Hardware to monitor actual oven temperature (not meat temperature)?
I’m trying to monitor my actual oven temperature (not meat temperature) with an HA-compatible device and I’ve been unable to find any hardware that can do that.
Lots of bluetooth and wifi thermometers seem to do this, but all the ones I have researched so far that can measure ambient temps up to at least 500 or 600 degrees (which is what I need to measure.) But you can’t just put the probe into the oven because a part of the probe (the “meat probe”) is limited to 212 to 225 degrees or else threat of damage and safety issues. Can anyone suggest a solution?I don’t really care about ruining the meat thermometer capability so long as the ambient temperature sensor continues to work, but the product warnings about this are rather stern.
Why do I want to do this?
Oven temperatures are notoriously erratic and inaccurate, so I’d like to connect something measuring actual oven temp to my HA system so I can monitor and graph the temperature. My intention is to understand the actual characteristics of my oven, with the end goal being better and more consistent baking. “Every oven and thermometer is a complex heat transfer problem”
You can just use a standard wireless grilling thermometer, you just have to run the probe wire out the oven and close the oven door on it. You can get probes intended for air temp measurement; they make them with clips to clip on the grate and the probes have blunt ends. They are intended for monitoring your grill while you barbecue (smoke) something, but it will work for oven air temps too.
I use mine for my smoker, not my oven, but the idea is the same. I monitor it in HA using RTL433 with a USB SDR receiver. (I monitor a few other 433 MHz devices so the setup isn’t specific to just the thermometer).
I have an old Maverick Redi-Chek ET-732 thermometer which came with both meat and BBQ probe:
Well, the point is simple but perhaps you are not around dual temp probes, especially wireless/BT ones.
Something like a meater.
If you put that open air in an oven, crank it to 500 you will ruin the probe.
It needs insulation from the heat. The upper portion doesn’t and gives you ambient temp in the oven.
Now, NO ONE with half a brain would just put it on the grates. AND you are normally only tuning to the oven temp and probe ambient temp.
You can accomplish that task with a “single potato”. If the key is trying to line up oven/grill ambient temp against probes then that is perfect and that is “the point”.
Now, the OP wants to monitor oven temp … no reason stated why. But meater probes gien a damn good representation of the ambient temp (the tip needs to be in something).
I cannot think of any time would ever what to know temp in my oven unless I was cooking.
If there is something you are cooking that needs 500 degrees for hours … I ain’t eating it.
Thanks for the nudge to ESPHome! I am impressed at what’s available since the last time I did anything like this (remember the Parallax BASIC Stamp, circa 1998?)
Based on your suggestion, I ordered an ESP32-C6, MAX31856 thermocouple amp, and a thermocouple, followed some directions on how to set it up using ESPHome… and it worked first time. (Admittedly the parts added up to around $100 but if I was doing this just to be practical I’d have just sat in front of the oven with a pencil, kitchen timer, and metal oven thermometer.)
Tip: if you hook up the thermocouple wires backwards, you will get surprising results.
