Ugly Drum Smoker

Hey all, I made me a mini UDS over the weekend with a 30 gal drum that was given to me. I did an 8 pound Boston butt today and it turned out awesome. Temps stayed between 230-250 all day with just minor adjustments. I'm going tomorrow to pick up a couple of 55 gal drums to start on a regular sized UDS.

Wyley said:

Hey all, I made me a mini UDS over the weekend with a 30 gal drum that was given to me. I did an 8 pound Boston butt today and it turned out awesome. Temps stayed between 230-250 all day with just minor adjustments. I'm going tomorrow to pick up a couple of 55 gal drums to start on a regular sized UDS.

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Hey Wyley, fellow TNFO here just down the road from ya! If you haven't already stop by cattle call and introduce yourself. glad to hear your mini UDS worked out great! How much height do you have between the bottom of your charcoal basket and cooking grate? Curious minds want to know!

As I have a stainless 55 gal coming, and pretty much all the steel ones I want at $10 for a local yard – no real loss about this free concrete-bottomed drum. It’s not powder coated and tricked out…

Skidder said:

I have a pizza pan bolted to the bottom of my charcoal basket and there was a piece of paper in the bottom of the drum and it never burned so I'm not to sure about your concrete idea. Also I've seen concrete explode from to much heat. One piece was thrown over twenty feet.

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I’m not word about too much heat and exploding then, if the paper didn’t even burn.

Cecil said:

With the extra 2 inches on the bottom that would mean your cooking grate will have to be 2 more inches higher. That would give you less space between the grate and the lid. Are you planning on using a grill lid instead of the flat lid?

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I have 27” down from the grate to the bottom, when I make the rack it should put me at the 24”. I have about 6” above with the flat lid. With this one, it was an open barrel, and with the lip it’s 23 ½”, so the Weber lid doesn’t fit w/o modifying.


Us newbies get through this read in a few days to a week, so all is design and mods happen in a short time, even though the evolution took 2 ½ years to this point. I’m sure the long-timers don’t have the anticipation of getting a build going. But I bet a good majority of the people just joining read though, all the while in the back of their head are thinking up what spin of their own they can put on it…

Wasn’t trying to be the young hot-shot cowboy walking into the saloon of regulars. Just a brainstorm. I have learned my lesson. KISS…

It took me about 2 weeks to read this thread first time through and the anticipation really gets to ya. I just wish my work would slow down enough to let me finish it.

Everybody has to do something to make it their own, I know before I got my donor grill for parts I had planned on an antique tractor mod for the exhaust. Just because I'm a redneck with tractors to play with.:tongue: Sorta thought that old tractor muffler exhaust flapper would look pretty cool on one along with maybe some John Deere green.:mrgreen: A small magnet on the side of the stack should hold the flapper open when in use. But that will have to wait for the Kingsford UDS to get done before I get to the Johnny Popper UDS.

Ok, so I FINALLY finsihed the UDS about 3 weeks ago. I love it. I've cooked on it multiple times, turned out great Q and noticed somethings I need to change.

1. I don't have a cover where I store mine, so how do you guys cover the holes in the flat lid to keep water out?

2. I cannot seem to get the temp above 240-250. When the neighbor was welding my intakes in, he said the drum was a thin metal. He actually blew through it a couple of times. He fixed those, but what can I do?

3. The other thing that throws me off is when I open the lid forsomething (Which is rare) I get temp drops not spikes. Why is that?

how many intakes and what size are they Stiltz??

Stiltz6ft9in said:

Ok, so I FINALLY finsihed the UDS about 3 weeks ago. I love it. I've cooked on it multiple times, turned out great Q and noticed somethings I need to change.

1. I don't have a cover where I store mine, so how do you guys cover the holes in the flat lid to keep water out?

2. I cannot seem to get the temp above 240-250. When the neighbor was welding my intakes in, he said the drum was a thin metal. He actually blew through it a couple of times. He fixed those, but what can I do?

3. The other thing that throws me off is when I open the lid forsomething (Which is rare) I get temp drops not spikes. Why is that?

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1. I can't help because I have a pipe coming out of my bung and I just put a plastic cup over it.

2. All I have to do in order to get my temps up is to make sure one of the in takes (usually the ball valve) is facing the wind and open up the other two and off to the races she goes.

3. When opening the lid, you should get a temp drop. You are letting the heat escape. Now if you are in and out, then the temps should come right back in a bit. Be patient. If you dilly dally with the lid off then you will see a huge temp increase due to the amount of oxygen you are allowing into the drum

HF Handle

I recall seeing this one, thanks for the tip.

Stopped at Harbor Freight today, had these hammers on sale for $3.99.

Cut it off, propane torch for a minute or so, and I could bend it right over.
Now I'll either get someone to weld it to the flat lid (no welding equip for me), or take a die and thread the end so I can attach it with some nuts and washers.

what is everyone using to hang the flat lid off the side of the drum?

I need to go back through this again because I am looking to add a table for my maverick thermo and other items..plus I still do not have handles on the lid or thew sides of the drum....and nothing to raise the charcoal basket out with other than my hands...I also need to fab an ash shaker.

Rookies - Read the thread

Read the entire thread.

Before I read the thread, I made this out of a metal 5 gal pail I had. Didn't have nearly the airflow for a complete even burn.





Also (before I read the thread) was going to try cutting this old compressor - 16" diameter tank for a coal basket with stable feet. Now might just cut it in 1/2, put a grate on it to have a place to set a hot chimney starter.
Go with an expanded metal surround.






And again, (BIRTT) - Got this free barrel that had corn sweetener / red lining.Thought it was a great score. Full day of burn. Bunch of grinding, sanding. Still too much liner left.





Wiped with denatured alcohol, gave another burn, then some more wire wheel.
Finally looked good.



As repeated often, get used one without a lining, or a new unlined one. Save yourself some of dirty work. Get to cooking faster.


Got some Kingsford for the test, and I have a few places by me that stock the Wicked Good lump and briqs, will get some for the first cook soon. Can't wait.

StayDown said:

what is everyone using to hang the flat lid off the side of the drum?

I need to go back through this again because I am looking to add a table for my maverick thermo and other items..plus I still do not have handles on the lid or thew sides of the drum....and nothing to raise the charcoal basket out with other than my hands...I also need to fab an ash shaker.

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i use a Tarp Rope Hook i believe it is called it was under a dollar at the hardware store

Stiltz6ft9in said:

Ok, so I FINALLY finsihed the UDS about 3 weeks ago. I love it. I've cooked on it multiple times, turned out great Q and noticed somethings I need to change.

1. I don't have a cover where I store mine, so how do you guys cover the holes in the flat lid to keep water out?

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You can get a generic cover at HD or lowes. Here is what mine looks like and cost.

http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail&productId=187619-47981-15593&lpage=none

Size doesn't matter!

I used a heavy duty trash bag used for yard debris or over a year, worked great! Slip it over, tie a string around the bottom to keep the wind from blowing it off. It adds to the UDS exp

cardiac_cadet002 said:

I used a heavy duty trash bag used for yard debris or over a year, worked great! Slip it over, tie a string around the bottom to keep the wind from blowing it off. It adds to the UDS exp

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Now that's in spirit with the UDS concept!

So, how do I build one of these?
















Kidding... I finally finished reading all 227 pages, 3396 posts and I have now committed it all to memory. Got a free drum from the local sewage plant... I'll burn it out and start installing all my galvenized hardware. I'm going to put in 18 1/8" intakes at 4 1/2" from the bottom. :roll::wink:


Again... joking. It's amazing how many people don't read and simply ask "How do I build one of these?" :evil:

Seriously though, I am getting a new drum today for free that my brother acquired through work. He says it has some kind of lining, I'll check it out later. I'm planning on the standard no-weld build... 3 3/4" intakes, one ball valve, 2 caps, 2" from bottom, 8 1/2" exhaust holes. I'll post pics along the way and more specs as well. I won't get to it until next weekend as we're going to San Antonio tomorrow for a long weekend getaway with the kids, my parents, and my bro and his family. :shock:

Thanks to those before me that have posted all the amazing collection of info and ideas. Only took me two weeks to read. I can't wait to start building. I even got my boss interested in building his own too! :twisted:

Well I got my U.D.S. built and outside seasoning.so here are a few things learned. Washers are your friend I drilled a few holes a little to big. The lady at lowes return desk is nice:grin:.Bought the wrong size bolts..

So finally got all the right parts had Jose at the local weld shop put together my fire basket $25 bucks for labor and expanded metal.

so now I have everything put together. Took the drum out side and sprayed pam cooking oil on the inside to season put about 10 pounds of kings ford got out my handy Harbor freight flame thrower and lit the coals.. Extreme caution should be used here. while using it to light the coal things get friggen hot I put on a long welders glove on but that only helped a little bit...

so here are a few questions now.

I put in the coals and wood chunks. Open all the vents how long should I wait before I close things up to drop temp and start my cook?

jeepaholic said:

so here are a few questions now.

I put in the coals and wood chunks. Open all the vents how long should I wait before I close things up to drop temp and start my cook?

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It is better to catch your temp on the way up and stabilize it than going past your target temp and playing hades trying to get your temp back down. I usually start capping about 190F and by the time I'm around 210F I have one intake wide open and the ball valve 3/4 open. From there it is a matter of fine tuning temp. Mine is usually g.t.g. in roughly 15 minutes.

cardiac_cadet002 said:

Hey Wyley, fellow TNFO here just down the road from ya! If you haven't already stop by cattle call and introduce yourself. glad to hear your mini UDS worked out great! How much height do you have between the bottom of your charcoal basket and cooking grate? Curious minds want to know!

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Cardiac, I have 21 3/4 inches between the bottom of my charcoal basket and cooking grate. I had to throw the conventional wisdom out the window when I had to drill my intake holes (1") dead even with the bottom of the drum. There were some small gashes that had to be taken care of so I just incorporated those into my intake holes, not realizing just how far down that was going to put the intakes. I am using a perforated pizza pan that I enlarged a bunch of the holes in for the bottom of my charcoal basket with an expanded metal ring that measures 16 X 7 sitting on top of it. I have eight 1" exhaust holes which i think is too much but if I cover a couple of them the temps stay down so I'm not real concerned about that.

I had no problem at all keeping the temps within about a 15-20 degree window all day. The only time I had a big swing was when we had a thunderstorm come through and the outside temp dropped about 20 degrees in just a couple of minutes, and the temps in the UDS went from around 235 to 200. I just moved a magnet covering one of the intakes a bit and my temps went right back up. One thing I did notice though is that I had to run all of the intakes almost entirely closed to keep the temps in the right place. I think that's because I have so much exhaust area that it was letting in fresh air. But the flip side of that is that when I took the lid off to turn the meat I got no swing in temp either way.

The best thing about this small UDS that I made is that I have absolutely no money in it at all. I'm probably going to pass it on to a friend after I've made a normal sized one but the experience was fun and I learned a few things not to do again and a few things I need or would like to do on my next one.

Paul