Hello from Bermuda

[M Gibbs]

Hi all,

Thanks for letting me join!

I’m new to the whole forum scene so please forgive me. Let me start by letting you know a bit about me, my bank account no. Is 368754190, my mother’s maiden name is Steele. Ha only kidding, I’m a Brit living in Bermuda for the last 7 years, I have zero metal work skills or knowledge, but have pretty good diy skills and a sound logical mind. I have been cooking on my 14 1/2” WSM for about 3 years now, the wife got it for me as a gift, little did she know it soon turned into my second wife! I have learnt everything i know (not very much) about bbq from you tube and trial and error, and I love it!

I have been toying with the idea about an offset for a while as my WSM is just too small, but the cost has always put me off, Bermuda is crazy expensive a bag of Kingsford blue is about $30. Buy a smoker and ship it in I hear you yell (well maybe not on here), by the time I get my grubby paws on it, it has cost me double the price as US. So when I learnt the wife had gone off and got Botox I decided it’s time to treat myself with a new smoker. Thinking that I can do just as good a job as the pros, thought it would be a good idea and more cost effective to build my own. This morning I found an old water tank at work (20” x 60”) and got it straight up to the metal fabricator, to learn that its galvanized and that’s not cool for cooking. So they going to cut the door open and see what’s inside, fingers crossed the inside is not galvanized so we can move forward with this build.

Finding this website I have learnt that’s it’s not just a case of sticking a box on the side of a tube and boom you have a smoker! Ahh man there’s a bunch of sciencey stuff involved! So thanks all for letting us know it’s not that simple. I will have a few questions coming and hope I put them in the right sections, mainly about the difference between traditional offset and RF and how you plan a baffle plate.

Looking forward to learning a lot and seeing all the cool things you guys get up to.

Thanks,
Martin.

[ajfoxy]

Hi Martin, welcome to the crew.

Although generally a pit will not get hot enough for the galvanised metal to be much of an issue, it is generally not considered a good thing to have it in a cooking environment. Now, not sure if it has closed yet or not, but the site was offering free plans for a smaller type smoker, you just had to stump up for postage etc. Have a look at it.
And a tip. if you go for it get the extra files to enable you to hand over the files to your fabricator (who hopefully has a cnc plasma/laser/waterjet to cut out all the parts. Just a thought.

[Big T]

Welcome aboard!!

[Pete Mazz]

Welcome

[Dirtytires]

Send us a sketch of your ideas....welcome to the group.

[M Gibbs]

Thanks guys, just been looking into galvanized, and decided it’s not the right way to go. So back to the drawing board I go, will try and have look round next week and hope to find a stainless pipe or tank.

Thanks

[Dirtytires]

Nothing wrong with plain old carbon steel. Stainless in nice but tough to work with and never stays looking shiny with all the smoke. Also, some will say tthat carbon steel is actually better as it has more pores which hold the smoke flavor.

[Big T]

[Chromeski]

Welcome. Start looking away other smokers to get ideas of exactly what you want and how big you need. Building a smoker can still get incredibly expensive, but will last forever.
Do you have large propane tanks around there? If you can find the right size propane tank for cheap then that's an option