Has anyone experimented with a solid puck cut from a board with a hole saw.
Not that I recall. There have been several people who have made pucks out of sawdust, although I don't know if the effort would be worth the cost savings.
For my personal cost saving move, I transformed my Bradley into a pellet smoker a few years ago when the pucks were in short supply and I learned about the A-MAZE-N pellet tube. A $20 bag of pellets lasts me well over a year.
As TedEbear stated there are posts where some members have made there own out of sawdust. That process looks labor intensive.
There have been a few posts where members have tried solid wood pucks, some even have tried drilling several holes into each puck to help the smoking process. With a 125w burner they didn't have much success.
I tried a solid oak puck last year and it never got hot enough to actually smoke before it got pushed into the water pan. I placed it on the puck heating element and it got really hot, but never started to smoke, even after 30 - 40 minutes. So it was a fail for me.
I created a solid oak puck with a circular outcut drill attachment. I put it on top of a bisquesquette. The smoke was not as heavy, but did last for 3-5 hours. The outcome was OK...
Hi nakshinam;
Welcome to the forum.