VinSanity480
Knows what a fatty is.
First, I'd like to say thank you to everyone on this site. Your knowledge and willingness to help others is unbelievable. OK, on to my issue... I got a CGSP for Father's day and have really been getting in to BBQ. After seasoning the grill and smoking my first pork butt, a lot of babysitting. I've made the popular mods to the grill. I've installed two thermos at grate level, extended the chimney down to grate level, turned the ash pan upside down in the smoking chamber, and made a 12x12x6 charcoal basket for the SFB. BTW, the stock thermo reads 75 - 80 degrees low. The first smoke I did after making the changes went really smooth. I added the RO lump and about 5 hickory chunks to the basket and dumped a lit Weber chimney on top. The chimney was wide open and the SFB vents were wide open. The temps came up to about 225 and I started to close off the SFB vents. During the cook, I had the SFB vents about 1/4 open to maintain 230, which I figured was just about right for what I wanted. The temps were very steady and the coals lasted about 3.5 hours and did several refills throughout the twelve hour cook of a 9lb. pork butt. Each time, a load of coals would last about 3.5 hours. I think I used about 3/4 of a bag of the RO lump. BBQ was delicious and everyone was happy. This last weekend I was making the pepper stout beef, which was fabulous, thank you to those of you who inspired me. I did the same process to get the fire going as last time. The only difference this time was that I used the bottom 1/4 of the bag of RO and a lot of the pieces were smaller than the top part of the bag. I was having a hell of a time getting the temps up to 225-230. 230 was the highest it reached with the chimney and SFB vents wide open. I ended up pulling the meat off after it reached 140 (4 hours) and finished everything in the oven. There was some wind, but not any more than last time. Was it the smaller pieces in the charcoal basket not allowing enough air? I've read some past posts about the charcoal grate being upside down and possibly not allowing enough airflow, but if this were the case, why did it work so well last time? Any ideas?
