More Meat = More Time?

[smokindawgfan]

My daughter's 2nd birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks and I'll be smoking for about 30 people. The plan is 3 butts and 4 racks of ribs. A couple of weeks ago I was smoking chicken with my cousin and we were smoking 4 chickens on my Weber. It took twice as long as it usually takes me to smoke 2 chickens and although we had some fire problems (choking) I'd like to know if it usually takes more time to cook more meat or was it likely just the fire problem that caused the time lapse? If more meat takes more time, I'll need to plan for than when I start cooking on the big day (or more likely, the night before).

Any help is appreciated.

Cheers,
Brian

 

[pineywoods]

The fire was likely your biggest problem. About the only difference you should see when doing more meat is a little longer to get temps up when you load all the cold meat in at the beginning. However this shouldn't be much more time certainly not double the time

 

[flatbroke]

More meat, meaning larger chunk (bigger unit size) equals longer time.

More meat, meaning same size pieces equals about the same time smoking once the desired cooking temp has been reached.

The scenario you gave was probably fire related and I agree with Pineywoods.

 

[smokindawgfan]

Thanks for the responses. I figured it was probably the fire. Cheers...