UDS Temp Issues

Hi All
Long time lurker, first time poster. A few weeks ago, I was able to get an empty (unlined!) drum from a co worker and start my UDS build. Was able to complete within a day or so, and got to smoking the next day.
When I fired up the charcoal (I have a home-made chimney) and put it in the pan, I was having trouble getting the heat up to where I was aiming for 2 chickens. I created a windbreak and got the temp to settle in around 210 degrees, and went about my work. I let it chug along until the chickens reached 185 internal (just to be sure) and then sealed off the ports and let it choke out.

Given my successful run, I decided to try to smoke the thanksgiving turkey as well. The night before, I soaked some cherry wood chips, and started my chimney like I had previous times. All the coals were glowing orange when I put them in the center of my fire pit, and I went off to get the turkey prepped. When I got back, the drum had heated up to about 100. Getting worried, I set up a wind break, and let it ride for another 30 minutes, all 3 air vents open on the bottom. After this, the temp had gone up to about 125-150, and wasnt moving. I lit another chimney full of coals, stalled the rest of the family on the stuffing, etc and put more hot coals in a while later. Long story short, got it up to about 200 before I put the turkey in. I went to go get some whole chickens while the turkey was getting started (might as well, right?). When I got back from the store with the chickens, I was broken hearted to see that my smoker temp had plunged to ~90 degrees! I took the lid off pulled the fire pit, took it into the wind and it oranged up really quickly so I dropped it back in.

I figured that this would help, but after I let it ride on that for another 30 mins or so, I had to raise the white flag, and go to plan b and put the turkey in the oven. The chickens were still in the pit smoking away, and the temp didnt seem to change at all. After a while, I went out and cracked the lid (had been operating with my ~2" hole fully open) and within 15 min, the temp shot up to 325.

I obviously have an airflow issue of some kind, I'm just not sure where. My dad suggested that I put an exhaust pipe on the lid (right now it's just flat and covered with a piece of metal that slides), though I'm not sure that will work.

For reference, I've got 3 3/4" holes drilled about 2" off the bottom of the barrel for air intakes.

I thought that I was smart enough to do this on my own, but I'm not so I'd love some help!

Hey Steve, thanks for the reply.

I'm using kingsford bricks for charcoal at the moment. There's about 2-2.5" (cant remember exactly) under my fire pit, and my starting method was the minion method for both burns.

For this cook, I used a full bag of kingsford charcoal. I can get a picture of the basket when I get home, but as of right now it's partially filled with used charcoal.

Thanks guys. I'm going to do another smoke tomorrow so I'll try to raise the fire basket a bit. I've basically got a webber grate with expanded metal wrapped around it, and some ss bolts holding the metal together and holding the grate off the ground. Should be an easy fix.
As for the stack, i'm not exactly sure how to do that. I didnt have a hole saw, so I used an expanded drill bit for my holes at the bottom, and use a recip saw for the one on top (no bung). The hole got kind of sideways and isnt exactly a circle, so any ideas there? Perhaps just seal this hole completely and make a new one?

blu - the chicken skin wasnt rubbery at all, it was fairly firm. Attached some pr0n

Alright, thanks for all the tips guys, I did a lot of what was recommended earlier in the thread on saturday, and still it took quite a while and I never really got over 210 or so while smoking 3 chickens.

I didnt get a chance to add a stack yet (because I messed up cutting the hole I have to figure out how to do it), but I did raise my basket about 1.5" off of where it was, and it's sitting ~4" off the bottom of the drum now.
I used fresh charcoal as well. I'm not dead set on re-using old briques, I just happened to last time because they were all still pretty big - I think they were part of the problem.

This time I lit the fresh kingsford charcoal in the chimney (I have a homemade one out of an old coffee can), went to the store to pick up the chickens, and when I came back all the coals in the chimney were orange. I put them into the center of my basket, put the basket in the UDS and went inside to spatch the chickens and spice them. When I came back out, the temp was around 150, so I let it continue to build to about 175 before I put the chickens on. This is where I think Ive been going wrong. How long do I need to wait between when I put the chimney fired coals on and when I can put my food on the grill? I usually give it an hour or so, but is that not enough time, or is it too much?

I tossed the chickens on at about 175, and let them go for a bit over 2 hours - every one loved them! I didnt however, have the lid fully on during the smoking, I left it cracked a small amount because of what I had learned from the turkey debacle. There wasnt much of the lid open, but it did seem to get the temp up. I was using a few mesquite chips, and 4 apple chunks.

Here are some pictures of my current exhaust. It was supposed to be about 2" dia, but since I messed up the cut, It's a bit bigger than that. The other two are of my charcoal basket.

I do have an analog thermometer that I bought from lowes. How would I go about testing that for accuracy, use the oven?