Adding third grate??


 
The description says 6" between grates.

I would think most could figure out how to add another grate for a lot less than $70.

$2 for 4 screws would do it.....
 
No need for an expensive kit. Purchase a new lower grate. Then use long bolts, large washers and nuts to fasten it to your existing lower grate. They should be stainless because of the proximity to food. Here is a pic I found online:

grate4.jpg



I tried this years ago. I used a full size grate (unlike the set up in the picture) and located the bolts as close to the rim as possible. The set up is mostly useful for ribs and other thin foods. It is a real hassle to get food on and off of the stacked grates. I abandoned it when I bought a 22" WSM.

If I were to do it again. I would use the newer style handle grate (photo below) as the top of the two grate stack and an old style flat grate on the bottom. The handles would allow you to pull the two grate stack out easily. Combine it with a lid hinge, and you could really minimize the amount of time the cooker is open.

grill-parts-85042.jpg
 
On my WSM 22.5, my setup is as follows: I foil wrap the water pan with a clay saucer inside for a heat sink. I use the original smaller grate sitting directly above the water pan. On that grate, I sit an 18 inch round, 2 inch deep, cake pan. I put about a gallon of warm water in it, and add about 6 drops of cooking oil to prevent evaporation. That pan is used to catch any and all drippings from any cooking meat. I then place the top grate on the top brackets and add the Stacker and add a second grate on it's top brackets. This setup gives me ample room to cook a ton of meat, and also control any hotspots by forcing the hottest air away from the center of the Smoker. When cooking ribs, this is super important so as not to burn the smaller tips. As with any cooking method, you have to experiment and find out what works best for you. I always have a Weber Charcoal Performer next to my WSM when I am cooking. This gives me a place to park the lid, move the Stacker, place my BBQ Guru, and keep handy, all of my tools, condiments, sauces, rubs, and most important, a place to sit my beer.
 
"Hello, has anyone used the WSM Extended Rack support kit from Cajuin Bandit?

https://www.cajunbandit.com/product...er-smokey-mountain-extended-rack-support-kit/

How does this work? Does it lower the water pan to provide 6" from rack to rack?"


I have this on my 18 and like it a lot, with a few caveats.

At $70 (including an additional upgraded top cooking grate), it isn't cheap -- although way cheaper than getting a stacker or a second cooker. Provides a nice solid third grate with each grate being evenly and nicely spaced out. Screws right in, so no drilling or McGyvering required. Now the caveats:

In the 18, it does lower the water pan bracket several inches. The 18 already has an issue with the overly deep stock water pan and these brackets make that worse. The lowest point of the stock water pan goes below the top level of the charcoal ring. Because the stock pan angles in, you can still add coals or chunks to the chamber through the door with tongs. But if you pile the charcoal up high for a minion start, the bowl can actually touch the charcoal pile. So in the 18, you'll probably move on from the stock water pan and go with the Brinkmann, pizza pan, flower pot base, Hunsaker or FireDial (which is what I use). If I really want to use water, I just put an aluminum drip tray on the lowest grate and then have two cooking grates above to use. Since I usually only use all three grates for chicken or ribs or hot/fast cooking, a water tray plus two use-able grates works for fine for me. And the access and clean up of a disposable tray is much easier than dealing with a pan that has to be foiled or scrubbed.

Second, the diameter dimension of the CJ brackets are ever so slightly different from the stock brackets. The stock water pan fits in perfectly, but other things may not. For example, I use a FireDial (which being flat solves the space problem) instead of the stock water pan. Turns out that the FireDial (which drops right into the regular brackets) is about 1/4 inch too big to slide into the CJ brackets. Same thing happened with the charcoal unit. I like to put the charcoal unit up on the water pan bracket to use the WSM as a grill.

[BTW, one of the nice things the CJ brackets do is make the grilling set-up really nice. Charcoal unit goes on the lowest bracket. Put the cooking grate on the top bracket for low heat, and then down to the middle bracket for high heat/searing.]

The solution is to just dremel down two of the CJ brackets to create the fraction of an inch of space that you need. No big deal, but highly annoying!!! Since the point of my buying the more expensive CJ brackets was to avoid the DIY McGyver. Hard to understand why CJ would make their brackets slightly smaller. Especially since they know that their longer brackets would make the well known tight space problem of the 18's lower part even worse. So it is pretty obvious that someone using the CJ brackets on an 18 is probably going to need to use a pan/diffuser alternative to the Weber stock pan.

I don't know the extent to which these spacing/pan issues would apply to the 22 or are just limited to the 18.
 
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I attached some 4” bolts, washers, and wing nuts to my top grate. Now I can just drop another grate in place on top of the wing nuts and lift it right up with ease. This set up has been working well for a few years. I use 4 bolts for good stability. 4” is high enough to fit a brisket or ribs underneath, and low enough to easily clear the lid.
 

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Check out this mod I built for my 18" WSM with the Cajun Bandit extension kit. You can build out any configuration you want using threaded rod, one grate to hang in the "top shelf" position, then smaller grates to have a drop in unit.
 

 

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