Running a 22" WSM at 300* with Stoker

[swamprb]

Originally Posted by slowerlowerbbq

Hey Brian,

I used your door prop mod on my 22" before I got the Stoker and worked great. I was going to try propping the door along with using the Stoker on my next cook to see if this works better. From what you're saying, it sounds like you were using the Guru with the door propped and your temps soarded? That's what I was concerned about.

Are you getting pretty consistent temps by propping the door and leaving the guru off?

OK-heres the deal on my experiments with the big bullet and the Guru. I was using the Cajun Bandit High Airflow stainless steel charcoal ring-it holds a full 22lb bag of Kingsford, Minion start with a weed torch. Guru set to 350* grate temp. The fan labored to get to 300*, I would prop open the door and would get to 350* easily, but each time I was concerned of overshooting the target and would close the door and the temps would settle back in @ 275 and the fan was constantly running to do so.

In hindsight, it was not the the ideal conditions for a HH cook. The Cajun Bandit ring is more or less for long slow cooks and eliminates the need to add charcoal to the big fuel hog. I talked to Kenny Baker and Bob Trudnak about it and they felt the briqs were too compact in the ring to get the airflow to bring the temps up- I have to agree with that, and ditched the CB ring in favor of my smaller rings for HH cooks. Other than that my Guru performs flawlessly on my LBGE's and 18" WSM's, see no reason a Stoker would have the same problem.

Just a heads up on the door prop mod to the new style WSM handles- the brass ferrule that the latch bolt screws into will eventually fail at the most inopportune time- check out the handle mod at the other site.

[boogiesnap]

i can hit 300*-325* at home.

twice at comps

even at home it's a struggle. couple things i've noticed...

with the 22.5 outside temp is a major factor in reaching higher cooker temps.

higher temperature=more charcoal in the ring right? i don't think so. i feel the stoker fan can't get proper airflow to the top of the mountain of charcoal to stoke the fire.

haven't been able to experiment yet with that last one and less fuel for higher temp.