cmwr
is Blowin Smoke!
I know there's been a hundred posts on the internet about how to make a Weber lid fit a UDS barrel. I don't know if this has ever been mentioned before but just in case it hasn't I thought I would throw this tip out there that I discovered a few builds ago. A co-worker wanted me to build him a UDS several months ago and I was having a hard time finding open head drums locally. But I found an old antifreeze barrel from the local lube shop that was in immaculate shape with no dents. I also discovered this barrel was bare steel on the inside and had no liner. So I remembered seeing a tip on here years ago where you could grind the lip down all the way around and the lid would separate and voila you could use it like a flat lid. So that is what I did for the first time ever and it worked beautifully and my coworker now has a nice flat top UDS smoker. But one thing that I discovered when I built this was that once you grind that outer lip down enough for the top of the lid to separate at the seam, a Weber lid then sits down on that drum nice and tight. I wasn't setting out to discover this but I did and I've built several out of old antifreeze and oil drums since and they've all been the same. Thought I would throw that out there in case anybody was struggling to get a Weber lid to fit.