Seems most of the great cooks here use the 18 wsm. But I have the new 22.5 wsm. After reading this forum, I have not put water in my pan for the last two cooks with some suceccs. I have even head that people have had trouble keeping temps down in the zone on the 22.5. However I have found the exact oppisite. As discussed on this forum, the hood thermomerter is about 50-80 degrees cooler than the acutal temps. I have also used a full chimniy and then added coals to fill the ring to use the minion method and I still cannot achive temps over 300 degrees. These temps woul be used on chicken, high heat brisket or the like. I have about 6 cooks on my wsm and I am only batting about 30 percent. I woul love to hear other opinions especially cooks with a 22.5 and how they have overcome this 300 degree threshold.
22.5 temps
- Thread starter S Hoffman
- Start date
Clark Deutscher
TVWBB All-Star
While I do not have and have not used a 22.5 I would definately suggest propping the door open and leaving the lid slightly ajar.
Clark
Clark
Clark Deutscher
TVWBB All-Star
Paul is definately right but yes. You won't experience heat loss if you prop the door open or displace the lid by an inch. You will get much higher temps with the addition of the oxygen. Just watch the temps don't get too high.....
Clark
Clark
dwayne e
TVWBB Super Fan
I usually do not do high heat on my 22.5; however, a couple of times, I've been distracted at the beginning of a cook (using the minion method with a FULL ring of unlit K and a half to 3/4 chimney of lit K) and the lid temp has soared to over 300 until I shut the vents down. Also, at the end on a couple of cooks the natives were getting uneasy and I had to speed things up a bit. Even after a few hours, opening the vents wide open produced lid temps > 300.
Thanks to all. Yes I am aware the hood temps are 50-80 degrees cooler than actual
Dwayne,
When you’re setting up your wsm to cook say a couple of chickens or a turkey, do you use a full ring of blue bag of Kingsford to obtain 300 degrees for this type of cook? To me that seems like a lot of charcoal for a 2 hr cook. What I have been doing is a full lit chimney over about another chimney full of unlit to achieve the minion. Even this amount seem excessive to me, but I am trying the more fuel more heat theory. Also, I stopped putting water in the pan to get the temps up.
Ash catcher is cleaned every time and all vents open 100%.
Dwayne,
When you’re setting up your wsm to cook say a couple of chickens or a turkey, do you use a full ring of blue bag of Kingsford to obtain 300 degrees for this type of cook? To me that seems like a lot of charcoal for a 2 hr cook. What I have been doing is a full lit chimney over about another chimney full of unlit to achieve the minion. Even this amount seem excessive to me, but I am trying the more fuel more heat theory. Also, I stopped putting water in the pan to get the temps up.
Ash catcher is cleaned every time and all vents open 100%.
I've used my 22.5 WSM twice and haven't had problems like you're having. My first cook I was aiming for 200 and couldn't get it below 260 (at the grate). My second cook I had it dialed right in at 200-250 (at the grate) for 14 hours. I use water in the pan and had the bottom vents open 10-30%.
My dial reads about 25 lower than the top grate.
My dial reads about 25 lower than the top grate.
For my first cook on my 22.5, I used Chris's basic bbq chicken and used the standard method for lighting the fire. I lit one full chimney of K, then dumped another full chimney of unlit on top of the lit and waited for all of it to gray over. I then put in the pan, without water, and tossed in the chicken. The temp on my lid therm went up to 350 and settled in at 325. I've noticed in my subsequent cooks that the temp doesn't spike as high anymore. You might want to test your lid therm in boiling water to see if it's calibrated. If the temp is off, call Weber customer service and they will send you a new one. Hope this helps!
dwayne e
TVWBB Super Fan
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by S Hoffman:
Thanks to all. Yes I am aware the hood temps are 50-80 degrees cooler than actual
Dwayne,
When you’re setting up your wsm to cook say a couple of chickens or a turkey, do you use a full ring of blue bag of Kingsford to obtain 300 degrees for this type of cook? To me that seems like a lot of charcoal for a 2 hr cook. What I have been doing is a full lit chimney over about another chimney full of unlit to achieve the minion. Even this amount seem excessive to me, but I am trying the more fuel more heat theory. Also, I stopped putting water in the pan to get the temps up.
Ash catcher is cleaned every time and all vents open 100%. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
For a whole chicken, I'd go with a 1/2-3/4 ring of unlit and a 1/2-3/4 chimney of lit (I almost always use K). This maybe overkill, but K is cheap and I usually do ABTs or veggies when cook is winding down. Too much K is never a problem; using too little can delay or ruin a cook (and it's a pain in the butt to deal with).
Thanks to all. Yes I am aware the hood temps are 50-80 degrees cooler than actual
Dwayne,
When you’re setting up your wsm to cook say a couple of chickens or a turkey, do you use a full ring of blue bag of Kingsford to obtain 300 degrees for this type of cook? To me that seems like a lot of charcoal for a 2 hr cook. What I have been doing is a full lit chimney over about another chimney full of unlit to achieve the minion. Even this amount seem excessive to me, but I am trying the more fuel more heat theory. Also, I stopped putting water in the pan to get the temps up.
Ash catcher is cleaned every time and all vents open 100%. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
For a whole chicken, I'd go with a 1/2-3/4 ring of unlit and a 1/2-3/4 chimney of lit (I almost always use K). This maybe overkill, but K is cheap and I usually do ABTs or veggies when cook is winding down. Too much K is never a problem; using too little can delay or ruin a cook (and it's a pain in the butt to deal with).
I cook most everything in my 22.5-er at whatever-the-heck the temperature really is when the lid thermo needle is perfectly vertical!
4 pork butts for 18 hours followed by 10 chickens for 3.5 hours. Full bag of Kingsford, Minoned, helped along by 2 what-I-call "pony" bags (5#?) of on-sale grocery store brand as needed. Full 24-hour burn and the ashes still had embers in them the next evening--still too hot to dump!
4 pork butts for 18 hours followed by 10 chickens for 3.5 hours. Full bag of Kingsford, Minoned, helped along by 2 what-I-call "pony" bags (5#?) of on-sale grocery store brand as needed. Full 24-hour burn and the ashes still had embers in them the next evening--still too hot to dump!