- Nov 10, 2016
- 5
- 11
I've smoked twice on my Longhorn with zero modifications and was impressed with the results, so I was anxious to see how good it could be. I gasketed the lid to the firebox and cooking chamber, put a latch on the cooking chamber lid, siliconed the firebox to the cooking chamber, the top and bottom halves of the firebox, and the chimney, and added a baffle on the firebox side of the cooking chamber (sheet steel with holes driled). For burn time, I borrowed the idea of using stainless steel drywall mud pans, by turning the factory charcoal grate 90 degrees (raised it up because the grate is rectangular) I was able to fit 3 16" long pans in the firebox. I loaded the first pan and 1/2 of the second pan with 1 layer of charcoal to make sure the fire would carry across the bridge between pans, season the new metal I had added, and get a gauge for burn time. Fired it up and walked away; with the charcoal 1 layer deep, I was holding about 180 degrees (and thought about making jerkey) and got about 2 hours of burn before I got bored and decided it was time to cook. I had drilled 1/4" holes in the bottom of the mud pans (figured it was small) and had a fair bit of unburned charcoal and a lot of ash covering the drilled holes. I drilled several 7/8" holes in the pans to fix that issue and loaded up charcoal to the top of the pans for cooking. This resulted in a burn time of about 5 hours, the first 2 hours held about 240 degrees, but then climbed to 300 over the next hour when the second and third pan of charcoal were both burning-I was done smoking before the temp got out of hand, and when I closed the damper I was able to get it under control.
I know, I know, that's not important, what did I cook, that's the important thing. I smoked some pork tenderloin and chicken breasts because they are hard to screw up. The chicken got shredded for taco/burrito duty, I did pull 1 of the tenderloins (after reading that it won't work) which will also be used for tacos/burritos. The rest of the tenderloin is scheduled for my lunch this week at work.
I know, I know, that's not important, what did I cook, that's the important thing. I smoked some pork tenderloin and chicken breasts because they are hard to screw up. The chicken got shredded for taco/burrito duty, I did pull 1 of the tenderloins (after reading that it won't work) which will also be used for tacos/burritos. The rest of the tenderloin is scheduled for my lunch this week at work.
