- Feb 10, 2009
- 420
- 31
My primary smoker is a UDS.....built to original plans, now modified using some internals acquired from Mark Hunsaker of Hunsaker smokers fame. Works great for the normal smoked meats, but have had a time stepping it down to temps used for smoking sausage.
Trying to get it to 130 start.....then 150F plus smoke for a couple hours.......then 175 to 180F to finish. About an hour. So all told, roughly 4 hours start to finish and no wild runaways in excess of 200F at any time. The best plan seems to be to limit the amount of fuel in the drum at all times. The best method I've used to date is fill a charcoal starter chimney to about 1/3 full. Lite it, get it started, then place it in bottom of drum. I then poke the Hunsaker vortex baffle into the chimney, then load sausage and seal it up. As smoke and fuel is needed, remove sausage, lift vortex battle up, drop in some charcoal or fist size wood chunks, then meat goes back in and seal it back up. Very cumbersome.
Talked to Mark about it and they do not offer any options or accessories for that kind of work. He suggested I contact the Hunsaker smokers group on Face Book to see if any of them had solved the problem. I'm not on Face Book so decided to ask you guys instead.
If anyone is on Face Book and would like to ask the Hunsaker bunch same, I'd love to hear what they have to say.
Trying to get it to 130 start.....then 150F plus smoke for a couple hours.......then 175 to 180F to finish. About an hour. So all told, roughly 4 hours start to finish and no wild runaways in excess of 200F at any time. The best plan seems to be to limit the amount of fuel in the drum at all times. The best method I've used to date is fill a charcoal starter chimney to about 1/3 full. Lite it, get it started, then place it in bottom of drum. I then poke the Hunsaker vortex baffle into the chimney, then load sausage and seal it up. As smoke and fuel is needed, remove sausage, lift vortex battle up, drop in some charcoal or fist size wood chunks, then meat goes back in and seal it back up. Very cumbersome.
Talked to Mark about it and they do not offer any options or accessories for that kind of work. He suggested I contact the Hunsaker smokers group on Face Book to see if any of them had solved the problem. I'm not on Face Book so decided to ask you guys instead.
If anyone is on Face Book and would like to ask the Hunsaker bunch same, I'd love to hear what they have to say.