Need DIY plans for a smoker

[ampsucker]

fyi, i tried cooking in my 55 gallon drum smoker the first time last week. cooked about 10 lbs of brisket for 11 hours. it turned out real tasty but was tough so ended up steaming the finished meat in the inside oven in apple juice at about 300 degrees for two hours to break up the collagen. that made a mighty tasty product.

during the smoking i built a small charcoal fire in the smoker itself and was able to keep the fire low so it would maintain a cooking temp inside the barrel of anywhere from 160 - 260 degrees. i was shooting for a steady 225, but the fire would burn down and i would have to add a few lumps of charcoal and some fresh apple wood every 30-60 minutes. i did not use any water in the smoker but did spray the meat with apple juice everytime i added fuel. kept the air vents closed the whole time to keep the fire low and smokey.

amp

 

[Travelover]

My late father in law used to make smokers from old refrigerators by cutting notches in the gasket to let it breathe. He used an old stove burner element as a heat source to make the wood chips smoke. If you salvage the burner adjustment knob off the old stove, you can control the heat more easily.

He got pretty good at it - could even make carp into a delicacy.

YouTube - DIY Convert an old refrigerator into a meat smoker or smoke cooker

 

[moeh1]

Mine is a Burger King half height stainless freezer they were throwing out. I use an electric element in a ceramic dish grill-type thing with a temp contoller hooked to it. I use a small pan of wet chips on top. You need both an air intake and a decent sized exhaust for the moisture removal. I also crank up the temp and do a brisket almost every year. I cook mine 22 hours with a pork butt above it for some fat to drip over the brisket. Gotta go I;m gettin hungry

 

[aggiehortguy91]

fyi, i tried cooking in my 55 gallon drum smoker the first time last week. cooked about 10 lbs of brisket for 11 hours. it turned out real tasty but was tough so ended up steaming the finished meat in the inside oven in apple juice at about 300 degrees for two hours to break up the collagen. that made a mighty tasty product.

during the smoking i built a small charcoal fire in the smoker itself and was able to keep the fire low so it would maintain a cooking temp inside the barrel of anywhere from 160 - 260 degrees. i was shooting for a steady 225, but the fire would burn down and i would have to add a few lumps of charcoal and some fresh apple wood every 30-60 minutes. i did not use any water in the smoker but did spray the meat with apple juice everytime i added fuel. kept the air vents closed the whole time to keep the fire low and smokey.

amp

At those temps, you are going to need 13-15 hrs in the smoker for that sized piece of untrimmed whole brisket, maybe longer if you spend too much time down on the lower end of that range. A trimmed brisket is a whole different animal and requires a different technique. IMHO, low and slow is the best way, but it is hard to keep a small pit at consistent "cool" temp. Wrapping in foil to finish the cooking speeds things up quite a bit at the end, but has a tendency to make the meat hard to cut like it is too tender. It also changes the texture of the outside crust. You might do a search for the "minion method" for your fire. I have had some success in my small pit using this method using lump charcoal and wood. It does make tending the fire easier.

I've cooked 12# briskets (untrimmed whole briskets) for 15 hrs without foil at 250-300 on my smoker (New Braunsfels Hondo) and done the same size at about the same temp in 12 if I wrap in foil for the last couple of hours. It is almost impossible to run my pit cooler than 250 consistently. We (I wasn't cooking, I'm not THAT good) competed in Houston one time with 15# brisket cooked at a very consistent 180-200 for slightly over 20 hrs on a custom made 24' pit. It was the best darn brisket I ever ate, even if we didn't win!

I'm gettin' hungry, this is the second time tonight smoking a brisket has come up. I gotta clear a day on my calendar to do some cookin'!

 

[aggiehortguy91]

What type of smoker are you trying to build? I missed it if you have already said. I don't have any plans, but I do have some experience with designing offset-firebox type smokers. My step-dad has build several larger offset pits. I am currently using a small New Braunsfels Hondo that I've made a couple of modifications to. It is a great small smoker in my opinion, but smaller pits are harder to use.

I know very little about vertical smokers or cold smoking, although my neighbor did build a nice vertical cold smoker for fish out of a small propane burner and a stainless commercial freezer. He makes one H#!! of a smoked fish dip out of kingfish and spanish mackerel!

 

[aggiehortguy91]

I want to smoke hams, turkeys, fish in temperatures down to -30 if possible.

I have heard of people making a smoker out of an old stove, fridge, even an outhouse.

Then what is the proper way to smoke the meat so that it doesn't turn black.

OH! I missed the "so that it doesn't turn black" part!

If your meat is turning black, most likely your fire isn't burning properly. Usually it is caused by using the damper on the exhaust side of the pit or improperly cured wood. NEVER (well, almost never) close your damper on the stack. You get soot when you don't let the fire breath properly so only limit your fire on the input damper. Sometimes it is caused by cooking at too high of a temp.

I'm not experienced with cooking in the temps you are asking about. I have heard of people using an OLD refrigerator (no plastic!) to cook in (temps in the 250+ range), but have never seen a good picture of how it is done. At those temps, I would guess that you are going to need insulation to keep your temp up in the cooker unless you can put the whole affair in a building and exhaust the smoke outside.

 

[Minotbob]

I've used an old refer a couple times for a smoker. One had an electric hot plate and one was charcoal fed. I wired the hot plate up to a thermostat from a hot water heater to maintain a constant temp.

 

[49tandc]

Alltoys,
For ease of use - go with propane. The GOSM smoker from Wallyworld is great. Spring for the wide-body one, you won't be disappointed. I've had one for a couple of years and use it all the time. I can get about 6 butts/briskets (50-60 lbs of meat) in it at a time - for a 12 - 14 hour smoke. The meat only absorbs the smoke for the forst 6 hours or so. Any wood used after that just goes out the chimney. Wind is hard on a smoker too, plan on making a wind-block when its running.

If you want to convert a freezer or frige, try http://www.gassmoker.com/c-burner.htm
Whatever you do, go to: SMF - Smoking Meat Forums - Powered by vBulletin

Learn about smoking fatties and ABT's (Atomic Buffolo Turds) They are unbelievably good.

49T&C

 

[tjintheshop]

I made my smoker out of a 250 gallon bulk tank that dairy farmers use for milk storage. Its all stainless and insulated. I gutted the cooling compnents and installed a 220Volts Pakstat controller unit that goes from 50 to 250 degrees and runs just like your oven. Built a tray with two stove burners in it that sits on the bottom of the unit. On the legs I installed casters so I can move it in and out of the shop. Made over 700lbs of venison sausage in it the last three years with out a glitch. When done, just take out the burners and hose down with soapy bleach water to sanitize it. They come with a drain in the bottom of them.

 

[hockeyhead]

Try the www.smokerring.com They have plans, and plenty of pictorial builds of different smokers. Kind of like the TBN of smoking food, I use a couple of Weber water smokers, they're called Mountain Smokey Joe or something like that, anyway there is a lot of build from scratch and some kind of conversions to a smoker on this site.



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