Do me a favor and hit your temp gun with a really heavy hammer . it will work better lol

tune for performance only , forget temps and forget smoke. when we talk about racing if you watch the top guys in on road and off road you will notice hardly any smoke . Why is it so ? ( i love saying that ) many reasons but one reason we must consider is that some fuels smoke more than others . EG

fuels that rely on glycol based oils ( 95 % of rc fuel on the market ) will smoke a lot, glycol based oils have a low flash point hence they burn off easy . when you burn oil it makes a lot of smoke. if you use a high performance fuel with good oil it will tend to smoke a lot less.

So if you are a basher or beginner then yes look fo the smoke by all means , thats a good sign , but when you tune for racing and performance dont rely on a smoke trail all the time. Just tune for performance . that dosent mean choke it till it dies , Performance means an engine that runs reliably , consistantly and performs well.