weber modifications

[Mark George]

Also, there is a place on the Weber website that can assist you in finding a dealer: Weber dealers

Get a list of places, then call around. I'd bet you will have a WSM by sundown!

George

 

[Kevin Taylor]

Hey Roy!!

Good to see you are still around!

As Chris mentioned..LOL is internet speak for laughing. Don't get me wrong..I wasn't laughing at you, just thought it was humorous that all these posts had come in and we hadn't heard back from you.

I could just picture you being totally overwhelmed by the responses and sitting there with your head spinning. Weird humor maybe?? LOL

As to buying them, why not your local ACE or TrueValue dealer. They carry them and will gladly get one shipped in for you.....at least around here they do.

Good Luck whatever way you go!

 

[Guest]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Rocky:
[qb]Wow!! That sounds great. You should take some pictures of that baby. Post them on my msn site if you need a place to point your links to.[/qb] <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

The Globe Cafe "Paella Pan" arrived. Found a distributor that sells it for $31. It is absolutely perfect for what I wanted.

You can see a couple of small pictures on these pages:
http://www.renewableenergy.on.ca/bbq/globe.html
http://www.grandhall.com/glbaccess.html

It's a very heavy casting -- typical Taiwanese cast iron, a little crude but functional. It has a pretty thick coating of semi-gloss porcelein enamel.

The outer diameter is exactly 21.5 inches so it replaces the cooking grate on a Weber kettle with a perfect fit.

The inside recessed area measures 17.5 inches wide by 7/8 inches deep with rounded corners. My 16 inch pizza stone fits perfectly and ends up dead flush with the top of the paella pan. Looks like somebody actually engineered it that way!

I put the water pan/drip pan on top of the pizza stone -- my 18 inch x 2 inch pan works fine. If somebody didn't want the pizza stone, the 17 inch version of the cake pan should drop right into the recess on this cast iron disc and be held solidly in pace.

The outer circumference of the casting has sixteen oval slots -- each about 3/4 inch wide by 2 inches long -- that should be just about right for a adequate flow of heat from the fire chamber of the kettle up to the cooking section. It should reduce the airflow somewhat relative to the cooking grate I was using. That should be OK -- I was able to hold temps above 400 degrees and was running the bottom vents mostly closed to hold 225 degrees. So a little less airflow should be beneficial.

The handles are functional, so it's pretty easy to lift the whole thing off for fire-tending.

It makes for a very slick set-up. My "thermal barrier" between the fire and the cooking chamber is now 1/16th inch of solid cast iron plus 7/8th inch of ceramic stone, plus up to two gallons of (optional) water in a layer 2 inches deep.

I shot a half roll of film this afternoon, but the light wasn't ideal (hey, what do expect from New England in November)! I'll try to finish the roll on the next sunny day and post some photos of this contraption.

 

[Guest]

Yippee.

I tried the new cast iron thermal barrier tonight. Cast iron disk, ceramic stone, no water.

Did a four-pound boneless lamb roast, so I was looking of high-heat roasting -- the one area I wasn't sure this cast iron thermal barrier would allow enough airflow to achieve.

I started with small fire (about a chimney full) and the temp topped out in the 350 degree range with full vents and would go no higher. To see if it would actually go higher, after 45 minutes, I added a bunch of charcoal and gave it 15 minutes of gas flame with the cooker open to ignite the whole pile.

No Minion method -- just got a big 'ol roaring fire going, now with probably the equivalent of half a WSM ring of charcoal.

Put the lamb roast on, opened the top vents all the way and cranked opened the bottom vents. The temperature climbed steadily. After 30 minutes, it had hit 380 and was still inching upwards a degree or two every few minutes. I throttled back the bottom vents to about 50% and she settled in to a rock steady 350 degree temperature. Just cracking the vents would start a slow rise, just shutting them a bit would start a slow fall.

Cooked the lamb 'til the thermometer read an internal temp of 145 degrees (about 2-hours, counting the screwin' around with the fire in the middle) and it was probably the best lamb I've ever eaten. Nice dark brown crust, but not a hint of black char. The center was cooked through but still a little pink. I'd call it a perfect medium.

After I pulled the lamb off, I figured I would test out the low-temp operation. My big roaring fire had been burning for about one hour at this point and was holding a steady 350 with half vents. So I shut all the vents (top and bottom) for 15 minutes. This dropped the temps pretty rapidly. When it hit 250 degrees, I opened the top vents back up and left the bottom vents full closed. Over the course of the next hour, the temps slowly inched down from 250 to 230 degrees.

Opening the vents halfway started a slow rise back up to 250 over the course of half an hour. This thing is very responsive to vent settings.

I split the difference on the bottom vents and, with 25% vents, the cooker has stabilized at 240 degrees at the top grate.

Looks like a winner. With no water and a big fire, I'm able to stabilize from 230 to above 375 degrees at the top grate, just with the bottom vents. Once it's stabilized, the temperature just tends to inch ever so slowly up or down with each vent adjustment. Very cool.

Throughout all this testing, I'm seeing the same 10 degree drop from the top grate to the middle grate that I've seen before.

My wife brought home a big cyropak of baby backs from Sam's Club this afternoon -- looks like three slabs. So I'll be doing a nice 5 hour cook tomorrow. Rather than the Minion method, I think I'll do a big ol' fire again with all the coals glowing red. I'll get the thing stabilized at 250, put the ribs on, and set the vents so it's just drifting down. When it hits 220, I'll crack the vents and let it inch back up to 250. That should give me a good feel for the vent control for low temps with a good sized fire and see what kind of temp swings I see over time.

One thing is for sure: the amount of airflow between the fire chamber and the cooking chamber definitely affects the behavior of the cooker. There is no way in heck I could have stabilized the temps below 300 with the size fire I had tonight without the reduced airflow of the cast iron fire block.

 

[Guest]

Sorry for the late post on this, but I cannot believe what I read....

I've lurked and learned over the past several months. Thanks to all among you.

Now I am reading of a 1/16" thermal barrier??? With a pizza stone? That's as thin as. or thinner that the provided waterpan, or the two gallon pan I'd salvaged from my 10 /yo CharBroil water smoker.

I love the notion of a ceramic barrier (above the boiling point of water) - I was even among those who thought that 2 inches of mason's sand in a water pan was a good idea before being persuaded that it all might be poison....

When I read through this thread, I thought of a manhole cover - a bit much, admittedly, but any decent metal fabricator ought to be able to provide a disk - 3/8" to 1/2" (or more) of steel to be installed as a heat sink for the WSM. Not left alone, but with water pan over, dry, to catch the drips,