I have wanted to build a smoker for Years

[USA_774]

I have wanted to build a smoker for year. I currently do all my cooking on a 25" Weber grill and an XL Green egg I bought used from a friend. I like the Egg, but it doesn't really give me the bark I like on my briskets.

I recently bought an old butane tank from a local trailer manufacturer that had sold their property. My best guess is it is about 100 gallons in volume. It measures approximately 30 inches in diameter and about 42 inches long.





I have purged the tank and removed all the fittings. Now I just need to figure out where I go from here. Since the tank is so tall and not very wide, I was thinking of building a reverse flow smoker and putting two rack in it for more cook space.

I look forward to finding lots of useful information on this site!

[Big T]

Welcome aboard!! You can check out the smoker builder calculators to figure out the exact size of your tank.

[Pete Mazz]

Welcome

[Dirtytires]

Beautiful tank size! A reverse flow is perfect and with 30 inch dia you could easily fit a third rack in it. Being a little shorter it should help keep left to right temps pretty even and make for a pretty efficient pit.

First step is to determine your tank volume then run thru the calculator to see what your throat, exhaust, intake and firebox sizes need to be. Then decide on a square or round firebox and gather your materials. A square firebox is easier to build and work with as well as easy to custom size. Then the tank gets cut....door, throat and exhaust holes. Get it on a cart and attach the firebox and baffle plate. Finally, door flanges, cooking racks and a log rack.

Sounds easy, right?

[USA_774]

Sounds easy, right?

My wife asked me why don't you just buy one. I told her I can't. I already spent $10.00 on this tank!

[USA_774]

Welcome aboard!! You can check out the smoker builder calculators to figure out the exact size of your tank.

Thanks for the welcome!

At this point I feel like I don't know enough to know what I don't know.
I have a lot of reading and videos to watch before I start cutting anything.

Plus I would like to upgrade my acetylene cutting torch with a plasma cutter.

[hogaboomer]

Here's a tank volume calculator. Your side measurement is to the point where the flat starts to curve down. You don't measure end to end.
https://www.calculatorsoup.com/calculat ... n/tank.php

[USA_774]

Here's a tank volume calculator. Your side measurement is to the point where the flat starts to curve down. You don't measure end to end.
https://www.calculatorsoup.com/calculat ... n/tank.php

Thanks for the clarification. When I get back out to the barn I am going to measure the tank again. I figure there is no use calculating anything until I get accurate measurements.

I like the picture of the smoker on wheels in your Avatar. I am hoping to do something like that as a way to move the smoker around on the gravel.

[hogaboomer]

This was the last one I did, my neighbor is pretty happy with it.

[tinspark]

I recently bought an old butane tank from a local trailer manufacturer that had sold their property. My best guess is it is about 100 gallons in volume. It measures approximately 30 inches in diameter and about 42 inches long.

Yes on the 100 gallon tank.
My phone app calculator figures a little over 98 gallons but it figures true radius bells on either end. Your pic shows that you might be right at or just a little over 100 gallons (102 gal?) more flat spot than a true bell. You likely would be fine using 100 gallons as your base line build size. Everything calcs out from the tank volume. Feldons, as well as the one on this site.
I used the calculator from this site on my center feed and it works fine. Stick with one calculator or the other.
I then reverse engineered Feldons and put it on an excel spread sheet and it is super close to this one and it works great. Here are the results..
I guess I got bored .. HAHA!!