them after 2 or 3 hours?
And last night a 9 pm I put an 8lb butt on for an overnight smoke session.  As I type this, at almost 11 am, it just hit 195* so I'm off to find a cooler it will fit in.  I'll report back on how it turned out. 

 

[gregbooras]

To help figure out why the baby backs turned out the way they did, a bit more detail is needed.

What temp did you set the smoker at?
How long did you smoke the ribs for?
Did you use a water pan?

To answer part of your question, most of us don't foil ribs at all. For baby backs ribs I set my smoker at 235 degrees, smoke for 5 hours, open door test to make sure they are tender, then sauce and smoke for an additional 30 minutes.

Greg

 

[ScottsGT]

As mentioned above, 220 temps using an internal thermometer.  Don't really remember the knob setting since I set it and watched the temp gauge, but it was swinging from 200-225.  I did have a pan of water and apple cider vinegar on the bottom rack, and the ribs were at the second from the top, if I remember correctly. 
I went 4 hours, opened it up, slathered on sauce and went one more hour.

Should have I placed the pan on the floor next to the element?  I did it this way with the butt.

 

[Grampy]

ScottsGT, It is possible you just had a bad rack of ribs. 4 hours should not have been long enough for the ribs to be done much less over cooked. I have a #2 and like Greg mentioned for baby backs ribs I set my smoker at 235 degrees, smoke for 5 hours, open door test to make sure they are tender, then sauce and smoke for an additional 30 minutes.

 

[DivotMaker]

Sounds like a bad batch of baby backs.  I do them a lot, and occasionally you get meat that doesn't cook right, no matter what you do.  And yes, always put the water pan on the floor, next to the smoke box.