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[pmillen]

I'm going to smoke 2 lbs. of bottom round, sliced 3/16" thick, into jerky at 180°.  I'll probably need to stack it on trays.

Since fat renders at about 140° it's likely that grease will drip on the meat below.  Is this a concern?

[slaga]

It is not anything I ever worried about. I trimmed as much of the fat as I possibly could to begin with so there is very little fat in the jerky I make.

[Bar-B-Lew]

It is not anything I ever worried about. I trimmed as much of the fat as I possibly could to begin with so there is very little fat in the jerky I make.

+1

The fat is what turns to mold the fastest so getting rid of as much as you can on the exterior before slicing is a good practice.

I stack 4-5 trays on top of each other when I make it in the MAK.

[yorkdude]

I also agree with the others.
I typically trim as close as I can on fat and often I stack the jerky and have never had a problem.

[Bar-B-Lew]

Same here with the trimming and the stacking. I do lay the jerky out on paper towels and blot away any moisture when finished though.

The last time we did a big batch, I let it sit out on the racks for several hours after pulling off the smoker.  I then placed them in brown paper bags in the fridge to draw out more moisture.

[pmillen]

The beef has been in the smoker for a couple of hours.  The temperature is swinging between 125° and 155°.  The beef is fairly dry but still flexible and chewy, not tough.  It's not brittle.  It bends without breaking.

How dry should I make it?

[Bar-B-Lew]

I usually go about 4 hours at 170-180 but it also depends on how thick the meat was when you started.  I also do not pat dry the meat of the marinade either so it may take longer for my methods to dehydrate.

[slaga]

A little late to the party concerning how long to cook to help you on this cook but... The short answer is multiple cooks on my Traeger differed quite a bit from my single cook with my Pitboss Copperhead 5. See this link for my experience. Seeing how your PG500 is not the same as my Traeger or Copperhead 5, your results might vary some but I expect yours to be more in line with my Traeger cooks because the PG500 and Traeger do not incorporate a water pan, unlike my Copperhead 5. I probably should also add that the slices I hand cut when cooking on the Traeger were a little thinner than the slices on my single cook with the Copperhead 5, when I used the Weston Jerky Slicer which cuts about 1/4" thick slices.

https://pelletfan.com/index.php?topic=1569.msg33058#msg33058