Last weekend I was surprised by my wife with a 18.5" WSM as a Father's Day gift. Nice surprise to say the least.
After assembling it, I immediately ran to the store to get charcoal, wood chunks, and baby back ribs. I then followed the Weber instructions. Not having a charcoal starter, I piled the recommended 50 briquettes in a pyramid and lit them. When they were ashy I spread them out, plopped on 4 chunks of hickory, and put on the rest of the WSM. Then I filled the water plan with cold water pretty much to the brim, put on the ribs, and closed her up. It was 70 degrees outside.
I was immediately getting great smoke, but the big problem was that I could not get the smoker hot enough. Initially when I first closed it up it read around 300, but it immediately dropped below 200 and levelled out about 170. I opened the bottom vents all the way and nothing would work. I waited for maybe an hour thinking it would rise but it never did regardless of what I did with the vents. I also checked with an instant read thermometer and the Weber thermo was quite accurate.
I decided it needed more charcoal so I added about 12 and waited some more and no rise. I added some more coal and the same thing. Then I did some checking online and decided I probably had too much water, so I bailed out a bunch of water which helped a little but still under 200.
So I kept adding more coal and also added a few more wood chunks. By having the bottom vents and the side door open it would go up and when it reach 275 I would close the door and it would just drop back below 200 in about 10-15 minutes. Finally after hours of frustration and cycling between adding coal, letting the temp go up with the door open, closing it and having it drop back down, something happened and it leveled out at 250 and stayed there for the last hour. This was about 4 hours in.
In total I cooked them about 5.5 hours - longer than should be needed for baby backs because I knew the temp was too low most of the time. Also I had the top vents closed some of the time before reading you shouldn't do that so they were over smoked bordering on unpleasant tasting. They were also in the end not cooked enough so it was very hard to pull them apart by hand.
Luckily now I found this site so my next attempt should be greatly improved. This is what I think I did wrong but please give my additional suggestions:
1) Use more charcoal and start with a chimney starter having additional unlit charcoal in smoker.
2) Don't fill the water pan all the way up and maybe use hot water.
3) Let the smoker get to the proper temperature before adding the meat.
4) Use 3-4 chunks of wood and don't add more. Also use some milder wood for baby backs - all hickory seemed a bit strong.
5) Keep the top vents fully open the entire time.
After assembling it, I immediately ran to the store to get charcoal, wood chunks, and baby back ribs. I then followed the Weber instructions. Not having a charcoal starter, I piled the recommended 50 briquettes in a pyramid and lit them. When they were ashy I spread them out, plopped on 4 chunks of hickory, and put on the rest of the WSM. Then I filled the water plan with cold water pretty much to the brim, put on the ribs, and closed her up. It was 70 degrees outside.
I was immediately getting great smoke, but the big problem was that I could not get the smoker hot enough. Initially when I first closed it up it read around 300, but it immediately dropped below 200 and levelled out about 170. I opened the bottom vents all the way and nothing would work. I waited for maybe an hour thinking it would rise but it never did regardless of what I did with the vents. I also checked with an instant read thermometer and the Weber thermo was quite accurate.
I decided it needed more charcoal so I added about 12 and waited some more and no rise. I added some more coal and the same thing. Then I did some checking online and decided I probably had too much water, so I bailed out a bunch of water which helped a little but still under 200.
So I kept adding more coal and also added a few more wood chunks. By having the bottom vents and the side door open it would go up and when it reach 275 I would close the door and it would just drop back below 200 in about 10-15 minutes. Finally after hours of frustration and cycling between adding coal, letting the temp go up with the door open, closing it and having it drop back down, something happened and it leveled out at 250 and stayed there for the last hour. This was about 4 hours in.
In total I cooked them about 5.5 hours - longer than should be needed for baby backs because I knew the temp was too low most of the time. Also I had the top vents closed some of the time before reading you shouldn't do that so they were over smoked bordering on unpleasant tasting. They were also in the end not cooked enough so it was very hard to pull them apart by hand.
Luckily now I found this site so my next attempt should be greatly improved. This is what I think I did wrong but please give my additional suggestions:
1) Use more charcoal and start with a chimney starter having additional unlit charcoal in smoker.
2) Don't fill the water pan all the way up and maybe use hot water.
3) Let the smoker get to the proper temperature before adding the meat.
4) Use 3-4 chunks of wood and don't add more. Also use some milder wood for baby backs - all hickory seemed a bit strong.
5) Keep the top vents fully open the entire time.
