finally starting

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dewberry

Fire Starter
Original poster
Mar 19, 2009
42
10
sorry this is so long, ill explain why at the end

so i have been a member of this forum for a couple years (roughly) but i just lit my first fire in my first smoker tonight. so a couple years ago i got really interested in smoking meat and decided to learn. so i got a piece of 20inch long 18inch diameter pipe with 3/8inch wall thickness free from a friend, welded 3/8inch plate to the ends and cut out a connecting hole in one end and a door in the other end. installed hinges and a door to control the air intake. the work came to a halt because i couldnt find any free pipe to make a cooking chamber with. then recently one of my dads coworkers was throwing away a store bought "new braunfels" offset style smoker because the fire box was rusted out. i figure it wasnt the perfect chamber i was looking for but i was kinda tired of waiting, so i connected the two together and ended up having to weld on a extra leg under the fire box to support the extra weight. today i went up to the family ranch and found a dead oak tree that was dead and fallen but not on the ground. the wood was nice and dry but not rotten. so i cut and split quite a bit of it and brought it home. i decided to do a test run tonight and see if i could get the smoker to stay at a constant temperature so about an hour ago i made a fire using all oak and right now im working a trying to get it to hold a constant temperature, im bouncing back and forth between 150 and 250. any suggestions of pointers? im using both the air intake and the plate on top of the chimney to control the temp moving only one at a time and making small adjustments. 

PS i know how much people on forums like pictures so ill try and post pics tomorrow
 
ummm kinda i was waiting a while but didnt know how long was long enough, thanks for the 10 min number. 

quick question, while you are cooking in the smoker and maintaining temp do you want an actual flame or do you just want a bunch of hot red coals with very small flames coming off of them?
 
at the moment i have 2 racks of ribs and 2 beer can chicken at 225*. im a very happy novice smoker :) should i post pics here or start a new thread? if so where?
 
here is a picture of the smoker
285_10150365608192925_523487924_10240253_3220828_n.jpg
and here is the write up of my first bbq on it http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/forum/thread/108771/my-first-try-at-smoking
 
If your going to use straight wood to fire it I would suggest using smaller splits you'll have more consistent temps. Or you can burn the wood in a separate barrel or something then just shovel in the coals. If you want to stick with the splits try making them about the diameter of a beer can and about 2" shorter than the length of the firebox. You'll have to add wood more often but it should keep your temps more consistent doing so
 
If your going to use straight wood to fire it I would suggest using smaller splits you'll have more consistent temps. Or you can burn the wood in a separate barrel or something then just shovel in the coals. If you want to stick with the splits try making them about the diameter of a beer can and about 2" shorter than the length of the firebox. You'll have to add wood more often but it should keep your temps more consistent doing so


thanks for the advice, very helpful
 
No problem we are here to try to help the most consistent temps would be achieved by pre burning the wood and shoveling in the coals but of course. Personally I just make my splits smaller but then again I have a gas powered splitter.
 
well i dont have a hydrolic splitter but im still young and im pretty good with a splitting maul. but is there an article i can read on here about preburning your wood?
 
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