Chimney & Paper Towel w/ Veg Oil


 
Originally posted by Larry D.:

Has anyone tried wax paper to light the chimney? I doubt it would be cost effective unless you recycled it, too, but I bet the wax would give you a nice, hot little fire to get the charcoal started.
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I did this a week or two ago....had all the goods out in the backyard except for the paper to light the chimney. Looked at the pan of meat covered with wax paper......

Worked well, probably was about 2 foot square total of wax paper. But the lump was a fresh bag too, super dry and just waiting to see a spark.

Raining here today, sometimes extremely heavy. But the WSM just keeps on cranking.

 
First time I tried the oil and paper towel method it was a little messy; oil on all the fingers. Not bad, just an extra step of having to wash off the oil. Next I stuffed a bunch of paper towels into a gallon sized ziplock bag and poured in a cup of oil. After a couple of days all of the towels were equally saturated. Just open the bag, grap a paper towel with tongs, and put under the starter. Works great, much easier and no oily fingers!

Ken
 
I tried the paper towel trick this weekend. Used the oiled towels to lube up the racks first. Coals lit well and left virtually no ash compared to paper. Also, the cleanup from the lubed racks was much easier. I'll be using this method from now on.
 
I was reading old threads and found this. My method is not listed so I thought I would share. 1 large piece of newspaper, 1 piece of wax paper, roll them together with the wax paper inside. Wrap the resulting "tube" around your hand making a donut shaped thing. Put that under the chimney and light it up. Works for me . .
 
Since I found a place to buy the weber starter cubes localy I have never looked back. Paper towels and oil work, but the starter cubes are just so easy and inexpensive its hard to deny.

Brandon
 
I really like the Weber starter cubes. My local Ace hardware has them. So easy. But it's good to know about these other methods that work well too.
Those cubes may not be available forever.
 
No one around me stocks the cubes any longer so I was speaking with the guy who runs my local Ace and he did a special order for me, bought 6 boxes! they're just too easy . . .
 
Oil and paper towels? Starter cubes? Paraffin? Forget-about-it.

Go to Smart & Final or similar, get a $10 4-pack of Sterno Wick and you're all set. Reliable, no ashes, quicker and cleaner than the suggestions here, and lasts all summer under heavy use.

Place 1 to 3 lit pots under your chimney. Remove them with tongs and blow them out as soon as there's a decent amount of smoke (5 minutes?)
 
I prefer to use my propane burner or propane grill to light my chimney.

However, I am very much considering buying some of those firestarter cubes so I can just drop em in, fire em up and be done with it.
 
Following up on Derek's post re propane burner to start the fire.

I don't even need a chimney. Up till recently, what worked well was just a self lighting propane nozzle on a one pound ball. Shoot flames into the base of the lump pile for thirty seconds, then same on some spot on the other side and that's it.

What's even better now, is my taking an old five pound propane ball, leaving it on the ground, and running a several foot long hose to my lighter end. Now, no problem with the liquid being upended as I hold the burner upside down. The burner head can be upside down, but the propane bottle sits on the ground feeding me gas constantly.
 
The easiest and cleanest way is to put veg. oil in a spray bottle. Just adjsut the nozzle and go.
What I usually do is brush the grates off, place them on some paper towel, spray the grates with the oil, place the grates on and use the dampened paper towels. it works great and there is no mess!

Just my 2 cents.
Rob T.
 
I use the diamond fire starter sticks work awesome get them at walmart, all u need is half a stick to start the chimmey, also i turned the chimmey grate the opposite way sits closer to whatever u r using to start the chimmey.
 
I've been ripping off pieces of empty charcoal bags instead of newspaper for lighting the chimney. (makes me feel like I'm being environmentally correct by not throwing the empty charcoal bag in the trash)Still have some ash, but not near as much as newspaper. I like the PAM idea, I'll give that a try.
 
I use a sterno type product. Take the cap off, apply fire from a match, put under the chimney for a bout 5 min, take chimney off sterno type fuel, close container, done. These things last about 2 hrs and if you buy a lot at one time they are VERY cheap.
 
I use newspaper to start my chimney,but when I ran out one time,the missus freaked out when I grabbed some paper towels and oiled them up! She was concerned about sparks! Now I just make sure I keep newspaper on hand,although I have used the empty charcoal bag to light it before!
 
Wow. After years of using my propane torch to light the charcoal, I tried the oil and paper towel method.

I like the idea of wiping the machine clean first. Grill, or metal outsides to avoid rust.

And I didn't use a chimney. My char basket stacks the coals about three or four high, so I after cleaning the bbq, I dropped the oily towels in the basket, piled coals and lit it.

Wow. It started much faster then with my propane torch system. Never having used a chimney, I never saw how powerful this "chimney effect" is.

Only down side, lots of smoke until the paper and oil was all burned away. My propane torch creates no smoke.

Oh well. More fun stuff to learn.



Originally posted by derek_d:
I prefer to use my propane burner or propane grill to light my chimney.

However, I am very much considering buying some of those firestarter cubes so I can just drop em in, fire em up and be done with it.
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Originally posted by KevinMurray:
I've been ripping off pieces of empty charcoal bags instead of newspaper for lighting the chimney. (makes me feel like I'm being environmentally correct by not throwing the empty charcoal bag in the trash)Still have some ash, but not near as much as newspaper. I like the PAM idea, I'll give that a try.
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I've been using empty charcoal bags too. It lights really easy......
 
In order to avoid the veggie oil mess, I've found that using a kiddie sized waxed Dixie cup works great. Just ball up two sheets of paper towel, stuff it into the Dixie cup and add 1/8 cup or a little more of veggie oil. The cup does a nice job of concentrating the heat and acts as a wick. I've never had a mess after the coal is lit either.
 
4 very cheap paper towels and the cheapest veg oil spray you can find will do the trick...
 
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