Let's Be Careful Out There...


 
PeterD

PeterD

TVWBB Super Fan
I'm still somewhat shaken by something that happened during my last overnight brisket smoke a couple of weeks ago. I did a Minion start with a good amount of hickory and apple smokewood right on the top of the ring of Comp-K. I brought the charcoal chimney up onto the deck and poured out the contents on top of the unlit, assembled the smoker and went from there. I was quickly smelling the aroma of burning smoke wood and thought all was well.

Until about an hour later when I just happened to glance at the deck.

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One lit briquette had dropped out of the chimney onto the pressure-treated 25YO deck and burned its way right through the 2x4s. I wasn't smelling the hickory and apple, I was smelling the burning deck. I grabbed the nearby hose and put it out thoroughly, but the damage had been done. It's a bloody miracle that it didn't cause the whole deck to burst into flame. I shudder to think what might have happened if I'd just gone to bed once the brisket was on and the temps stabilized. Be careful out there folks!
 
I've had little bits of red hot charcoal fall out of my chimney onto my patio which luckly is concrete. I also keep my hose on and close by just incase and usually hang out by the grill for the first 20 mins or so. Recently with the drought conditions I'll water all around the patio after loading the coals. Maybe a little paranoid but that's what I like to do.

glad it all turned out well for you!
 
Same thing happened to move several years ago. A few coals had fallen through my grill, which was a cheapo and had rusted. Fortunately, after we were sitting around the table my sister-in-law saw a lot of smoked and asked what was on the grill. I looked out and my deck was smoldering with 3 or 4 nice size holes burned through it. My water hose was right by the deck and I put the fire out before too much damage was done.
 
Last week when I did my turkey in the Kettle, I was pouring the coals from the chimney into the grill. One lit one had fallen out and hit the bag of charcoal I had sitting next to the grill, It burned through the bag and was inside smoldering when I caught the smoke. I got lucky there since the grill was sitting on my front porch due to some rain showers that passed through. I pulled the lit briquette out of the bag and extinguished the smoldering hole before anything else caught fire.
 
Had a small but very hot piece of lit briquette go through my shoe and on to my foot while pouring charcoal into the wsm. THAT didn't feel good
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Peter, glad your place didn't burn down, but as I've mentioned over and over the last year, my cousin has a friend that DID have his place burn down from an overnight smoke on the deck.

If smoking on a deck, at the least, I'd get the biggest size concrete grill pad I could find to put under and around your "smoker pan". They sell 'em at Lowes and other places.
 
As shown the picture (above), my smoker is in a steel water-heater pan...but the errant briquette silently fell out enroute to the WSM from the pad where I light up the chimney. This can easily happen if you're not paying 100% attention to your surroundings. I've done this easily a few hundred times in the past without incident. All it takes is once.
 
Originally posted by PeterD:
As shown the picture (above), my smoker is in a steel water-heater pan...but the errant briquette silently fell out enroute to the WSM from the pad where I light up the chimney. This can easily happen if you're not paying 100% attention to your surroundings. I've done this easily a few hundred times in the past without incident. All it takes is once.
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Peter... I had the same thing happen. One piece of lit was left in the chimney and burned to the point it fell thru the chimney and onto my deck. My wife saw it before I did and yelled "FIRE"! I grabbed the nearby hose and dowsed the deck down.

I've replaced the boards and now place my smoker and grill on a couple of those grill mats found at the home improvement stores. I have a 12 x 12 paver I place a old lid on which is what I put the chimney on.

Now, after each time I use the chimney I look in the chimney and more often than not, there's a piece of lit wedged in the wires of the chimney.

Paying 100% attention to your surroundings is right!
 
Even though I've had my WSM for over 4 years now and am totally in tune with it's workings,I always spend about a half hour checking the temp to make sure that it's dialed in. I'm also checking my deck to see if there is any smoke coming from it!
 
I also use a piece of wonder board but did the same thing.. lost a coal during transfer and left a mark that looks just like that. Keep a hose or big bucket of water near by.
 
Originally posted by PeterD:
As shown the picture (above), my smoker is in a steel water-heater pan...but the errant briquette silently fell out enroute to the WSM from the pad where I light up the chimney. This can easily happen if you're not paying 100% attention to your surroundings. I've done this easily a few hundred times in the past without incident. All it takes is once.
Click to expand...

Yes, and while paying attention is paramount, we've all dropped a chunk of charcoal. I've got the melted Crocs to prove it. Might point though was that if you'd had everything on a concrete grill pad, you likely wouldn't have a hole burnt in your deck.
 
I recognised the risk last year and bought myself a Looftlighter.

Now I light the charcoal in place, no burnt spots on my deck. I have large paving stones on my deck, but was still spilling charcoal from the chimney starter.

The Looftlighter is amazing, lights a small patch in less than 2 minutes.
 
I've had a few scares, and here are my words of wisdom from a LOT of cooks on a wood deck:

1- Only light new charcoal in your chimney. I pour fresh hot coals right on top of the unburnt from the last cook. The small pieces are the ones that like to escape.

2- If using lump and getting down to the end of the bag, pour enough briquettes in the bottom of the chimney to keep the small pieces from falling through.

3- Don't wait until the bottom coals have burned down before dumping your chimney. Most of the time you probably don't need to light a full chimney anyway.
 
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