I've often felt that heat loss due to removing the lid periodically was overblown. In my opinion, removing the lid gives the coals a breath of fresh air and possibly gives a small heat spike.
While I don't disagree with your fundamental point, I feel compelled to point out that the thermal mass of your house is somewhat greater than that of a typical WSM full of meat. Your house is also likely to be better insulated than a WSM.In the dead of winter when it's -9 and I open the door to take out the dog, my entire house doesn't drop in temp.
Rusty James said:I've often felt that heat loss due to removing the lid periodically was overblown. In my opinion, removing the lid gives the coals a breath of fresh air and possibly gives a small heat spike.
While I don't disagree with your fundamental point, I feel compelled to point out that the thermal mass of your house is somewhat greater than that of a typical WSM full of meat. Your house is also likely to be better insulated than a WSM.
I think it depends on how long you have the lid off. A loss of most of the hot air in the WSM will slow cooking, but I'd agree that the oft-quoted 10-15 minute cooking time extension is probably way on the long side. From what I've seen the air temp recovers very quickly from a quick peek. Ironically, as you point out in reference to a breath of fresh air, if you have the bottom vents mostly closed to maintain temp then opening the lid may actually cause an increase in temp. On a recent cook I had the lid off for a couple minutes while re-positioning things and when I got it closed up again the temp spiked by more than 50F. Took a while to get things back under control. It's a good idea to be quick when taking off the lid.
Thank you Mike and Jay for the in depth responses. Helps gain a better understanding of things.