Spares at high altitude, first try

Today was my first cook with the new WSM. I've been using an off-set on and off for 10 years, and always got uneven results at best. We live at 7000' altitude which tended to make the off-set act like a big leaky barn...on Mars. I never could achieve high enough temps without really laying on the coals. Nothing ever turned out all that good. I never had the nerve to try any big cuts.

So today I fired up the WSM for spare ribs using the MM. I put in 30 lit coals and some mesquite over a half a ring of unlit coals, and opened all the vents. I used sand instead of water, and racked the ribs on top and the trimmings on the lower rack. After 30 minutes the temp (lid) was 180. At 45 minutes it was still 180. This concerned me, so I lit up another 20 coals. Meanwhile I removed the door and the temp went up to 200, but stayed there. I added the other 20 coals, and opened and closed the door over the next hour and a half nursing the temp up to 240-260. It didn't really settle on 240-250, my goal, until almost 3 hours into the burn. When it finally settled in, it became very steady, almost spooky. When it settled, two of the lower vents were at 30-50% and one was wide open. They stayed that way for the rest of the burn. The top vent was wide open, but there was a cork in one opening holding a temporary thermometer.

I'm pretty sure I can do a better job on the start at this altitude with a full can of coals, but I think it will always take close watching for a few hours, and opening the door will be necessary. Plenty of hot coals seems to be what will off-set the really obvious lack of oxygen. The same airtight feature that makes this cooker so great seems to starve the fire at first, where the air is thin.

Has anybody else had experiences with very high altitude and the WSM. There isn't much on this subject on the forum, and it definitely acts different up here.

Oh, and by the way, the ribs were the best I've ever made! I'm going to give away the old off-set.

We cooked at Tahoe last Febuary, we in the teens temp wise. A mix of Kingsford and lump may be the best way to get to temp or straight lump. Getting temp up is a problem when oxygen is in lower supply.
Jim

I also used my WSM for the first time this weekend. We are at an altitude of 5500 feet. I had the same problem with the temps at first. I was cooking spares and was trying the MM. I started out with 20 lit coals and a Weber chimney full of unlit briquettes. I could not get the smoker above 200 F. I had to add a one half full Weber chimney of lit briquetes to get the temperatures up. The first batch of coals looked as though it had gone out. I had all of my vents open 100%. I can only think that the lack of oxygen and a poor draft caused the fire to smolder instead of burn.

I know that I don't need to use the MM on shorter cooks, and I would probably have better luck with the standard method at this altitude. But I need to practice MM for when I need it on all-nighters. I got the heat up in my old off-set by just really laying on the coals. I guess 60 or so, a full chimney of well-lit coals over the unlit would work. We'll see. Once it gets to temp, it seems to hold it just fine. I want to be able to do this with Kingsford if I can.

I've had my smoker here in Colorado Springs for about 9 weeks now, and I've slowly developed a method for dealing with the altitude.

I always start with Minion Method.

I always start with a fairly full ring of unlit charcoal. I have a layer of the charcoal from the last cook, a layer of lump charcoal, and some more Kingsford on top.

I start a chimney with 20 to 30 kingsford in it and wait until all of the coals appear to be translucent and glowing. Maybe a few on top and around the edges still have dark spots. At this altitude its hard to get every single coal fully lit.

I spread the lit coals around on top of the unlit coas and add the smoke wood. I open all vents.

I assemble the smoker. I might or might not add water depending on desired temp. I add the meat.

I set my ET-73 to give an alarm when the smoker has reached desired temp (high alarm at 220). I remove the door from the smoker and go inside and try to occupy my impatient mind while the smoker heats up. Usually within 30 minutes. When the ET-73 alarm goes off I go out and put the door on. Total start time is about 1 hour.

Once the door is on the temp generally pegs within a few degrees and stays there. I watch the temp for 30 minutes or so and if there is a tendency to raise, I close the vents 30% and wait some more. I reset the ET-73 with high and low alarms for grate temp and meat temp.

I usually wind up with a good 12 hours of stable temps. I sometimes get a bit of a temp spike as the lump fires off, but it's easily controlled.

I have done mostly 225 degree cooks this way, but it wors with 300+ degree cooks as well. I might wait until the high temp is reached before adding the meat (not sure it matters).

I experimented once and got a full chamber of coals all burning at once and a temp of 350. I shut all vents and the temp dropped to under 100 within 10 minutes. Its very easy to put coals out at this altitude.

After every cook I just shut all the vents. The next time I go to cook I usually have allot of charcoal left. I just lift the grate and shake it to get all the ash off, dump the ash, and I'm ready to add more lump and kingsford and start again.