Here is the current pit I am building. Going to be a long post... offset 125-gallon backyard model.

[realdocBBQ]

I love your vision and execution on this door. The whole idea, from the insulation to the dampers, the whole thing. I aspire to build a pit myself. I have zero welding experience, zero building experience, but 100% confidence that I want to. So, I am learning from the professional builders.

Thank you! I appreciate the feedback. Not a professijal by amy means, but I will admit to getting better a bit over the last couple of years. Luckily, I do this as a hobby so I have plenty of time - time to experiment, time to go slow and try to be methodical, etc. And I like to do different things with each pit, so I've been able to sort of 'spread my wings' (lol) and try different techniques and concepts.

His work is unbelievable. realdocBBQ is the real deal.

Thank you very much! I have had some really good mentors who have inspired and advised and tutored me.

 

[realdocBBQ]

Your fit , finish and esthetics are impressive . Really nice work so far .

Funny you should mention this... lol.

I got my door installed... but it's not yet functional....

See, there's a little problem - I can't exactly... open it.



When I try to open it, it gets stuck. There's a spot around the 5 o'clock point where it gets stuck with the very back (innermost) portion of the door butts up against the inner sleeve of the firebox. So... it's stuck. lol

Actually shouldn't be too much of an issue, though, really. I had similar issues with the one other 'bank vault' type door I built (on my very first smoker) and had to spend some time grinding down the edges of the door and the firebox inner sleeve a little bit to get it to open and close easily.

Being that these doors (the insulated or 'bank vault' style as I think of them) have a thickness to them, and are not just a single plate that opens and closes like many smokers have, they have a 3-dimensional space they occupy. When you mount them and go to weld on hinges, you have to try to be very specific about where you place the hinges in relation to the door's edge and the rest of the firebox, etc. When the door goes to open, it pivots on the hinge point and the door doesn't just move straight in and out like a cork in a bottle. Try putting that cork in from the side or the edge - it's a little more difficult, requires much more precise alignment, I guess.

Anyways, no one ever taught me if there's a trick to doing this, or what the 'proper' clearance is or whatever, so I've just had to wing it on my own with trial and error and try to figure out what works and what doesn't. Some of these professional builders out there would probably laugh at my design or implementation or whatever, but it seems to work 'ok' - just sometimes requires a bit more umm... finagling.

So that's what I've got to do now - the finagling. lol With a grinder. And a 40-grit ceramic flap disc.



Yeah, that's my tool of choice for something like this. Like an 8-lb sledge on a finishing nail.

But I'll get it to work, eventually. lol

 

[Brokenhandle]

Funny you should mention this... lol.

I got my door installed... but it's not yet functional....

See, there's a little problem - I can't exactly... open it.



When I try to open it, it gets stuck. There's a spot around the 5 o'clock point where it gets stuck with the very back (innermost) portion of the door butts up against the inner sleeve of the firebox. So... it's stuck. lol

Actually shouldn't be too much of an issue, though, really. I had similar issues with the one other 'bank vault' type door I built (on my very first smoker) and had to spend some time grinding down the edges of the door and the firebox inner sleeve a little bit to get it to open and close easily.

Being that these doors (the insulated or 'bank vault' style as I think of them) have a thickness to them, and are not just a single plate that opens and closes like many smokers have, they have a 3-dimensional space they occupy. When you mount them and go to weld on hinges, you have to try to be very specific about where you place the hinges in relation to the door's edge and the rest of the firebox, etc. When the door goes to open, it pivots on the hinge point and the door doesn't just move straight in and out like a cork in a bottle. Try putting that cork in from the side or the edge - it's a little more difficult, requires much more precise alignment, I guess.

Anyways, no one ever taught me if there's a trick to doing this, or what the 'proper' clearance is or whatever, so I've just had to wing it on my own with trial and error and try to figure out what works and what doesn't. Some of these professional builders out there would probably laugh at my design or implementation or whatever, but it seems to work 'ok' - just sometimes requires a bit more umm... finagling.

So that's what I've got to do now - the finagling. lol With a grinder. And a 40-grit ceramic flap disc.



Yeah, that's my tool of choice for something like this. Like an 8-lb sledge on a finishing nail.

But I'll get it to work, eventually. lol

We have faith in you! And not laughing at you... just the comment with sledge and finishing nail!

Ryan

 

[realdocBBQ]

We have faith in you! And not laughing at you... just the comment with sledge and finishing nail!

Ryan

Oh trust me, I get it. I'm fine with the laffing - I laff at myself constantly. Not to mention SMDH and forehead smacks on a regular basis. lol

 

[chopsaw]

When I try to open it, it gets stuck. There's a spot around the 5 o'clock point where it gets stuck with the very back (innermost) portion of the door butts up against the inner sleeve of the firebox .

Funny you should mention that . Lol .
I saw it when I first saw the picture . Thinking it might hang on the strike side .

no one ever taught me if there's a trick to doing this, or what the 'proper' clearance is or whatever

Any door of thickness will get longer in the hole when first opened , before it pulls away from the " jamb " .

I've done all kinds of doors in residential and commercial buildings , yes even a couple bank vault doors .
A quality door in a structure will have a bevel on the strike side towards the hole . That way when opened it doesn't catch the jamb . Now days they just rip the whole thing smaller leaving all edges square , but a larger visible gap on the pull side of the door . The door stop on the push side hides the gap .

So your contact point is most likely at the innermost edge , but you probably know that already . Might try a tappy tap away from the strike side on the bottom most hinge , and see what it does .

It doesn't take much . If your inner diameter was 1/8" less than the outside it would probably swing . Residential doors are about 3/16 .

 

[seenred]

Strong work, Danny! The fit and finish are looking good! The slight "hang up" on the door shouldn't be too difficult to address - probably nothing that a few minutes with a grinder won't fix...which is kinda like applying chopsaw 's idea of beveling the inner diameter.

I'm liking your design ideas so far! Definitely outside the box and not just "cookie cutter". This thing's gonna be heavy, but I'll bet it's gonna be nice when you're finished!

Red

 

[realdocBBQ]

Funny you should mention that . Lol .
I saw it when I first saw the picture . Thinking it might hang on the strike side .





Any door of thickness will get longer in the hole when first opened , before it pulls away from the " jamb " .

I've done all kinds of doors in residential and commercial buildings , yes even a couple bank vault doors .
A quality door in a structure will have a bevel on the strike side towards the hole . That way when opened it doesn't catch the jamb . Now days they just rip the whole thing smaller leaving all edges square , but a larger visible gap on the pull side of the door . The door stop on the push side hides the gap .

So your contact point is most likely at the innermost edge , but you probably know that already . Might try a tappy tap away from the strike side on the bottom most hinge , and see what it does .

It doesn't take much . If your inner diameter was 1/8" less than the outside it would probably swing . Residential doors are about 3/16 .

Yup, that's exactly right. I don't know of a good way to prevent this in this particular design, no way to 'bevel' that one portion of the door - I considered early in the planning trying to make my door slightly narrower on the inside portion than on the outer portion, kind of like a cork - remembering having this issue when I did my first door like this almost 2 years ago.

But I got it to work with some shaving. So I did make the inner portion slightly smaller than the lip, but apparently not quite small enough. It's a balance between wanting it to fit well (can't really make it a 'plug' like I'd like, but oh well) and allowing enough clearance to open and close.

Good thing about metalworking - you can remove and add almost at a whim, though it can take some work. But it is just barely hanging up on the lower edge at the almost open point, so it won't take a lot of grinding. Probably only needs a thirty-second or so ground down and it'll be perfect. Of course, then once I get it fitting well, I have to worry a little about once the whole thing heats up how it might change the fit. Hopefully it's built stout enough that it shouldn't cause too much shifting. Fight that battle when I get there. lol

seenred you're right, this thing is heavy - I had hoped to be able to keep it somewhat lighter by using the 1/8" for the outer casing, but it's still a heavy beast. I really hope once this is done that it isn't too heavy for someone to move around easily... but I've built a couple of 250s on yard carts that were surely heavy beasts and I know this thing, even being fully insulated, shouldn't come close to what those were - and I was able to move them around the shop yard (albeit with difficulty) by myself... so we'll just have to wait and see when it's all done.

This one below was a heavy freaking beast - all 1/4" firebox, partially insulated on bottom corners and that tank itself was all nearly 5/16". Man, this was tough to move solo...

That was a fun project, but it was a 'contract build' I took on and really did it for much less than I should have. I knocked it all out in about 6 weeks from start to finish. I've spent more than that on this firebox alone! lol Of course, I haven't been able to work on it consistently due to weather issues.

I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to do the 'cart' portion of this one, especially the front axle. Previously, I've done this, but I don't think I want to do that this time, as I'm not going to use a whole hub and spindle for the rotating axle.

 

[chopsaw]

Damn man ,,, that's awesome . Find an old " Georgia buggy " and add a drive line so it can be driven into place . Lol .

I considered early in the planning trying to make my door slightly narrower on the inside portion than on the outer portion, kind of like a cork

You could do it with a smaller diameter inside plate and a series of kerf cuts in the ring to make fingers . Bend those in to meet the smaller disc .

Just thinking out loud . I did a lot of radius framing when I was working . Always loved it .
That came out really awesome . You got the skill that's for sure .

 

[realdocBBQ]

Damn man ,,, that's awesome . Find an old " Georgia buggy " and add a drive line so it can be driven into place . Lol .


You could do it with a smaller diameter inside plate and a series of kerf cuts in the ring to make fingers . Bend those in to meet the smaller disc .

Just thinking out loud . I did a lot of radius framing when I was working . Always loved it .
That came out really awesome . You got the skill that's for sure .

Yeah I have the smaller inside diameter plate, and rolled the flat bar to make the 'standoff' for the thickness - didn't think of doing kerf cuts like that to make it taper inward. Lotta work, yeah, but could be done, then welded up.

 

[realdocBBQ]

Gotten some more work done.

Collector welded up and my ugly ass welds ground down to beveled corners. A different look for this one, we'll see how it comes out, and if I can manage a similar look on the firebox.

Today I worked on cutting into the tank. Lotta time laying out lines and places with my laser level.

Then used the plasma to cut out my openings:

The collector needed trimming to fit the tank.

Tomorrow I'll be mounting the collector, then starting to work mounting the firebox. I hope to get it all done tomorrow and at least sitting on rear wheels. Maybe by Sunday afternoon, anyways. Time will be a little cut short both days, as The Wife wants me to go to a local theater show Sat nite (small local theater we have both performed with in the past), and then Sunday is off to see Andrea Bocelli at the BOK center.

Busy weekend...

 

[seenred]

Looking good Danny! I really like the look you achieved with grinding the outside corners on that collector. I always grind every outside corner too. That's some slow, painstaking, and dirty work!

And I've heard lots of pro welders disparage that practice, but we're not fabricating a nuclear reactor, after all...I like to make those visible seams look good. And my welds aren't always ugly, exactly...but they're rarely consistent, either!

Keep up the good work - looking forward to more updates Brother!

Red

 

[JckDanls 07]

OK.. I'll ride along in the back of the truck... But there's something I'm missing...

I can't seem to find the beer cooler back here ?