OK. I read thru 405 pages of this thread, constructed a UDS with 3 1" intakes with 3/4in nipples and one ball valve on an 18" riser. I have 4 3/4in outlet vents on top. Burned out the barrel (which was unlined but i didn't know what was in it.....the lining was silver and got some light surface rust just sitting out overnight), seasoned it with spray vegetable oil. It burned hot (450-500) for 7 hours and had a hard black coating on the inside after it was done....no residue on a finger swipe.
Hooray, i thought. Yesterday I put on a fatty and 10 chicken thighs to break it in. To make a long story short, they came out terrible. Waaaay to smoky. I used a half basket of charcoal with 3 fist sized chunks of hickory and a few smaller slivers. Started about 15 briquets in the chimney and then dumped them on the firebox. The UDS held a steady 250 the entire time with one of the intake caps on. I waited for the smoke to die down before putting the meat on, but it never got to the point I would consider TBS. Once I put the meat on, the smoke got very thick for a while. I checked the meat at 2hrs, and never opened the lid until that point. At 2.5 hrs I pulled everything as both the chicken and the fatty were near 180 degrees. The chicken was good without the skin, and the fatty was good with the bacon removed. The skin and bacon were so smoky we couldn't eat it.
It's obvious I have a problem with smoke control, but how do I fix it? I've come up with several possible fixes but I'm not sure which apply, and I don't want to make more work for myself.
Add 2 more 3/4" outlets to the lid
Wait until there's nothing but TBS before I put the meat on
Use less wood
Scrub the barrel back to bare metal and reseason
???