Hey all!
First post, apologies for the length. I dove in on building a ghetto, super cheap offset smoker as a fun project to learn how to smoke meat. I picked up a 55 gallon and 15 gallon drum for like 20 bucks and got to work. Burned them out, cut doors, bought a stovepipe stack, made a stand with a shelf out of scrap wood, made a cooking grate, etc. Thus far I estimate I've only got $55-$60 invested in the project. Earlier today I was finishing up what I thought would be the final part of this build, wire brushing everything down in preparation for a seasoning fire and paint.
The problem (among many lol), that seems so obvious looking back, is the lining on the barrels I used. I think its the epoxy based red stuff that takes forever to grind off. I didn't know that the lining was such a bear before I got this far, doing just a rudimentary search brought up tons of forum threads of vertical 55-gallon smoker builds where the lining was sandblasted out, but the obvious thing would be to buy an unlined barrel to begin with. My mistake. The 55 had cherry juice or cherry sauce in it, the 15 had a liquid fragrance, if that helps anyone identify the lining that was likely used. The inside is red in some places, and I double checked with another barrel from the same place that I bought for something else. Red inside.
I realized I haven't taken a picture of it completely assembled yet, so here it is from a few days ago when I hadn't added the shelf, door handle, thermometer, firebox vent, or firebox grate. So my question is: what should I do with this thing? Its more annoying than just cleaning out or sandblasting the 55 because I believe my firebox has the same lining. My ideas so far are to get an unlined drum and start over, ditch it and buy a cheap commercial offset, or start again and do things right with better material. Seems like more money than I'm willing to sink into a project that was intended to just get my feet wet. Can I just paint the entire thing inside and out with high temp BBQ paint? Can I use it as is (I've already ground a decent portion of the crap off the inside)? Ideally I'd season it and cook some cheap chicken or pork butt and ribs to see if smoking meat is my thing. What would you do?
TLDR Unknowingly built 55 gallon drum offset smoker with potentially dangerous epoxy lined barrels, what should I do?
First post, apologies for the length. I dove in on building a ghetto, super cheap offset smoker as a fun project to learn how to smoke meat. I picked up a 55 gallon and 15 gallon drum for like 20 bucks and got to work. Burned them out, cut doors, bought a stovepipe stack, made a stand with a shelf out of scrap wood, made a cooking grate, etc. Thus far I estimate I've only got $55-$60 invested in the project. Earlier today I was finishing up what I thought would be the final part of this build, wire brushing everything down in preparation for a seasoning fire and paint.
The problem (among many lol), that seems so obvious looking back, is the lining on the barrels I used. I think its the epoxy based red stuff that takes forever to grind off. I didn't know that the lining was such a bear before I got this far, doing just a rudimentary search brought up tons of forum threads of vertical 55-gallon smoker builds where the lining was sandblasted out, but the obvious thing would be to buy an unlined barrel to begin with. My mistake. The 55 had cherry juice or cherry sauce in it, the 15 had a liquid fragrance, if that helps anyone identify the lining that was likely used. The inside is red in some places, and I double checked with another barrel from the same place that I bought for something else. Red inside.
I realized I haven't taken a picture of it completely assembled yet, so here it is from a few days ago when I hadn't added the shelf, door handle, thermometer, firebox vent, or firebox grate. So my question is: what should I do with this thing? Its more annoying than just cleaning out or sandblasting the 55 because I believe my firebox has the same lining. My ideas so far are to get an unlined drum and start over, ditch it and buy a cheap commercial offset, or start again and do things right with better material. Seems like more money than I'm willing to sink into a project that was intended to just get my feet wet. Can I just paint the entire thing inside and out with high temp BBQ paint? Can I use it as is (I've already ground a decent portion of the crap off the inside)? Ideally I'd season it and cook some cheap chicken or pork butt and ribs to see if smoking meat is my thing. What would you do?
TLDR Unknowingly built 55 gallon drum offset smoker with potentially dangerous epoxy lined barrels, what should I do?
