Vertical Smoker

[kingofbother]

I've only seen pictures of the vertical smokers that have the fire box on the bottom. How do they transfer the heat and smoke to the smoking chamber? Do they have louvers that direct the heat....indirectly? Do they have ports that carry the heat and smoke up the sides and out? This may sound silly but I'm not sure how it's indirect when it is directly under the meat.

 

[cowgirl]

I'm not sure if I'm following your question. Some vertical smokers have water pans or something to diffuse the heat and smoke before it reaches the food above.
Having the food grate higher above the heat source keeps the food from smoking at too high of a temperature too.
Usually the spacing between the heat source and the food is enough to keep it from over cooking.
Hope this makes sense! Wouldn't be the first time I misunderstood the question. lol

 

[kingofbother]

I'm not talking about the little WSM type. I'm wondering about this kind. I know that this one looks like a gas one but this is the style that I'm referring to. The pitmakers have one that burns wood and charcoal.

 

[tn_bbq]

My Backwoods works this way:

It's what some call a vertical, insulated, reverse-flow, water smoker.

The water pan separates the coals from the meat. The hot air and smoke travel up and around the water pan AND UP THROUGH THE WALLS. The hot air enters the cooking chamber at the top. Towards the bottom of the cooking chamber are a few holes that allow the hot air and smoke to exit through the chimney.

It's nice because the hot air completely surrounds the cooking chamber.

Pretty complicated (and well engineered) stuff.

 

[bbq engineer]

I have built a couple of vertical cabinets, and they work exceptionally well. Here is a rough diagram of how they work...



The fire is positioned below the water pan, which acts as a heat sink and stabilizes the temperature fluctuations and also adds humidity to the air. There are channels on the sides that also allow heat and smoke to divert around the water pan into the smoking chamber. The smoke stack exit is at the bottom of the smoking chamber so the entire thing fills with smoke (S.S. Exit on my diagram).

 

[kingofbother]

Awesome info. This is really what I needed. I want to build one. How is the heat recovery after opening the door? If you want to mop or check the temp of the meat how long does it take to recover? Also what is the temp diff. from the top to the bottom? Thanks for the info.

How is the firebox vented? and how do you control the temp?

 

[tn_bbq]

Heat recovery is good with my BWS. Heat recovery has to do with design, insulation, WEIGHT, etc. I'm not a big fan of opening the door (card carrying member of the "if you're looking, you ain't cooking" club).

Heat temp. diff. is not all that bad. In fact, it's real good (especially compared to offset smokers).

The BWS are vented with sliding doors on each side of the firebox.

 

[carpetride]

Take a look at the Stumps smokers....works very similar but the lump or briquettes are gravity fed which works out very nice. I don't think I have many pics of mine but I will look and see. Lots of clones have been built of the Stumps, Backwoods, and Spicewine. I considered building one but came across a significant on my Stumps and bought it instead.

 

[bbq engineer]

When I built my smokers, I had a welder and could easily weld a pipe nipple to accept a gate valve as the air intake...so that is what I did. It works really well, and offers a lot a adjustability. Since mine is insulated, it holds heat like nothing else out there. This makes it super efficient and also makes it impervious to the weather...I have smoked in -2° dead of winter with a stiff wind blowing, and my team at work said it was the best Que that they have ever had. Here is a pic of mine with the gate valves. Heat recovery is not an issue. Really you have to learn to control the fire, because if you open the door to let heat out, guess what, you just let air in to stoke the fire hotter. Control the air intake, and control the heat.

 

[hddm3]

wow nice little smoker.