Big Sky, thanks for the info on your NG conversion. I just bought my 44" this last Saturday, fired it up and had my first ever attempt at smoking meat (a boneless pork butt and a whole chicken). It was just an experimental run and things turned out pretty well - moist and great flavor. Anyway, I'm also planning to covert mine to NG as my patio is plumbed for NG and I have my NG weber grill already set up and its nice to not deal with tanks. I'm looking at setting a T connection so they can both run independently. I've been researching the conversion options and will also give OLP customer service a call for their insight or if they have recommendation on conversion kits. I see that Smoke Vault sells a NG conversion kits for their propane smokers, so may also see if that could somehow work in this case. At any rate, if I'm unable to obtain a simple conversion kit, I'm planning to drill out the orifice. I may have to do a little more research, but I'm using this video as an example:
Plus the conversion table for bit size vs. BTU:
http://www.joppaglass.com/burner/lowp_chrt.html
My understanding is that the 44" puts out 10,000 BTU, so I'm currently planning on using a ~ size 53 bit or there a bouts.
For other mods, I'm also looking at insulating the smoker as I noticed the temp fluctuated ~20-30 deg depending on the breeze on that 50 deg day.
I also appreciated reading the previous recommendations on the SS plate under the wood trays to help control the smoke rate.
Looks like OLP makes a cover for the 44", but its currently out of stock.
I also need to invest in some reliable remote read thermometers.
At any rate, I'm glad I came across this site and this thread. There is lots of good info to learn from you guys. Keep it coming.