Hello Ya'll, I was told to post the following here since you "build"ers would have the answers:
A newbie to this forum, from TN., but not to smoking.
So far I've used a round metal electric smoker that rusted out so I bought an aluminum one from Oregon but much too small and forcing me to buy chipped wood. I own a 70 fruit tree orchard (apple, cherry, pear, peach) with the majority being apple. When these trees die (I'm suspecting moles) I cut them up into 3" chunks/lengths and I have a large amount of dried apple wood. So far I've seen NOTHING on the commercial market that will allow me to use my stock. The charcoal offset smokers come the closest to what I would need but currently I'm being torn between building my own electric smoker out of single layer (non insulated) metal or consider a commercial charcoal smoker.
If I build my own (I have a small metal fab shop) I would build it out of 1/8" sheet metal, electric wand at the bottom of the smoker attached to a removable drawer holding the wood.
Questions:
#1 Firstly: last year I built a smoker out of 5053 aluminum but NO ONE so far can tell me if it's safe to use this metal to smoke food without any chance of food poisoning. Thoughts anyone?
#2 Does anyone have any recommendations about building a vertical electric smoker out of 1/8" metal with no insulated walls? Walls would be only 1/8" metal.
#3 Does anyone here use the offset charcoal smoker and what are your thoughts about them?
Suggestions/thoughts are very much welcome. I want to hear from anyone before I start building this new project.
A newbie to this forum, from TN., but not to smoking.
So far I've used a round metal electric smoker that rusted out so I bought an aluminum one from Oregon but much too small and forcing me to buy chipped wood. I own a 70 fruit tree orchard (apple, cherry, pear, peach) with the majority being apple. When these trees die (I'm suspecting moles) I cut them up into 3" chunks/lengths and I have a large amount of dried apple wood. So far I've seen NOTHING on the commercial market that will allow me to use my stock. The charcoal offset smokers come the closest to what I would need but currently I'm being torn between building my own electric smoker out of single layer (non insulated) metal or consider a commercial charcoal smoker.
If I build my own (I have a small metal fab shop) I would build it out of 1/8" sheet metal, electric wand at the bottom of the smoker attached to a removable drawer holding the wood.
Questions:
#1 Firstly: last year I built a smoker out of 5053 aluminum but NO ONE so far can tell me if it's safe to use this metal to smoke food without any chance of food poisoning. Thoughts anyone?
#2 Does anyone have any recommendations about building a vertical electric smoker out of 1/8" metal with no insulated walls? Walls would be only 1/8" metal.
#3 Does anyone here use the offset charcoal smoker and what are your thoughts about them?
Suggestions/thoughts are very much welcome. I want to hear from anyone before I start building this new project.
