I have wanted to build a smoker for a while now and I am finally on my way. Let me being by giving you a little background about myself. I am a volunteer at the local high school helping out with their FFA program. The agriculture department holds drive through BBQ events three times a year to help raise funds for students activities. We BBQ tri tip and serve it with beans, salad and a roll. The students pre-sale the tickets so we know how many meals to prepare. Our largest event to date had me grilling over 950# of meat. I also help the same group of students at our county fair. Last year we opened a booth that sold a similar meal to the public to help raise additional students funds. Instead of grilling the meat I decided to smoke it. I smoked 580# of tri tip over a five-day period. I could barely keep up with the demand on my little home smoker. I was limited to about 30# at a time. I would like to be able to smoke 150# at one time. So with that in mind, I have decided to build a smoker. Here are some pictures of the build. I have used information from this site to help me plan and calculate my build. So here we go!
I was able to find a tank locally
Preparing for the first cut
Removing the end
Successful removal
The students helping me plug the holes
The door cut nicely without springing
The students are helping me with the project. This is were we ended on day one. Not too bad for a Friday! I will post up my specs in hopes that I can get some confirmation that I am on the right track. This is our test smoker. If all goes well we will be building a similar pit out of a 500 gallon tank.
