Project: Barbecue Trailer

Found a way to post pics via the Droid.
It's a pain in the meep, but it works:

I finished the linkages to the air inlets yesterday.
There's three ports on each side of the firebox and each has a flap valve:


You just turn the crank in back...


...and the valves open on both sides:

I finished the linkages to the air inlets yesterday.
There's three ports on each side of the firebox and each has a flap valve:


You just turn the crank in back...


...and the valves open on both sides:

Used a half-cup of this in a couple of gallons of water to wash the oil out of the steel:


-And since VOC (Good) Paint is banned in California, I just picked up some shaker cans of manifold paint. (Figures they wouldn't have enough of one type)


meep it.
I couldn't get the paint in a can to brush it on thick, but I could still spray on a half dozen layers.

Looking good mate.

How long did it take to heat up and cook that first feast?

The beastie warmed up to 250F in about 15 minutes and hung at that temp for the four hours it took to do the ribs and tri-tips. I went through a large and a small bag of charcoal during the first run.
Not really sure if that's a little or alot by smoking standards.
I noticed the temp stayed pretty constant without me having to fiddle with the dampers.
(Wide open got me up to 300, fully closed took it down to 200 with half a bag in the firebox.)

Cool.

Have you tried grilling a steak on it yet?

Not yet, but the strip steaks did pretty well on the front edge of the grill.
There's a hot spot there and I kind of like having it, so I might just leave the thermal plate as-is for now.

I'm beginning to understand why those things cost seventy six thousand dollars.

Use wood for smoking. Apple, cherry, hickory or mesquite. If you want more smoke just soak a couple small logs in water and toss them onto the coals once your meat hits the grill. Cooking with charcoal is ok but doesn't deliver half as much flavor.

^That's the plan.
I just glued some boiler tape to the lip of the fire box door(high temp gasket stuff) so the air leaks won't be so bad.
On my initial burnout with raw wood, the temp was still around 300F withthe dampers fully closed.
I'm hoping to fix that without having to put rings of boiler tape on the damper plates too.

I've gotta find that balance where I have a big enough mass of wood to keep the coals going for hours, but with the air intake down enough that the temps stay in the 200's.

Got the lights all rigged up.


Aaaand...
Well that's pretty much it kids.

Thanks for watching!

Nice rig mate. Looks good.

As an aside, I bet your neighbours loove the noise you make when you are doing this sort of meep.

I've got a guy that works in his front yard doing custom welding across the street one way, a pack of screaming puerto rican chicks living on the other, two black families down a couple of houses that play nothing but thumpingly-loud rap and a whole neighborhood full of meepbags driving little foreign cars with the exhausts cut off (also playing rap at 140db.)

On my loudest day, I'm still the quietest one here.
With one or two exceptions, I would happily torch this entire meeping city block.

Sorry,
Gets on my nerves sometimes.

Fair enough. That is one of the reasons I like living where I live. Only noise around here is birds. wind, and the occasional tractor. No neighbours for at least five miles.

Now that you're done, it's about time to edge that driveway.

^No.

I guess I lied. There's still stuff to be done detail-wise.
Things like this little grease bucket I made:



I also wanna put some wooden fold-up prep tables on the sides and maybe some drawers under the smoke chamber.

AND...

:Cue prepping-for-battle theme music:


Bum..badda da BUM! Badda da BUM!...

Note to self:
Build shelf for nearly OCD/homomeepual amount of cookbooks.

F*cking Department of Motor Vehicles.
After a week of getting the runaround and playing phone-tag with the CHP's inspection department I finally get told that the CHP only handles trailers over 2,000 lbs.
Back to the DMV bright and early tommorrow to spend some quality time with people wearing the same slightly-crazed grin as me...

Yes, I'm still meeping around with this thing.

^Me at the DMV inspection bay FINALLY getting the damned thing registered.

Today was "Take Your Barbecue to Work" day.
Okay, not really. In fact I'm probably gonna get in trouble, though how somebody could yell at me straight-faced for barbecueing for staff on a slow Sunday afternoon is beyond me.

(This is the last pic where I blank out the plates. Seriously. If you can't track me down by now...)

I don't know if you're supposed to name barbecues, but...
My baby said she thought it looked kinda like a buffalo with the tongue up.
So that's it's name.

I'm up to ten people wanting me to build trailers for them now.
-And I'll believe them just as soon as one of the cheap meeps actually gives me a down payment.

Anyhoo....
I tried a few new things:
Like seeing just how many racks of ribs and trimmed chine pieces I could fit:

(About 15. Twice that, if I put in another rack)

And the proper use of smoking chips:
NO:

YES...-ish

(It didn't stay lit)
I'm working on it.

I installed caps for the stacks:

Which seem to make no damned difference at all. -But at least keep the bugs and rain out.

A good thing was the addition of a couple of water pans under the grill;

(You can just see them under the grate there)
-Resulting in the temp never getting above 210 or so for the entire four hours of cook time and turning out ribs so tender that I couldn't get the damned things out in one piece no matter what I tried.
-And these were the CHEAP, tough-meep ribs from FoodsCo.

Total amount of fuel for a 4-hour smoke: 30lbs of charcoal.

Many a brownie point was scored, but alas: not one hammy as yet.
Not even from the meepty mail-room clerks. :(

Still, If I don't catch meep come Monday, I'm gonna do it again soon with a brisket and using splits. I'm going to get this meep DOWN.

This is how much oak $90 will get you in Bakersfield.

Time to take the training wheels off this meep and smoke a meepING BRISKET.

(Okay, so it's only cool if you know how hard those things are to cook)

I got a bit pissed about running out of room during the barbecue this weekend, so I went ahead and added in another rack:


Also, I put in some springs to hold the exhaust caps down so they would stop bouncing out and swinging around retardedly.

Got tired of the trailer making old-mattress meep noises and trying to flip up and over my hood when I hit train tracks doing seventy(No. meep slowing down)



Finally got around to making a little storage space too.



Gotta come up with a latch or somethin' for the drawers.
They might not look it, but I made 'em out of 1/8" plate with 3/16" fronts.
They're not something you wanna hit on the freeway.

What about four of those old-school hood clips to secure the drawers?

Sounds cool.
Do you mean the stretchy rubber ones like off a jeep?

How/where to attach please, sir...?

@dragonstaff

I was thinking more the pin and clip type like on a race car. I would weld a length of 3/16" by 1" bar across each of the drawers, drill a suitable sized hole in each end for the pin to go through, and bolt the pins to the outer panel.

So, am I gonna see this thing? I'll get a couple of tri-tips...one for dry rub, one for marinade.

@dragonstaff

Hrmm... I think I might meet you in the middle and weld tabs & pins on the outside edge of each drawer (1 each)
I hate fussing with too many clasps. (Too many awkward teen memories)

@BeachGoat

Very likely,
I hit Morro Bay every few months. Was there last month with the kiddies gettin' some meep fish and chips at the Tognazz. (It was greasier than Long John Silver's, and that's saying something.)

Was thinking about this this last night: We've REALLY got to get a few guys together and do a the West Coast version of the Linkswarm Aimless and Staggeringly Drunken Tour.

Where the meep would we go though?
L.A.?

Tiajuana.

@spankerchief

We are working on a Morro Bay solution as we speak.,

Noice.

we wanna see you also. where is nocal?

I'm starting to picture a tribal bonfire on the beach...meat, fireworks, liquor, herbs, incense, guitars, the waves calling in the distance, dancing (middle aged) women..

Ain't that Purty?

Damned if I'm gonna set four or five racks of my best ribs on the ground to mop, rest, cut and serve.

Spanky your skillz never cease to amaze me.

Aww, shucks...
:blushes:

Okay, so I've got a few barbecues under my belt and now I wanna do a whole pig for the west coast swarmers.
Seeing as Bakersfield is just chock-full of messicans, there was a Villarta Market just a couple of blocks away that sold 'em.
Trouble though, was that they won't order a pig under 60lbs.
According to this that would mean my little buffalo's 34" chamber would be wayy too damned small.

and so...