pit tuning

[prettychili]

ok give me the skinny on pit tuning. is 3/16 plate more than enough? 1/8 will warp under heat and not gonna put 1/4 i have a back to think about. spacing thoughts and how far from the cooking grate. pit is 6 foot long and 24 inches deep.

 

[smokin' dick]

That's a nice big pit. Mine is only 16" x 36" and I use 5" x 16" x 1/4" tuning plates. I have 5 of them and use as few as 2 or as many as five depending on the cook. The exact length of yours will depend on how low the fire box opening is into the smoke chamber. You will want the tuning plates to be just above the top of the firebox opening. Many offsets, including mine, have a permanently installed baffle, or horizontal plate, near the fire box to help distribute the heat into the smoke chamber.

 

[prettychili]

mine does as well, however with the lenght of the defector plate it would place it only 4 or 5 inches away from the grate. is that ok?

 

[smokin' dick]

the distance from tuning plates to grate on mine is 2 1/4". Works for me.

 

[ddave]

Mine has 1/8" thick tuning plates and works fine. If you get your cook chamber hot enough to warp 1/8" steel, I think you have more problems than just the tuning plates warping.

Dave