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Couple Of New Toys - Pron Heavy

Untraceable said:
get it seasoned?
Click to expand...

Yeah, I cooked up some country style ribs last night for dinner. I will say this thing is so darn efficient that I may end up switching to hardwood charcoal instead of lump.

I used lump yesterday and did another lump test today, planning on a charcoal test tomorrow to see how that goes. Josh recommends charcoal and there may be a dang good reason for that!

I was above 275 for 6 hours and when I checked the coal basket this morning there was at least half the lump left, if not more.

Lump seems to burn so hot and react to the guru so quickly that on my first two tests I have had trouble keeping the cooker under 300, I blame this entirely on the cooker being to efficient :icon_smile_tongue:

Yesterday I just flew right past 275! Today I decided to take it up to 225 and then slowly work my way up to 275, and this worked until I opened the door to move the temp probes around and the guru kicked on and overstoked the coals. This sent me back up to around 300. I suppose I could always close the air damper on the fan every time I wanted to open the door, but I want to give charcoal a try first and see how it reacts to something that doesn't burn so hot.
 
thats the old backwoods trick of slowly coming up to temp. by the time all the steel is heated up your fire is way bigger than needed to keep your temps.
 
I am sure you'll do much better with Charcoal vs Lump. Once you get to temp with the coal, I like to close the draft on the fan at least to close it one line. Also, you dont have to fill it with briquettes. A little goes a long way with these cookers.
 
Untraceable said:
thats the old backwoods trick of slowly coming up to temp. by the time all the steel is heated up your fire is way bigger than needed to keep your temps.
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Yeah I figured as much. But since Josh builds them and has cooked on them as much as anybody, I thought I would give his recommended fuel and startup a try. It's never a bad day to have a smoker fired up so I will test it again tomorrow while I am getting my work trailer setup.

I will let everyone know how it goes.
 
Untraceable said:
thats the old backwoods trick of slowly coming up to temp. by the time all the steel is heated up your fire is way bigger than needed to keep your temps.
Click to expand...


To keep this from happening, I now start a chimney and empty it into a 1/2 sheet. I just set it in the bottum and let IT heat up the metal with the guru's help. I get the coal basket then loaded with coal and chunks so when the unit is at or close to temp, the cooker doesnt waste the fuel to heat the pit. The result is long burns without overshooting temps. Just one of the things I am working on.
 
WineMaster said:
I am sure you'll do much better with Charcoal vs Lump. Once you get to temp with the coal, I like to close the draft on the fan at least to close it one line. Also, you dont have to fill it with briquettes. A little goes a long way with these cookers.
Click to expand...

Thanks Dan, are you saying that you run it at 3/4 open or 1/4 open once you get up to temp?

Also, do you start with room temp water, hot tap water or boiling water?

Josh printed out a manual for me and emphasized to not start out with much more than 1/4 of a chimney of charcoal!

I am sure I should have started by doing a burn exactly as Josh recommends but I was to excited to see how lump would react!
 
WineMaster said:
To keep this from happening, I now start a chimney and empty it into a 1/2 sheet. I just set it in the bottum and let IT heat up the metal with the guru's help. I get the coal basket then loaded with coal and chunks so when the unit is at or close to temp, the cooker doesnt waste the fuel to heat the pit. The result is long burns without overshooting temps. Just one of the things I am working on.
Click to expand...

Very helpful, will give that a try tomorrow as well!
 
Untraceable said:
Sounds like a weed burner to preheat the chamber would be the ticket
Click to expand...

Yeah we have used that on Trent's (TTNuge) big clone, that worked ok, but I think we found that a couple splits in the firebox worked better similar to what Dan was saying with a pan full of charcoal.
 
I use 25 cfm fans. 3/4 open is the most I keep it open sometimes 1/2 or 1/3 depends on the load of meat. Water is just hot not boiling.
 
I was just thinking based on relative size, they recomend a 10cfm for a backwoods competitor. when your fan kicks on, your getting one heck of a temp spike?
 
I like the 25 cfm. You can damper it down if needed. You can't increase the CFM of a 10 though.
 
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