Smoker "enclosure" question

[yardbird]

I have a Smoke Hollow cabinet smoker. It sits out in the yard in an area that's going to catch every breeze. I had to move it away from the house because my wife objected to the whole house smelling like smoke for 3 days every time I cooked something. :)

Anyways... I'm going to build a little "house" for it. I want to enclose it because when it gets cold out and there's any kind of breeze, I won't be able to maintain temperature. Wrapping it in a welding blanket just ain't going to cut it.  So.... after I finish building all of our kitchen cabinets I'm going to build a little outhouse style enclosure to put the smoker into.

Here's my question:

When I cook stuff, I get grease running down the legs and pooling. Right now the smoker is sitting on a couple of patio blocks. The dogs love lickin' those stones when I'm done cooking. If I put the smoker into a little building, I can't have grease running onto a wood floor. That would get rancid and smelly and be a fire hazard. If I set the legs in tuna cans or something to CATCH the grease, I'm going to have to lift the smoker to get the cans out and empty them.

What do you guys do about this? I see some of you have them on patios. Surely you can't be letting grease run all over. My other thought was to just use shallow baking sheets. The kind with sides only about 1/2 inch high. Then when I'm done, soak up the pooled grease with paper towels and then just clean the pan with some simple green or something. If I find the right size pans, I could have the whole floor covered. And if I occasionally have to pull the smoker out and wash those pans in a laundry tub or something I could see doing that once or twice a year.

Thoughts?

 

[smokinhusker]

The pan sounds like a good idea, but couldn't you slope the pan towards the back of the smoker, for example, and cut aligning holes in the pan and the floor, so the grease would drain to the holes and perhaps into a can or bucket of some kind? Just a thought

 

[diggingdogfarm]

Auto parts stores sell oil change drip trays...they're usually 2x4 or 3x4 feet.


~Martin

 

[s2k9k]

My GOSM did the same thing and after examination I saw that the way it was constructed was the problem. The way the sides were spot-welded to the bottom there was no lip or anything and the grease could run right out the seam and then down the leg. Easy fix for me, I cleaned the seam real good then wiped a bead of black high temp silicone on the seam all the way around the smoker. Now it's sealed and nothing can run out. It could still come out the bottom of the door but lucky for me where it sits my patio has a slight slope so the grease runs to the back away from the door. Also i wipe it out with paper towels after each smoke so not a lot of grease will accumulate.

If i were you I would be looking for the cause of the grease running out and try to seal it up.

 

[cabrego]

Chances are the stuff you are cooking is too big for your smoker, or you are not using grease pans.    I had the same grease drip problem when I was using a smaller smoker, I upgraded to the smoke hollow (44" model) and I place a grease pan under my meat and I did not have a single drop of grease hit the ground.