Herecy!!! I know, but I made an electric WSM.....


 
Clean looking mod.

I have an element and control from a Char-broil Patio Caddy electric grill that looks almost identical to the one you used.
 
That's pretty slick. Nice neat job. I can see that being very handy and trouble free for lower temp smoking like cheese and bacon. Ooh ! Cheese and bacon! :cool:
 
Thanks guys.....

I still have to work out in my head how I'm going to finalize the supports for the far end of the elements. If I make the extended bracket like I originally planned, then if I have to take the main body off to fiddle with the pellet tray, the legs for the element will be way too tall for the main body to sit on the deck. I'm wondering now about a T or V shaped strut that comes back to the door above the control. I would need to work out any clearance issues with the element it's self and the water pan (remember I have the old style shallow water pan, so if you have the new larger pan, you may need to make sure this will all clear the pan).

I've been sick this week, and with Easter this Sunday it will be next weekend at the earliest before I can get a batch of sausage on the e-WSM.

Eventually I may try a single pork butt, but I wanted this mainly for sausage and snack sticks. I have a BBQ Guru and for a long slow smoke like butts, you cannot beat a power draft with charcoal and wood chunks for real flavor.
 
Heck, if I had even thought about Chris putting this on the front page of the TVWBB site, I would have washed the outside of the WSM!!!!! Well, you can tell I use it....
 
I sent Chris a message about the description on the electric modification area. His description said I used a tray on the element for wood chips. This would be like the Brinkmann element. THIS IS NOT what I'm doing.

I'm using one of Todd's A-MAZE-N pellet trays, and here is why. I made this for sausage & snack sticks. You apply smoke at lower temps, so how are you going to a chip tray on the element to smoke at 100-125*? It's not going to work. I'm putting the pellet tray on the fire grate and it works regardless of the element temp. That way I can start off with no smoke and about an hour of low heat to dry the sausage casings. Then toss in the pellet tray and step up the temps every hour or so like normal sausage smoking until I get to the desired internal temp (usually 152*). A pellet tube would work the same way. I would go with a tray or tube and not even consider a chip/chunk tray sitting on the element for these reasons.

My WSM has the fire ring wired to the charcoal grate (a mod I learned here back in 2005). I also bought a 2nd charcoal grate that I would sit on top of the fire ring so my chimney would sit on this when I was using charcoal. Right now I'm putting the pellet tray on the bottom fire grate, and the element legs are resting on the 2nd fire grate on top of the fire ring (the pellet tray is below the heating element). Another thing I like about the pellet tray is I can fill it and it will run for hours. So I expect I will not find much need to fiddle with the tray once it's set up. The only potential issue I can see is if the pellets go out, but proper lighting should solve that. I'm in GA and no matter how I store the pellets, they seem to absorb moisture from the air. I've found the best results by either putting the pellets in a pyrex container and microwaving them for 2-3 minutes to drive out moisture or putting them in the tray and letting the tray sit in the heated smoker for a while before lighting the pellets (I did this a couple of times when I used the hot plate). 90% of the time, I go with the microwave method.

Does this make sense.
 
I love to tinker and that's a pretty cool mod! Good Q' is good Q'! No matter what it's cooked on. But as long as you used a weber, even better!
 
I have a spare WSM door that I shall modify by adding the electric element as shown, but I do not have the latch. Amazon no longer sells the compression latch that they used to handle - any suggestions for a substitute latch? :wsm:
 
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My question is why? But in America you can do what you want. What a great country. I will say this. As much as I think this is herecy I'll say one more thing and shut up. Beautiful install!
 
Frank Eriksen said:
My question is why? But in America you can do what you want. What a great country. I will say this. As much as I think this is herecy I'll say one more thing and shut up. Beautiful install!
Click to expand...

Cold smoking is what I think I'd use it for, not for larger cuts.. The way it's designed it can be switched back & forth easily,,,so it's a cheap clean controllable option.
 
I did build it for cold smoking and lower temp smoking of sausage and snack sticks. I don't think that element is up to the task of heating a pork butt or any other large cut of meat. But it's got cold smoking and snack sticks written all over it! Try and run a WSM at 130 or 140* for hours. I seem to end up either choking out the coals or overshooting (and that's asking for fat out in a snack stick). Electric with a pellet tray for smoke solved that problem.
 
So, DAVE....I think I must go for it. I have been wanting to brine some lake trout and cold smoke. I think I may have a solution to the salmon at dollars per pound that does not make sense to me. I know the farm raised salmon eats orange food so they look authentic, but maybe I'll use a lot of pink shrimp stock for the brine and fool at least me....great fun...and you can eat your mistakes....usually. DAVE
 
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