How long for the fire to burn before cooking?

Burn the logs down to a nice bed of coals, regulate the temp after that by adjusting the airflow and add meat! Add smaller splits or chunks of yer flavor wood as needed.

"if ya smell smoke, you're smoking." That's been said in here many times. If your temp is maintaining, and ya have TBS, leave it alone! No smoke at all, temp dropping, add a split or a couple of chunks. If ya preburn your wood, just add a scoop of coals to your firebox to maintain temp. You'll have the workins of that new smoker figgered out fast!

you got your dampers open? Open everything up wide and you should see the temp jump up quickly. How big a fire you got going / how good is the bed of coals (but with only 45 minutes into the fire, you prolly don't have a good coal bed yet.)

DISCLAIMER! I know nothing about your rig - just saying what I would do with my rig (without propane assist!).

yes, what Seboke said, and yes open everything up, you may even have to crack open the door the firebox for a short time. Get that dawg up to 350-400 degrees and then brush them grates good with a stiff wire brush, then on my smoker, I use a hose with a wide spray nozzle to wash off the hot grates and let it drain out the grease drain and steam the grates clean. This will bring your temps down a bit, for just a lil while. When the grates are back to temp, I spray heavily with spray non stick coating, and let it sit while I get the temps backed off to where I want them to be. It will not hurt for the meat to go on a grate that is 250-300 degrees. The cold meat will also bring down chamber temps for awhile. You'll notice that this rig will hold heat alot better and have less to rebound when opened.I take about 35-45 minutes to get my bed of coals to where I like them, but I start my wood with a full chimney of lump, and then stack my wood on top after I put it in the firebox. I starts going very well within 5 minutes and it easily at 400 degrees within 20 minutes( unless its a blizzard or super windy and cold). Just start turning stuff down, or closing inlets a lil at a time to get it to where ya want it. Its gonna be at least 2-3 smokes to get it figured out, but It will be fun.

Lotsa great help here to get ya through it.