Quest M3/Artisan/TMD-56 Problem

#1: Post by **whattodo** » April 29th, 2015, 3:47 pm

Hi there. I have Quest M3 and TMD-56. I also bought a thermocouple from coffeeshrub. Recently I have started to try to connect TMD to my laptop and use Artisan. However, Artisan reads weird temperatures. For a while it reads smoothly then jumps to very high temps then reads smoothly again. I did try this with two different laptops but received similar results. Could TMD be faulty? Or am I doing something wrong? Thanks

#2: Post by **wrakocy** » April 29th, 2015, 6:08 pm

Hi Erge,

I'm running the exact same setup (Quest -> TMD-56 -> Artisan) and had the exact same problem when I first started out. If you haven't already, check out this thread: Troubleshooting Electrical Noise with Roaster Thermometer [Solved].

The reason I thought I'd chime in here is that, as thorough as that thread was, it didn't wind up resolving my issue. I tried unplugging my laptop (to address a possible ground loop) and added ferrite cores to my thermocouple leads (to potentially suppress electrical noise), but neither approach had any effect.

What wound up solving the issue for me was relocating my setup (from the kitchen to a work table in another room). I still don't completely understand why I got such jumpy readings in the kitchen, but I'm pretty sure it was due to proximity to a radio-based baby monitor in the kitchen. (Yes, I suppose I could have just moved the baby monitor instead, but hindsight being 20/20 and all....

)

Moral of the story is, if at all possible, try changing up your location and see if that has any effect...

Good luck!

#3: Post by **jalpert** » April 29th, 2015, 8:51 pm

Mine did that for a while. The issue was that the USB cable was touching the chassis of my computer.

The Amprobe seemed to be reading reasonable temperatures on its display, but Artisan was recieving spikes, so the issued seemed to be in the USB connection for me. I did the following and it solved my issue:

- Move the amprobe and its USB cable away from my Variac transformer
- Don't touch the USB cable during the roast
- Keep the USB cable isolated from the computer chassis

May 1st, 2015, 9:56 am

Thanks wrakocy and jalpert. You're great.

Today, I moved my setup to garage aaaand no more spikes.

This time I faced another issue. It seems BT thermocouple bought from coffeeshrub needs calibration.

Thanks again.