UDS finally done (Pic heavy)

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buschleaguebbq

Newbie
Original poster
Mar 21, 2014
7
10
After weeks of researching and planning, I finally put my welder to work and built me up a UDS. Here are some photo's from the journey.

Picked up an unlined drum from craigslist for $5. The burn:


Making some progress:




Primed:


Paint:


After seasoning and a couple of cooks I decided I needed to hinge the lid. This makes life much easier.



Built a new handle and put some rope gasket around the lid and she's finally done:




Prior to this I had zero experience cooking on the drum. I gotta say, these things are fantastic cookers! Once you get some practice it's set it and forget it. I made my charcoal basket out of a Weber 22.5" charcoal grate and 7" tall expanded steel. I was amazed when I filled it up and got 15hr's with the temps holding steady around the 250F mark. Now that the builds done there's only one thing left to do, smoke!!!!
 
Great looking drum.... 
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That looks great. Love the hinge system on the lid. How did you remove the ceramic coating to get down to bare metal to do the welding?

Chad
 
 
That looks great. Love the hinge system on the lid. How did you remove the ceramic coating to get down to bare metal to do the welding?

Chad
Thank you! I just used a wire wheel attachment for my angle grinder to get through the factory Weber coating.
 
 
Thank you! I just used a wire wheel attachment for my angle grinder to get through the factory Weber coating.
Really? Not doubting you, just didn't have the same luck when I tried to remove it with a wire wheel. It more or less buffed it rather than removing it. I tried everything I had. 120-400 grit sandpaper on a DA, 60-120 grit sanding wheels in a high speed drill (don't have a die grinder), wire wheel and grinding disks on my angle grinder. Nothing seemed to work well. I'm looking at doing a 30g with a Weber lid and I need to remove that coating so I can attach it to the drum lid like I did here:



Chad
 
 
Really? Not doubting you, just didn't have the same luck when I tried to remove it with a wire wheel. It more or less buffed it rather than removing it. I tried everything I had. 120-400 grit sandpaper on a DA, 60-120 grit sanding wheels in a high speed drill (don't have a die grinder), wire wheel and grinding disks on my angle grinder. Nothing seemed to work well. I'm looking at doing a 30g with a Weber lid and I need to remove that coating so I can attach it to the drum lid like I did here:



Chad

Yeah I know what you're saying about "buffing" the factory coating. That's what mine looked like too but I just kept at it. Once I broke through it though the rest seemed to flow rather easily. One thing I did find however was the wire wheel would get the lid so hot it would actually burn through the metal lid itself, which I had to fill with weld later. I'll try to get you a pic of the set-up I used. It was just my angle grinder with a cheapo Harbor Freight wire wheel. Excellent build by the way. 
 
Yeah I know what you're saying about "buffing" the factory coating. That's what mine looked like too but I just kept at it. Once I broke through it though the rest seemed to flow rather easily. One thing I did find however was the wire wheel would get the lid so hot it would actually burn through the metal lid itself, which I had to fill with weld later. I'll try to get you a pic of the set-up I used. It was just my angle grinder with a cheapo Harbor Freight wire wheel. Excellent build by the way. 

Thanks for the compliment. I thought the same thing as far as burning through the metal. It's almost as if trying to grind the ceramic coating off it makes the metal thinner. When I do the 30G I'm not going to try and remove it. I'm just going to start the weld on the drum lid and let it flow up to the Weber lid. Hopefully it will melt the coating, whatever it is, and let it float to the top of the weld. We'll see and I'll keep you informed.

Chad
 
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