It's time.

Post by **Big T** » June 25th, 2018, 6:07 pm

It sounds like it was an awesome time

Weldun · Post by **Weldun** » June 25th, 2018, 8:15 pm

Job well done, sounds like a very satisfying weekend.

Dirtytires · Post by **Dirtytires** » June 25th, 2018, 10:09 pm

Wait....shouldn’t somebody be here to say something silly like “no picture- never happened?”

Where is that guy with the hammer?

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » June 26th, 2018, 9:07 am

Dirtytires wrote: ↑
June 25th, 2018, 10:09 pm
Wait....shouldn’t somebody be here to say something silly like “no picture- never happened?”

Where is that guy with the hammer?

Yeah, I know. I was a bit busy...... gonna see if I can get a shot or two from my niece.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » June 26th, 2018, 10:21 am

Just a couple of teasers... This is where the smoker was sited, and when I loaded the brisket & pork butts.

ajfoxy · Post by **ajfoxy** » June 26th, 2018, 4:53 pm

Nice... and you can keep drip feeding the Q-view through...

Post by **Rodcrafter** » June 27th, 2018, 9:14 am

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » June 29th, 2018, 10:29 pm

Frank, Rod, et al, your comments on the bullet hinges are spot on. The smoker was effectively hard mounted to the front of the trailer for a 1,300 mile round trip (couple of long detours,) and the cook chamber door didn't budge a bit. I don't think that I have a thing to worry about with that door at all.

I may cut most of the bottom skin off to fix the grease leak, that'll give me the opportunity to get more insulation up around the charcoal chute that I missed, at the expense of a little cutting time. Sounds like a good trade-off to me.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » July 6th, 2018, 1:52 pm

I ordered a 6" long tap to try & fix the lift eyes issues, should have that next week. Hopefully, I won't have to cut a section of the wall out.

I'm going to work on the grease leaks tomorrow morning, now that I'm dug out from the email deluge.

Post by **Big T** » July 6th, 2018, 7:47 pm

Good luck.

Post by **Rodcrafter** » July 9th, 2018, 7:08 am

Keep the faith you can do it

Making memories!

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » July 9th, 2018, 10:09 am

Rodcrafter wrote: ↑
July 9th, 2018, 7:08 am
Keep the faith you can do it

Making memories!

Oh, I'm sure I can do it.... just a question of how many times am I gonna have to do it.....

Had a little excitement yesterday when I was unloading the beast. I have a 10k lbs flat bed, with 1/2" plywood bolted over the 5' ramps. There's a bit of a gap between the bed, and the top of the ramps, which wasn't a problem when I winched the smoker on (Jeep w/ a 9k self-recovery winch.) I couldn't quite push the casters up over myself, so I grabbed a rolling floor jack and a piece of 2" tube, and put it under the firebox.... the point load under the steel wheels on the jack found some dry rot in the deck and the smoker started to tip, fortunately only after the casters were far enough down to get safely on to the ramps. I did have it tied off with the winch safely, it wasn't going very far either, but still made for more excitement than I'd really like to have.

And I still have to figure out how I'm going to flip this over onto it's back to cut the bottom out. I think my best bet will be to use a couple of 4x4's as cribbing on the concrete, and use my shop crane to ease it over. I can't drop it on a pallet, it'd interfere with the forward legs/arms on the shop crane. Hrrrm..... crud.... is that load going to be too far out from the shop crane base..... I may have to reverse that.....

Make no mistake about it. These double pan gravity fed smokers are heavy monsters. When fully assembled, you're not throwing them around by yourself. Be very, very, very careful.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » July 10th, 2018, 7:41 pm

I'm pretty sure I've figured out where the pinholes are, in the interior grease pan. I degreased (w/ non-chlorinated brake cleaner tonight.) If I get the chance tomorrow night, I'll lay a bead along there before I tip the smoker over.

Before I forget: significant safety tip: DO *NOT* USE CHLORINATED BRAKE CLEANER to clean up steel, then immediately hit it with a welder or oxy-acet torch. When heat is applied, you'll generate something close to phosgene, used in World War II, and it's rather more than intensely toxic. You either need to let it completely flash off, or simply not use it at all.

Post by **Rodcrafter** » July 13th, 2018, 7:21 am

Thanks for that info, I never have used it but now I never will.

Making memories!

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » July 15th, 2018, 3:05 pm

A compact track loader (neighbor is setting big concrete blocks for a retaining wall,) makes quick work of flipping the smoker around.... my shop crane is just not quite up to the task for one man.

Good news is that the insulation is in better shape than I thought it would be. Bad news is that I seem to be fusing the wire back inside the MIG tip today for some reason, burned through 3 tips in short order. Grease pan is capped off, and filled with water, waiting to see if it's leaking. After a couple of weeks of smokes (and figuring out the job bombshell that got dropped on me last Thursday,) I'll finish welding the bottom back up.

Edit: And that ain't good. Still have a leaky grease pan. Nutz.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » July 22nd, 2018, 8:02 pm

The rewelded grease pan has passed a 2 gallon water test, but it's gonna be at least a couple of weeks before I get to welding the bottom back up. Smoking for 15-20 people next weekend, at least 1 full brisket, maybe a couple of chickens. Gotta make some of Alton Brown's beans, some good scratch macaroni & cheese and a whole pile of smoked potatoes.

Post by **Big T** » July 22nd, 2018, 8:52 pm

I'm glad that you got the leak stopped, it sounds like you have big plans.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » July 23rd, 2018, 7:24 am

I wouldn't say big plans..... just a few people in the back yard. The only thing I'm making that's really time sensitive is the macaroni & cheese, everything else gets done ahead of time.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » July 29th, 2018, 12:08 pm

A little food porn.....

viewtopic.php?f=35&t=6702

The Czar · Post by **The Czar** » July 30th, 2018, 9:07 pm

Yum!!!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » August 26th, 2018, 12:12 pm

JKalchik wrote: ↑
May 31st, 2018, 12:18 pm

ajfoxy wrote:Removable firebox grate is almost an essential. If you get a flare up in the chute you want to be able to drop the charcoal load right sharpish.
Something else crossed my tiny little brain over the last couple of days. I use lump hardwood charcoal, and have had some..... let's just say "non-burnable" material show up. In my grill and current smoker, that's really not a big deal, other than taking up space (one chunk was a well over a lb, and a few inches in diameter.) With a fixed grate, that would be a steel plated bugger to get back out, with a removable grate, just let it drop into the ash box for removal. Yes, I am going to have to be rather more careful when filling this smoker, I won't be able to just blindly dump in a bag.

Coming back around to this, just in case anybody else is contemplating building a GF...

I now consider a removable grate mandatory, not an optional feature. I burned through some old briquettes I got from a coworker. After the charcoal column burned through & down, there was still a pretty good pile of ash on top of the grate. Being able to pull the grate made it really easy to clean out the column. A fixed grate would make it quite a bit more difficult to clean out the ash, not impossible, though.

Frank, I'd really suggest this get added to your GF plans.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » September 25th, 2018, 9:42 pm

One more reason for a removable grate: looks like I may have the occasional problem with ash bridging on the grating, I can give the removable grate a healthy shake during a heat-up or smoke to knock the ash down. It'd be a bit more difficult with a fixed grate, I'd have to empty out the ash box and reach in with a hammer or sledge to knock the bottom of the fixed grate.

The symptoms I'm having with the ash bridging are that with the forced draft on the airbox inlet, nothing is getting through to the cook chamber, and I'm not getting much above 165 degrees F. A quick shake of the grate, and it's up 40 degrees in less than 30 minutes.

I may just make another grate, spaced an extra 1/8" apart.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » November 10th, 2018, 9:25 am

Fired it up last night so I could throw pork butts on at 0630 for a party tonight.... and had to knock the ash down, temp started to drop around 0515, and still had several lbs of unlit charcoal in the chute. Temp ran very nicely overnight, though, with an ambient temp down to around 5 degrees F.

Chromeski · Post by **Chromeski** » November 10th, 2018, 12:14 pm

Do you have round bar for the grate or square? I've heard others mention ash staying on the gate. I'm about to actually start building my mini and I'm planning round just not sure if that will change anything.

JKalchik · Post by **JKalchik** » November 10th, 2018, 12:19 pm

Round, using the rebar that SmokerBuilder spec'ed for the fixed grate.

SmokerBuilder.com

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