Leaky Shutdown


 
J

J. Ray Silva

TVWBB Fan
I noticed after my first cook the other night that when I shut down my smoker it never really put the fire out. I noticed today the stop on the vents don't allow the window to be fully closed. four holes in a total of four vents leaves a lot of air leak. Has anyone else encountered this problem?

I always use to shut down my kettle and save unused coals. I find I couldn't do this on my first cook on the smoker.

Has anyone jettisoned the little stop tabs?

Thanks
 
You could snap them off with a pair of pliers, or eventually they will bend off. I like them because they act as a blind stop, as in you don't have to visually bend down and see if the vents are fully opened or closed. After a few cooks that slight gap will seal up and you should be able to shut down normally.

Tim
 
Thanks Timothy.. I was prepared to take a pair of dikes to them, but figured I would ask before I butchered the new smoker. I guess a little gunk goes a long way. The pork butt Im smoking tomorrow ought to help with that.
 
I bought a CB door and a gasket kit for the WSM. It helped quite a bit with temp control and shutdown. It will shut down now before I burn up the remaining coals like before, but it could still be better.

I know the lid and door are tight. The bottom vents still have those air holes when closed and I doubt they will plug themselves with more use.

As far as burrs, I have sanding rolls to attach to my die grinder that will clean them up no problem. I could really save a lot on charcoal, if I could shut down my WSM like I can my kettle.

My goal is to figure out a way to get it to ambient temp within an hour or so.
 
Maybe the tabs are bent a little? See if you can bend them so the vent will close. After the gaskets and the CB SS door, my pit bottom is hand touchable in about an hour...
 
My WSM takes a while to cool off but it does a lot better now that I put a gasket around the door and between the mid-section and lid. It will cool down at least 100 - 150 degrees after I close the vents when the cook is over (seems pretty fast to me). Before it would take a couple hours to completely cool down, now it takes about 2 hours to get below 100. After smoking a butt for about 8 hours, I will still have 1/2 a ring of unused charcoal left over.

Dave
 
You said your first cook, it takes up to 5 or more cooks for the gunk to build up to shut down efficently

eventually you will have trouble getting the parts apart, that is good build up ;)
 
Gunk is the solution. Few cooks and the vents up and down will be sorrounded by grease and when I close the vent I can feel the grease to catch the metal disk or, better, I can feel the metal disk that goes into grease sealing all. It works for me!
 
I am at thsat part right now where it is hard to move the parts. I keep organic baby wipes around (because I have a young daughter they are easy to come by) and wipe down the areas.
 
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