- Aug 7, 2011
- 7
- 10
Hello all,
I posted this very same message on another forum a few hours ago and a user was nice enough to recommend this board to me thinking it might be better suited for my question so here goes...
I'm VERY new to this hobby (for me) and with the kids out of the house I decided I would try my hand at smoking meats. So I built my smoker and used some ideas from a mixture of plans.
I hope I'm in the right place to ask this question but I'm having some problems. The smoke house is 3' deep by 4' wide and about 6' tall. All wood and insulated. At the bottom on the front door I have a 6" vent and then is a 6" vent in the roof and another 6" vent in the side. I'm using a LPCAST10-2 from Tejas Smokers.
One of the problems I'm having is getting the temp down. Even with the flame set very very low I can only seem to get the temp down to about 240. The second problem is when I open the door it will blow out the burner most of the time. I emailed Tejas Smokers and told them I thought maybe my burner was to large because I can't really adjust the heat. They said
"If the flame goes out when you open the door…then you probably do not have enough chimney and air entry for the constant draft. What is happening is that when you open the door the pressure is changinginside the smoker, and the inside air is going to move around to equalize that change in pressure. First make sure you have adequate open chimney and about twice that cross sectional area in air inlet coming into the base of the smoker."
So I'm here to ask the experts a question or two if I may. First if need to add another / larger intake how big should it be? Would I be ok with putting a vent on the back or side at the bottom? Should it be an adjustable vent like the one on the front and top or just leave it open all the time. If I understand it correctly if I have two 6 inch vents at the top I would need at least 4 six inch vents at the bottom.. is that correct. Basiclly double to what I have on the top is the way I read this.
Tejas suggested I try this first and see if that doesn't help get the temp down but if not we could go with a smaller burner.
Sorry to just jump in here and start asking a ton of newbee questions but I figured if anyone would know you guys / gals would. Before I just assume and start hacking more holes in my smoker I figure it's better if I ask.
I know it is hard to tell but this smoker is on casters so I can roll it out of my garage when I want to use it so adding any large external hardware is really out of the question.
thanks
David
http://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=Smokerfront.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=Insidesmoker.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums...st/?action=view¤t=Insideceilingvent.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=Insidedoorvent.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=Insidesidevent.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums.../?action=view¤t=SideandTopexitvents.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=2partlpcast1m.jpg
I posted this very same message on another forum a few hours ago and a user was nice enough to recommend this board to me thinking it might be better suited for my question so here goes...
I'm VERY new to this hobby (for me) and with the kids out of the house I decided I would try my hand at smoking meats. So I built my smoker and used some ideas from a mixture of plans.
I hope I'm in the right place to ask this question but I'm having some problems. The smoke house is 3' deep by 4' wide and about 6' tall. All wood and insulated. At the bottom on the front door I have a 6" vent and then is a 6" vent in the roof and another 6" vent in the side. I'm using a LPCAST10-2 from Tejas Smokers.
One of the problems I'm having is getting the temp down. Even with the flame set very very low I can only seem to get the temp down to about 240. The second problem is when I open the door it will blow out the burner most of the time. I emailed Tejas Smokers and told them I thought maybe my burner was to large because I can't really adjust the heat. They said
"If the flame goes out when you open the door…then you probably do not have enough chimney and air entry for the constant draft. What is happening is that when you open the door the pressure is changinginside the smoker, and the inside air is going to move around to equalize that change in pressure. First make sure you have adequate open chimney and about twice that cross sectional area in air inlet coming into the base of the smoker."
So I'm here to ask the experts a question or two if I may. First if need to add another / larger intake how big should it be? Would I be ok with putting a vent on the back or side at the bottom? Should it be an adjustable vent like the one on the front and top or just leave it open all the time. If I understand it correctly if I have two 6 inch vents at the top I would need at least 4 six inch vents at the bottom.. is that correct. Basiclly double to what I have on the top is the way I read this.
Tejas suggested I try this first and see if that doesn't help get the temp down but if not we could go with a smaller burner.
Sorry to just jump in here and start asking a ton of newbee questions but I figured if anyone would know you guys / gals would. Before I just assume and start hacking more holes in my smoker I figure it's better if I ask.
I know it is hard to tell but this smoker is on casters so I can roll it out of my garage when I want to use it so adding any large external hardware is really out of the question.
thanks
David
http://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=Smokerfront.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=Insidesmoker.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums...st/?action=view¤t=Insideceilingvent.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=Insidedoorvent.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=Insidesidevent.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums.../?action=view¤t=SideandTopexitvents.jpghttp://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd400/Grim_Reaper_Beast/?action=view¤t=2partlpcast1m.jpg