Charcoal Amounts on WSM 14.5


 
J

JSpradlin

New member
Hey everyone,

I am still learning on my WSM 14.5 and I am about to do the basic baby back ribs recipe from Chris. Here comes my next silly question for you all. I see lots of recipes that are meant for the 18.5 when they refer to charcoal amounts. If a recipe calls for 9 lbs of KBB or enough to fill the chimney 1.5 times, and I have the smaller chimney meant for the 14.5, is that ratio still correct if I just fill my smaller chimney 1.5 times for my smaller cooker?

Thanks for your insights!

Jeff
 
Jeff,
When I use my 14 for ribs or anything longer I always fill up the charcoal ring to the max and the lit a minion method in the get it started. When I use Kingsford in my 14 WSM with a minion method with a full charcoal ring at 250 I get right about 6 hours before it start to need refueling. So if you got Kingsford Blue Bag (KBB) I say fill it up for those ribs.
Also I don't mind filling mine up because I will reuse charcoal in the kettle for weekend meals usually including some chicken. So if there is leftover charcoal it will just get another use.
Now, this limited time that I was able to get on a full charcoal ring of KBB lead me to trying other charcoals. I can get more the double the amount of time with the same full charcoal ring on Weber Charcoal Briquettes. I have done a 14 plus hour pork shoulder with still fuel left using Weber Charcoal Briquettes and a minion method. However, I am having a hard time finding Weber Charcoal Briquettes now and I am trying other options. I tried Royal Oak Chef's Select and it do not give me the same burn time that Weber did. I just used B&B Briquettes on ribs yesterday and here is what was left after 6 hours. I will be using the B&B Briquettes never weekend on a pork shoulder so I will report back how that goes. I feel promising about next week's cook time ability.
One of my biggest concerns with the 14 is fuel capability and KBB limited me, but Weber and B&B is making using the 14 WSM a lot more enjoyable to me.
Another note is I use water in the water pan for all my cooks. 20200816_123314_HDR.jpg
 
Thanks for your help! I will plan on doing the 1.5 chimneys in my smaller Weber chimney and see where that gets me. If I need to put a few additional briquettes to top off the charcoal ring for the minion method. I will only be cooking two racks of ribs and a pan of beans towards the end as it is just my wife and I, so I think it should be enough.

I agree that I have heard good things about the Weber briquettes but I could not find them anywhere. In fact, a rep at my local Ace hardware store looked it up in their system and said that they are not expecting the Weber briquettes anymore as it was being ended by the supplier. I hope that is not true, but that is what he saw in his system. Until then, KBB seems to at least be consistent.
 
I use B&B (from ACE Hardware) as well and I agree that it is much better than Kingsford. I fill my 14 WSM to the max and add 3 wood chunks (one each of apple, hickory, and apple). When lighting the charcoal I use about 10 briquettes. I've found that lighting B&B is a little more difficult so I add a couple briquettes of kingsford as well to the chimney (I use a weber starter cube).

I can go all day on this much charcoal but usually about halfway I add some old charcoal from my kettle just to top it off. Whatever is left over gets reused.
 
Last edited:
After adding the lit charcoal and filling the water pan I leave all the vents open 100%. I normally put the meat on once my probe thermometer reads about 170 through the port on the side of the WSM. Once the air temp reads about 225 I start closing all the bottom vents to 1/3 to 1/2 open. Once the temperature starts rising over 250 I set the top vent to 75% open. At this point it will hold 240-260 for several hours.

Each WSM is a little different so you will have to experiment to find out what works best for you. I live on the west coast of Florida so weather plays a role as well.
 
JWorden said:
...Once the air temp reads about 225 I start closing all the bottom vents to 1/3 to 1/2 open. Once the temperature starts rising over 250 I set the top vent to 75% open...
Click to expand...

I'm still quite new at this, but quickly found that if I wait close bottom vents until temps are great than 200 it will be a real challenge to wrangle the temps before they sky-rocket. I start a bit lower than that. Easier to creep up on the target temp then shoot by it and fight to get it lower.

many of you are recommending the B&B coal from Ace Hardware. Are you referring to the Oak Hardwood Briquettes. Seems many of the Ace locations by me don't carry it.
 
I also tried closing vents at about 175 but it was taking too long (close to an hour) to get to 240-250 range. I may have been using less lit charcoal and may have been Kingsford. The last few cooks waiting to 225 range has worked out well.

[Edit:I've found that kingsford lights easier which could explain why I've been able to wait to 225 to close the vents]

I've had had spikes where I put the lid on crooked and left an air gap and the temperature went up over 300. Closing all the vents down to 1/3 open brought it back down to 230 in 20-30 minutes.

All my temperature readings are threw the port on the side of the WSM (thermoworks smoke air probe). The lid thermometer is usually 20 or more degrees lower.

As for the B&B I ordered it online and picked it up at the store. I've tried both the oak lump and the oak briquettes (orange bag). I liked the briquettes much better.
 
Last edited:
MichaelM said:
I'm still quite new at this, but quickly found that if I wait close bottom vents until temps are great than 200 it will be a real challenge to wrangle the temps before they sky-rocket. I start a bit lower than that. Easier to creep up on the target temp then shoot by it and fight to get it lower.

many of you are recommending the B&B coal from Ace Hardware. Are you referring to the Oak Hardwood Briquettes. Seems many of the Ace locations by me don't carry it.
Click to expand...
Yes it is the B&B Charcoal All Natural Oak Hardwood Charcoal Briquettes I got two of the 17.6 lb bags for Ace the other day. I will be reporting back on this thread how it goes with a pork shoulder next week.
 
...a recipe calls for 9 lbs of KBB or enough to fill the chimney 1.5 times...
Click to expand...
i find this quite funny. The weather, the cook, the WSM or ANY thing else can dictate how much coal to use.
And, who actually weighs the amount of coal used for each cook?
As @MichaelRichards states, the easiest solution is to fill the chamber and fire away. Use what's left over for your next cook.
 
MichaelM said:
I'm still quite new at this, but quickly found that if I wait close bottom vents until temps are great than 200 it will be a real challenge to wrangle the temps before they sky-rocket. I start a bit lower than that. Easier to creep up on the target temp then shoot by it and fight to get it lower.

many of you are recommending the B&B coal from Ace Hardware. Are you referring to the Oak Hardwood Briquettes. Seems many of the Ace locations by me don't carry it.
Click to expand...
You can also order online and they will ship to store for the same price.
 
JWorden said:
All my temperature readings are threw the port on the side of the WSM (thermoworks smoke air probe). The lid thermometer is usually 20 or more degrees lower.
Click to expand...

Be careful taking the temperature that close to the side, you will usually get a much higher temperature reading at the side because all of the heat is rising around the water pan, deflector etc. I try to get as close to the middle as I can, sometimes clipping to the underside of the grate if the food will interfere.
 
That's a good point. I've been doing it this way since I got it with good results so I'll keep doing it this way for consistancy. I also have a thermoworks chef alarm so I can try monitoring the temperature at a couple of different places.
 
Jim Lampe said:
i find this quite funny. The weather, the cook, the WSM or ANY thing else can dictate how much coal to use.
And, who actually weighs the amount of coal used for each cook?
As @MichaelRichards states, the easiest solution is to fill the chamber and fire away. Use what's left over for your next cook.
Click to expand...
Yeah I know that weighing charcoal is strange and I would never actually do it. I was just quoting the recipe. The main thing I had wanted to know with this post was whether 1.5 chimneys in an 18.5 was equivalent to 1.5 smaller chimneys in the smaller 14.5 that I have. But I have taken away that my best bet for cooks like ribs is to just load up the ring and worst case scenario I just have leftover charcoal. Thanks!
 
Lee Ingraham said:
Be careful taking the temperature that close to the side, you will usually get a much higher temperature reading at the side because all of the heat is rising around the water pan, deflector etc. I try to get as close to the middle as I can, sometimes clipping to the underside of the grate if the food will interfere.
Click to expand...
Both Harry Soo and myself, along with a whole bunch of other people, take our pit temperature readings through that fitting and/or through a fitting we added to one of the grate holders. My ATC probe sits approx 1 to 1 1/2 inside my 22 WSM along the wall. Work Extremely Well... There is an application reason for doing so... Controlling the heat content in the air being delivered to the cooking chamber so that variations due to cold meat, etc have no affect on said control.
 
Bob Bass said:
Both Harry Soo and myself, along with a whole bunch of other people, take our pit temperature readings through that fitting and/or through a fitting we added to one of the grate holders. My ATC probe sits approx 1 to 1 1/2 inside my 22 WSM along the wall. Work Extremely Well... There is an application reason for doing so... Controlling the heat content in the air being delivered to the cooking chamber so that variations due to cold meat, etc have no affect on said control.
Click to expand...

I can't argue with someone with as much success as Harry Soo and you've had sound advice from everything I've read. I'll keep that in mind in the future.
 
Jim Lampe said:
i find this quite funny. The weather, the cook, the WSM or ANY thing else can dictate how much coal to use.
And, who actually weighs the amount of coal used for each cook?
As @MichaelRichards states, the easiest solution is to fill the chamber and fire away. Use what's left over for your next cook.
Click to expand...
JSpradlin said:
Yeah I know that weighing charcoal is strange and I would never actually do it. I was just quoting the recipe.
Click to expand...
Just to defend my good reputation here...this comes from a series of the beginner's recipes I wrote in 2006-2008. Each one uses 1-1/2 chimneys of lit Kingsford charcoal in the 18.5" WSM. They are not Minion Method cooks and filling the charcoal ring to the top would be way overboard given the short nature of these cooks.

The suggestion of "at least 9 pounds" was to help the beginning understand how much charcoal they needed on-hand in order to achieve the cook, not that they needed to weigh the charcoal before use. In retrospect, I will probably remove that reference when I eventually get around to rewriting these recipes.
 
Chris Allingham said:
Just to defend my good reputation here...this comes from a series of the beginner's recipes I wrote in 2006-2008. Each one uses 1-1/2 chimneys of lit Kingsford charcoal in the 18.5" WSM. They are not Minion Method cooks and filling the charcoal ring to the top would be way overboard given the short nature of these cooks.

The suggestion of "at least 9 pounds" was to help the beginning understand how much charcoal they needed on-hand in order to achieve the cook, not that they needed to weigh the charcoal before use. In retrospect, I will probably remove that reference when I eventually get around to rewriting these recipes.
Click to expand...
HolyBalls! I did not realize that you were the one that wrote the recipe, Chris.
Had I known that, I would’ve agreed with that wholeheartedly. Of course.
 
Lee Ingraham said:
I can't argue with someone with as much success as Harry Soo and you've had sound advice from everything I've read. I'll keep that in mind in the future.
Click to expand...

Harry is the one that started me on using a BBQ ATC.
During his class, I took note of the location of his pit temperature probe and duplicated it once back home.
For anyone looking at upping their BBQ game, Harry's class is a great place to start !
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

 

Back
Top