Tips for 1st Hog?
 

Greetings Brethren! I'm fielding suggestions, well wishes, good karma and free advice for smoking my first (half) hog this Friday. Dressed weight expected to be around 190-200 making my half about 100 LBS. I'm having the butcher split the half into quarters (2 pieces) so I can manhandle them, but I don't want to move the meat after it's on the smoker unless it's absolutely necessary. So here's the big question: Skin side up or down? I'm sure there are two equally divided camps on this, as with most things Q-related, so I'm looking for some input as to why one way would be preferred to the other.

The cooker is a trailer mounted beast with an offset FB and could probably fit 2.5 whole hogs of this size, so no worries there. Planning to start early AM with a target time of 6:00 PM for the finished product, including an hour rest (for the pork!). Best guess is 12-14 hours at approx. 250* with BIG cooler ready if needed to hold.

Thanks in advance for any helpful posts or letting me know if I'm way off on my timing! Will post pix along the way as practical.

skin side up or down? I use the skin as a sort of bowl to hold the juices in the meat (at least with a whole hog) so I suppose I would tend towards skin side down. The fact that the hog will be quartered will change some of the impact put I assume that the same effect will happen. I cook a 90 lb hog in 5-6 hours at 350* - doesn't help with your own time to temp ratio but I figured I'd add that to the mix FWIW.

We wrap ours in wire fencing (not galv.) and start skin up. Then skin down. The wire makes it easy to turn. A trick I learned from a guy in N.C. Just my two cents.

If the hog is quartered I don't think you need to mess with wire

We use wire fence sometimes with a whole hog, 4 men to flip. For a half around 100, 2 men could flip without the wire. If there is a way to turn the hog, we like to start face down and flip after 3 - 4 hours.

Good luck.

I've got no advice but I'm wishing you the best of luck!
And if you've got any leftovers........

Update w/PRON
 

I wanted to update my thread with some pix and let ya'll know how we fared with our Halloween Hog roast; thanks to all of you who sent suggestions! Friday here in the KC metro was WINDY (30 MPH+) and cool, making fire control a little dicey. I hopped outta bed at 3:45 and quietly started 20 LBS of charcoal in "Old Ironsides". Piggy went in at 5:00, along with some oak and pecan, and we started cooking @ 300*. I had planned to flip the two halves after 4 hours, but when I grabbed the leg, it was already too tender to manage alone, so I ended up going skin side down all the way.

12 hours later with an internal of 170* at the ham (was hoping to go 180-185), we took her off to rest. Time for a cigar! An hour later some reinforcements showed up and we pulled pork. Then a quick change into my Halloween costume - Father Fumidous from Our Lady of the Holy Smoke - and we delivered approx. 30 LBS of cooked pig (keeping some for ourselves) for our partying hosts and friends. It made for a long day and I'd personally like to thank the creators of 5 Hour Energy drink :shock: for allowing me to make it to midnight before we headed back home, absolutely whipped!

Father Fumidous? Love it!

Congrats on the cook. I would have probably been chain-smoking cigars all day watching the pit. ;)

Congratsz and thanks for the story!

Congratulations! Looks pretty good. Hope you enjoyed the cook. I'll bet you'll get a few requests to cook now.

Good looking pork! Like the cigar pic too. :cool::-D

Good job on the half piggy! I see what you mean about having enough room.

Awesome! I live in central MO and we did half a hog also. The wind was insane! Fire control was work and a lot of it! Glad it turned out great and cool pics also!

JA