Jason Paul
TVWBB Member
Hi All,
I've been lurking here for a month or two, trying to decide if I wanted to get one of these, and if so, which size. Went through the whole "18.5 or 22.5" debate, going back and forth for weeks. I ended up thinking the 18.5" was the way to go for me.
Lots of people say get the 22.5" since you'll always have the extra space. But I realized that this is mostly for full-sized racks of ribs and/or large briskets - neither of which I plan to cook very often. One complaint I heard several times was the inconvenience and additional charcoal from having to fire up the larger smoker. I even saw plenty of people who had the 22.5" saying they often wish they had the 18.5". So, all this had me leaning toward the 18.5".
So, I've been looking locally at the usual suspects: Home Depot, Lowe's, Wal-Mart, Academy, etc. The ones that had the 18.5" had it priced at the standard $299.
For the past 4-5 weeks, I've checked my closest Wal-Mart almost every week hoping it would be on sale (end of season), but almost every week they've had the same single beat-up boxed 18.5", at $299.
Went again last night, same beat-up box, same $299 price tag. But then I noticed on the side, facing the inside of the rack, was another price tag. A red one. For $199. In fact, it turns out the clearance price tag has probably been there the whole time. I just never saw it.
Woo hoo! $100 off! Yeah, the box was beat-up (the clerk said the box got wet, but it wasn't dropped or anything), so I confirmed that I could return it if anything was amiss. All good, so I got it home last night. Haven't put it together yet since it was already getting dark, but I pulled it out and checked to make sure everything is there. Looks good so far.
Did I mention I have little to no idea what I'm doing?
I already have a ginormous grill, with both gas and charcoal, a firebox and a sear-burner. It's about 80" long. But, I've hardly used it since it was given to us five years ago, and even then it was mostly the gas side I used. Now, it's been rusting out and I just don't want to mess with it. I recently started wanting to learn how to cook outside and looking around online, and it seems the WSM is the way to go. I also like the much smaller footprint.
So anyway, sorry for the long introduction. Looking forward to learning how to use this thing.
Thanks,
Jason
I've been lurking here for a month or two, trying to decide if I wanted to get one of these, and if so, which size. Went through the whole "18.5 or 22.5" debate, going back and forth for weeks. I ended up thinking the 18.5" was the way to go for me.
Lots of people say get the 22.5" since you'll always have the extra space. But I realized that this is mostly for full-sized racks of ribs and/or large briskets - neither of which I plan to cook very often. One complaint I heard several times was the inconvenience and additional charcoal from having to fire up the larger smoker. I even saw plenty of people who had the 22.5" saying they often wish they had the 18.5". So, all this had me leaning toward the 18.5".
So, I've been looking locally at the usual suspects: Home Depot, Lowe's, Wal-Mart, Academy, etc. The ones that had the 18.5" had it priced at the standard $299.
For the past 4-5 weeks, I've checked my closest Wal-Mart almost every week hoping it would be on sale (end of season), but almost every week they've had the same single beat-up boxed 18.5", at $299.
Went again last night, same beat-up box, same $299 price tag. But then I noticed on the side, facing the inside of the rack, was another price tag. A red one. For $199. In fact, it turns out the clearance price tag has probably been there the whole time. I just never saw it.
Woo hoo! $100 off! Yeah, the box was beat-up (the clerk said the box got wet, but it wasn't dropped or anything), so I confirmed that I could return it if anything was amiss. All good, so I got it home last night. Haven't put it together yet since it was already getting dark, but I pulled it out and checked to make sure everything is there. Looks good so far.
Did I mention I have little to no idea what I'm doing?
I already have a ginormous grill, with both gas and charcoal, a firebox and a sear-burner. It's about 80" long. But, I've hardly used it since it was given to us five years ago, and even then it was mostly the gas side I used. Now, it's been rusting out and I just don't want to mess with it. I recently started wanting to learn how to cook outside and looking around online, and it seems the WSM is the way to go. I also like the much smaller footprint.
So anyway, sorry for the long introduction. Looking forward to learning how to use this thing.
Thanks,
Jason
And it's actually quite a nice one at that.
,
