(2) 500 gal propane tank smoker build. Franklin style.

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Yeah his book is great. I'm not cooking every day, but often. I had the leftover tank so why not use it, ya know? I cut a section out of it and welded it back to slide inside the other. Gotta get this paint off first.


Yeah that will work haha. As far as the paint goes Have fun with that I've tried burning my paint off but it is still sticking around.
 
That looks awesome!

Luckily you'll never need to open your fire door. [emoji]128522[/emoji]
 
Man I bet it feels good to be a gangster! Well done!
Thanks yes it does haha. I have been meaning to ask you. Have you filled your smoker full yet? I did a cook a few weeks ago and the smoker was full but regulating the heat from end to end was difficult. I'm talking 100 degree difference yet when I did an empty test it was more like 20 degrees difference. I'm thinking I just need to play with damper on the stack to trap more heat in the stack end. Didn't know if you had any issues with a full smoker.
 
Thanks yes it does haha. I have been meaning to ask you. Have you filled your smoker full yet? I did a cook a few weeks ago and the smoker was full but regulating the heat from end to end was difficult. I'm talking 100 degree difference yet when I did an empty test it was more like 20 degrees difference. I'm thinking I just need to play with damper on the stack to trap more heat in the stack end. Didn't know if you had any issues with a full smoker.

Yeah possibly I run mine about half open. I get about a 25 degree difference front to back. Maybe 50 when I had 15 briskets first put in it, but it leveled out as the briskets started to warm up.
 
Yeah possibly I run mine about half open. I get about a 25 degree difference front to back. Maybe 50 when I had 15 briskets first put in it, but it leveled out as the briskets started to warm up.
Ok. Yeah I'm going to try adjusting the damper next time.
 
Well my brother-in-law and I cooked for our church picnic this past Saturday man was it awesome. The smoker cooked like a dream the pork was delicious. We started the fires at 12 midnight and put the pork on at 2am. We finally pulled the Butts at 3pm and they were awesome.




After about 17 hours of fire (we heated up beans on the smoker too) his is all the ash that came from the box.
 
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Yeah that will work haha. As far as the paint goes Have fun with that I've tried burning my paint off but it is still sticking around.
Dropped it off for sandblasting Saturday, will weld it in this week, and then pretty close to getting the thing mounted to the trailer and then back to be sandblasted prior to paint.  Getting close
Well my brother-in-law and I cooked for our church picnic this past Saturday man was it awesome. The smoker cooked like a dream the pork was delicious. We started the fires at 12 midnight and put the pork on at 2am. We finally pulled the Butts at 3pm and they were awesome.




After about 17 hours of fire (we heated up beans on the smoker too) his is all the ash that came from the box.
 
josheaton josheaton
Thanks. Yours looks awesome too. Your firebox opening does look small did you use feldons calculator? On this past cook I kept my damper closed quite a bit and it did great held temps really well once you add meat on there it is amazing how much different it performs. I would suggest a bigger hole in the fire box (using feldons calculator) but also load it full of meat and see what happens with the temps (my guess is it will be harder to maintain a consistent temp). We had to move the meat around every hour to make sure they all got done other wise the ones closest to the firebox would have been done way before the rest. I like your water pan I am thinking about doing something similiar to that. Feel free to ask me anymore questions. I'm still learning but it is nice to be able to bounce ideas off of people.
 
Dropped it off for sandblasting Saturday, will weld it in this week, and then pretty close to getting the thing mounted to the trailer and then back to be sandblasted prior to paint.  Getting close

Josheaton, I would defiantly open that up a lot more. I personally cut mine as big as I could, but then again I'm using a 1,000 gallon tank and am trying to acquire as much air flow as possible. Which seems to work pretty good because I can keep the whole 16' of cooking chamber within 25 degrees of itself. Only concern is if yours drafts too hard since it's so small you'll pull too much direct heat in from the fire.

http://s10.photobucket.com/user/SxFxZ/media/6E547668-FF78-4D4C-8B5B-F6D3105EF18E.jpg.html
http://s10.photobucket.com/user/SxFxZ/media/FAD7A929-31F8-4F35-BF29-004EA9C628B0.jpg.html
 
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Believe it or not, I did most of the math myself.  Ex math nerd here.  After using his calculator, I think I should open it up a bit.  I intentionally went small so that I could go bigger later.  I was more concerned with the draft.  I'm going to open it up a little tonight and probably weld a deflector plate on while I'm in there.  I also need to do a bit of adjustment on my drain and add a seal at the top of my doors.  I had some leaking there.  I figure where I see smoke leaving, heat is going right along with it. 
 
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