How to safely start a chimney for my 18" on a new deck


 
I have the Weber chimney. That's what drops the lit coals and cinders, unfortunately. No way I'm bringing a weed burner (a.k.a. flamethrower) within 10 feet of a deck that cost more than my first house.
 
PeterD said:
That's exactly the situation. I always Minion start.
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Or you could try this, start the coals using a chimney on the wsm grate, dump them and then pour unlit on top. I've done that on my wsm-mini and it worked the same as dumping lit on top of unlit. I have not tried this on my 18.5. I got a drip pan a couple of weeks back and it works great - highly recommend this.
 
Chris Allingham said:
I get it. I don't use a weedburner. But you can use a small handheld propane torch and get similar results.
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I like the idea of some kind of metal pan and a grill mat. I have a round grill mat under the WSM but it's not big enough for anything else. I think I'll get a larger square grill mat, put a few pavers on top of it on the side closest to the smoker and just be very careful to not have any Trex boards in the path, which would be about 2 feet. If I used a propane torch (I do have one of those in the basement), it would seem to me that it would take a few minutes of use to get things going. Not really practical, since I'm prepping the meat and bringing things out from the kitchen during the 10 minutes that it takes for the coals to heat up in the chimney.
 
PeterD said:
I have the Weber chimney. That's what drops the lit coals and cinders, unfortunately. No way I'm bringing a weed burner (a.k.a. flamethrower) within 10 feet of a deck that cost more than my first house.
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Could you put a pan underneath the chimney while carrying it?
 
Makes sense, though I prefer to use two hands on the chimney. I've got a cook comin' up next week so I'll give that a shot.
 
I bought a welders blanket at Harbor Freight. I lay that down when I transfer coals from my grill. I light my chimney with my side burner. I also used it to set my lid on. Seems to work pretty well.
As someone up above mentioned, I have my 22 setting on tiles as well. Deck is made of wood.
 
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