Baffle and Convection plate

[jdt]

when talking at the bar one night I mentioned to a kid from the neighborhood I grew up in (he is now 30 lol) that I was giong to mod my smoker with a baffle and some tuning plates or a convection plate, I told him I would rather go convection plate so its one piece etc, he said well figure out what you need and I'll fire up the laser at work, bonus was if I wanted plain steel he could just pull it from his scrap pile, The math for the baffle was beyound what I can do now, maybe in 11th grade and calc class but it was a simple cut and fit cardboard  template to match the curve of the pit, 1/4 cold rolled steel which I cut with a 3 inch air and 4 inch electric grinders, finished on bench grinder

the plate is 20 1/8 x 30 the holes are 1/4 to 1" five across and eight deep, its 1/4 cold rolled steel, not only were the holes cut by the laser but the outside to, perfectly burr free and smooth 

 

[jdt]

test fit firebox view, I ended up keeping about 1" overlap

inside the pit

 

[jdt]

 

[pineywoods]

Now that looks awesome have you gotten to test it out yet?

 

[jdt]

the old story about the blind sow finding a nut every now and then finally worked out for me, amazingly it worked great the first time out, took a little more to get to heat but not much if any extra to maintain, with a normal fire I was less than 5 degrees end to end,

 two chucks and bacon were the test subjects, bacon was eaten as removed as I had four guys over doing some drywall/texturing that day but at least they left before the chuck was done. I think making it out of the 1/4 steel was a good idea as not only will it last forever like the pit it adds thermal mass, took quite a bit longer to cool down and seemed to recover faster

 

[jdt]

another picture, for anyone thinking my wife would kill me don't worry thats the garage couch

 

[thunderdome]

Nice mod! I wonder which manufacturer is going to start including these in their SFB smokers one day

 

[jdt]

horizon puts them in the higher end pits, with a handle so you can slide it in and out, I may end up adding the handle later if I feel a need, the only reason I can think of is to crisp chicken but I think just a big fire and full intake will do that with the plate in place, only time will tell.

I know you can option a klose pit with a convection plate also.

This is about as close as I could get to the horizon style, due to the way bellfab mounts his ash dump the barrell is mounted higher on the chamber than the horizons which just have a kickup at one end of the convection plate like this one 

 

[rickw]

Looks like he did a very good job. Nice to hear it works well for ya. I love the one in my Horizon.

 

[chefrob]

almost didn't recognize ya rick!

nice lookin plate btw!

 

[smoke 2 geaux]

Looks great JDT.  Did you cut out that horizontal piece of metal that comes in the pit, or did you have Craig build yours without it?  I have it and I have quite a bit of temp difference from end to end (with a hot spot in the middle).  Not necessarily a bad thing, but you do have to plan for it. 

 

[jdt]

I did not have a  dampner plate in mine, I was used to a classic ok joes just being open so that is what I wanted. After seeing several horizons and custom tuning plated offsets I decided it might be nice to have a more even temperature across the smoker, since my pit gets moved in and out of the garage I was leary of tuning plates and having to check gaps and such, with this just a quick visual inspection from the firebox and chamber assure its at of near the same spot, the fact is weight 40 or so lbs will probably help keep it in place let alone the much and gunk from drippings which usually after a couple cooks gets tuning plates sealed in pretty good but I lucked out and got this.

 

[howufiga]

Awesome work!!  Look great!

 

[murfsmeat]

sure happy these post stick around as long as they do. Quick question for ya, if your still around after all this time.....

I am laying out my metal plate to do this very same mod right now. My piece of 1/4" steel runs pretty much the entire length of my cooking chamber, however I see most guys are only running 1/2 way. Should I cut this piece to half, or run it the entire length of the cooker. Any reason as to not running it full length??

 

[kim mudd]

about how much did this cost you and could you make another one?

 

[kim mudd]

do you make these for sale?

 

[wichita chief]

Very nice!! I'm jealous! I want one for my OK Joe longhorn. I just looked at a Yoder smoker yesterday, the loaded "Wichita", which has the "Heat Management Plate" option in it. It too appears approx 1/4" thick. I like that idea. I too feel the mass helps even out and maintain an even heat. I've seen people get light weight metal at Lowes or HD and use it because it's easy to find and easy to work with. Basically making just a baffle for the heat. I really like the one in the Yoder smoker. It goes to about approx. 6"-8" from the far end (the smokestack end). I'm going to make a pattern that fits mine and see how close theirs is to mine and see if the required mod's to make it fit are reasonable if so I'm buying/ordering one. The website lists the plate at $95 which is right in line with what the Horizon site get on the OK Joe plate. As soon as I can get my phone to transfer pictures I'll include pictures. Once again, nice job!!