Ideas on making a GIANT charcoal starter?

[Q-Dat]

Empty refrigerant drums. Any busy AC service company will gladly let you have as many as you want. Two or three of those full would probably take care of all you need while still being a manageable size.

I could see a potential disaster in trying to move too much burning charcoal in one vessel.

 

[jcinadr]

I probably will not have time, but would love to post how they maintain coals for our picnics back home. Pretty sure the starter will take a full cord of wood at a time. Then again they are usually used to cook for 2500-3000 people.

On a lighter side, soda kegs are stainless. Bet you could cut off the bottom and top and make a chimney starter that is 20"+ tall. Rig up a blower fan on the bottom (rather than relying on draft), and it should light pretty quickly (basically thinking a hole in the side to insert a heat gun, aka looflighter). Actually if that is the case, no reason to cut off the bottom - but you will need to give it some feet to stand upright (stock feet are rubber - not going to last).

I have an old stainless steel poison sprayer that would be even better - if the poison was not an issue. It has a square bottom and would stand upright. Might have to give it a burnout...

While I am thinking along these lines - you could use the blower in conjunction with a propane torch - creating a power blower. They are often used for backyard forges - I suspect a forge would light charcoal quickly :mrgreen:

 

[Grimm5577]

Beer keg with the top and bottom removed weld a grate to the bottom and give it some feet. Holds 15.5 gallons of liquid, I'm sure you could get a good 60lbs in there. maybe make a sliding tap door that dumps the coals out the bottom when you pull it out.

 

[Teltum]

A keg/55 gal drum depending on the amount lit at once. with the top and bottom removed. A removeable grate half way up and a grate in the bottom and a door on the side of the bottom so you can shovel out light coals.

Here is the process. Light the bottom with whatever you want heck you like weber cubes will work. Wait for the entire bottom half to light and the top half to have a few coals lit. Open side door pull out ready coals with shovel. Then remove the grate that is half way up the keg letting the bulk of the unlit coals fall onto the lower lit coals. Replace removeable grate, add more charcoal to the top so that the bottom lights the next batch. You have ready coals consistantly, no wasting propane lighting batch after batch after batch, one batch lights the next. A 55 gallon drum would work too. You may want to do a touch up light after the drop but there should be enough lit at the bottom to keep lighting the next batch.

Or add a removable grate to the bottom and drop the bottom into a wheel barrow. To move to the pigs instead of using a shovel to pull out of the keg.

 

[Teltum]

Oh, depending on how fast you need to light up the coals... Leaf blower. My brother works for a mower shop and was trying to burn some wet wood and pulled out one of his "home projects" to get the fire going good.

 

[jcinadr]

A burn barrel could make a very large chimney. With a big enough grate will allow coals to fall through for collection, while maintaining a fire in the top. That works great with wood - but not applicable to brickets - no easy way to get them out.

I personally use a small blower with a weed burner on my UDS. The weed burner alone uses up to much air and will extinguish itself. I could use a larger blower for lighting (as I can not open up the weed burner), but the small one works better during the cook. Working on one that has a variable speed for faster lights and will still stoke during the cook.

If you don't want to go all the way to a leaf blower - shop vacs put out decent air.