Sausage/Jerky Rack MES40 w step by step

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Tropics

That is a really nice MOD, I am going to do sausages one day and I too was wondering what would I hang them on, and that is really nice work there and very effective MOD !

I will save this, but I have Jerky and then Bacon in line ahead of the Sausage, wife is on board for all I have done thus far, that why I had a open PO for all of this, we are a team, we work together and she is as excited as I am hehehe, but if I were to go and get all the fixins for Sausage making right now, I know she would think I had lost my mind, I have it all on the back burner, already making lists hehehe

Good Job on that Wood Sausage Rack !

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I'm going to do my first batch of snack sticks soon. I'm familiar with the process just never done a batch start to finish myself. Do you guys recommend making a hanging rack or tying stick length pieces to fit the racks, could etc ? How important is it that the meat doesn't touch eachother very much in the smoking process. Seems like some guys have it touching while it's hanging? Also what mixture does everyone use 50/50? I'm going to be using goose to start then most likely pork but may add some beef as well. Any input would be awesome as I am not well versed in the snack stick / summer sausage field. Thanks !! [emoji]127867[/emoji]
 
I'm going to do my first batch of snack sticks soon. I'm familiar with the process just never done a batch start to finish myself. Do you guys recommend making a hanging rack or tying stick length pieces to fit the racks, could etc ? How important is it that the meat doesn't touch eachother very much in the smoking process. Seems like some guys have it touching while it's hanging? Also what mixture does everyone use 50/50? I'm going to be using goose to start then most likely pork but may add some beef as well. Any input would be awesome as I am not well versed in the snack stick / summer sausage field. Thanks !! [emoji]127867[/emoji]
avid If the meat touches it will not get the same amount of smoke.Leaving it wit a look as if it was not cooked.I have draped them over the rods and I have also tied small loops to hang them straight



Hope this helps

Richie
 
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I finally got a chance to whip some of Richie's fancy sausage racks.  Silly me... I decided to us up some plywood I had laying round. I will be making more out of solid wood. In fact I might have some cedar fence board that would work that is the right thickness. BTW this is in a 30" MB so I had to come up with my own dimensions. You will also notice if you look carefully this is in a Gen 2.0 that has a side vent on the left side. Notice the cutout?

 
 
I finally got a chance to whip some of Richie's fancy sausage racks.  Silly me... I decided to us up some plywood I had laying round. I will be making more out of solid wood. In fact I might have some cedar fence board that would work that is the right thickness. BTW this is in a 30" MB so I had to come up with my own dimensions. You will also notice if you look carefully this is in a Gen 2.0 that has a side vent on the left side. Notice the cutout?

My original was a gen 2,, MES40

Looks like it needs some sausage i made bacon once and use a piece of string to hang it,now I use a bacon hook.

Nice job

Richie
 
Your wooden racks are a great idea, however it looks like you're just replacing the current racks that come with the smoker with wooden ones?  I would imagine it would be too easy to take your design and just make stacking racks so that they are closer to each other, that way you could fit more me in their.

I like to design however I'm not set up to make racks like that I'm sure you use the router to make the holes on the side rails dolls fit in.  I don't have a router so my holes would be all different sizes which would only cause problems.  If you design a freestanding multilayer rack that will fit in the Masterbuilt 30 " please let me know how to your it. As I type this holes instead of grooves for the side pieces.

Do you have to do anything to to the wood you use as racks so they don't get burned up. I am new to Smoking so excuse my dumb questions.
 
I'll take a crack at your questions if I may...

These wooden racks are NOT simply a replacement of the original racks. Furthermore they are NOT designed to be "Stacked" but rather allow sausage, bacon or other meats to HANG vertically rather than on racks horizontally. When you place rope sausage or links over the dowels, they just hang down in a loop fashion, then the dowel gets slid in and set in place in the notch, then repeat with the next dowel.

The ones I made I did not use a router. Just use a drill. An easy way to do it is like what Dirtsailor suggests in an earlier post is by placing them next to each other and drilling between them so each half gets a half hole.

You don't have to put any treatment on the wood nor is it advisable to put any varnish, shellac, paint, or any other type of sealer on it. It will "Season" naturally.

For smoking anything you would use the wooden rack for, I cant imagine the desired smoker temps would ever be very warm. But even at a maximum temperature of the Masterbuilt of 275' you will not spontaneously ignite a wooden rack placed near the top. There are a lot of whole smoke houses still around that are made of wood.
 
 
I'll take a crack at your questions if I may...

These wooden racks are NOT simply a replacement of the original racks. Furthermore they are NOT designed to be "Stacked" but rather allow sausage, bacon or other meats to HANG vertically rather than on racks horizontally. When you place rope sausage or links over the dowels, they just hang down in a loop fashion, then the dowel gets slid in and set in place in the notch, then repeat with the next dowel.

The ones I made I did not use a router. Just use a drill. An easy way to do it is like what Dirtsailor suggests in an earlier post is by placing them next to each other and drilling between them so each half gets a half hole.

You don't have to put any treatment on the wood nor is it advisable to put any varnish, shellac, paint, or any other type of sealer on it. It will "Season" naturally.

For smoking anything you would use the wooden rack for, I cant imagine the desired smoker temps would ever be very warm. But even at a maximum temperature of the Masterbuilt of 275' you will not spontaneously ignite a wooden rack placed near the top. There are a lot of whole smoke houses still around that are made of wood.
Thank you for your reply, after I read further down the thread I saw more detailed description of your wooden racks that you built.  What I'm trying to accomplish is to design something that I can make jerky on rather than the four racks that come with my Masterbill 30 inch electric smoker.  When I saw your wooden racks I thought I could do the same thing with thinner dowels creating my own racks that can be stacked in replacement of the grills that are in the smoker.

The reason I want to do this is so that I can have more racks to dry my jerky on.  I looked at buying other types of cookie coolers, wire racks, but they're all too big to fit in the smoker.  That is why your design is an interest to me.  I would imagine I could take out the existing racks and the wall brackets that the racks go into maybe leaving the bottom rack, then building my own set of racks using your design altered.  The reason I would alter your design is so that I can make my racks just a bit wider and with narrower dowels, then I could put whatever spacers I need between each rack so that at the end I have a standing rack structure of several racks to dry my jerky on.

Using your design and altering it so that it fits my application, I'm wondering what you think about it and you think it's possible to do going with the smaller dowels.  I was thinking quarter-inch rather than a half inch and I'd be placing him a little bit closer together still leaving enough space to let air circulate.  I guess my question is as if I go smaller, and I don't use the side rails to put the wood pieces into I remove them and have a freestanding set of wooden racks, would that work?
 
I cant take credit for the sausage dowel design... that would be "Tropics" who is the OP. Anyway, I don't think this is going to work for what you are trying to do.

Depending on your version/revision of MES30 the side racks are installed differently. Some are screwed in in a permanent fashion (but can still be removed), and some are rapidly removable that hang on screws kind of like a picture frame. You can get as creative as you would like to install racks as you describe. I imagine you can make your own side racks to accommodate as many racks as you want out of sheet metal or wood to hang or screw in each side (Just use the existing side racks as a template for the hole pattern) Then buy more Masterbuilt racks or make your own. I do know the rack dimensions on MES30 are 14 5/8 W x 12 3/8 D. In a thread somewhere, somebody posted a link to another drying rack that would fit.

My only comment to adding more racks is that it is important to have a lot of space for airflow to allow adequate drying, and stacking them too close could cause issues between the racks.

Hope this helps.
 
 
I cant take credit for the sausage dowel design... that would be "Tropics" who is the OP. Anyway, I don't think this is going to work for what you are trying to do.

Depending on your version/revision of MES30 the side racks are installed differently. Some are screwed in in a permanent fashion (but can still be removed), and some are rapidly removable that hang on screws kind of like a picture frame. You can get as creative as you would like to install racks as you describe. I imagine you can make your own side racks to accommodate as many racks as you want out of sheet metal or wood to hang or screw in each side (Just use the existing side racks as a template for the hole pattern) Then buy more Masterbuilt racks or make your own. I do know the rack dimensions on MES30 are 14 5/8 W x 12 3/8 D. In a thread somewhere, somebody posted a link to another drying rack that would fit.

My only comment to adding more racks is that it is important to have a lot of space for airflow to allow adequate drying, and stacking them too close could cause issues between the racks.

Hope this helps.
The mounting side brackets then my racks slide into our are simply hung over some pins and then it slides into a slot so they can all be taken off.  My racks are only 13 x 12 so buying more racks is not an option because I'd have no hardware to slide them into.  That's why I'm trying to come up with my own way of building some stacking racks using the OP design.

Hopefully the original poster of the wooden racks will read this and reply.  I don't hear back I will go in post a reply to his post.  Thanks for your reply
 
 
 
I finally got a chance to whip some of Richie's fancy sausage racks.  Silly me... I decided to us up some plywood I had laying round. I will be making more out of solid wood. In fact I might have some cedar fence board that would work that is the right thickness. BTW this is in a 30" MB so I had to come up with my own dimensions. You will also notice if you look carefully this is in a Gen 2.0 that has a side vent on the left side. Notice the cutout?

My original was a gen 2,, MES40

Looks like it needs some sausage i made bacon once and use a piece of string to hang it,now I use a bacon hook.

Nice job

Richie
Erik nice job on the rack,get some sausage hanging

Richie
 
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