Yesterday I had 40 ABT's in the smoker when I noticed a HUGE amount of smoke coming out of the Bradley. The door thermometer was at 350 degrees. I figured the the bacon grease might be on fire. I cautiously opened the door and a fire began. I closed the door immediately and the fire stopped because of lack of oxygen. I immediately unplugged the Bradley and let it cool down. About 5 minutes later it was cool enough to open with out the fire starting again.
Here is what I think happened. I bought some bacon that was on sale. When wrapping it I noticed that it was a regular cut and not a thin cut. It was probably the fattest bacon that I have seen. I put them in the smoker when they were cold. The heater was on continually because of the cold ABT's. An immense amount of fat was melting and landing on the V tray right above where the heater is. Because the heater was on continuously the V tray was extremely hot causing the fat to smolder. When I opened the door the fire began due to increased oxygen.
Next time I will use thin cut bacon with less fat and I will allow the ABT's to come up to room temperature before putting them in the smoker.
The smoker appears to have no damage but I will open up the back to check the insulation and wiring.
Brad
You may want to wipe down the inside of the tower in case any of the burned fat got onto the walls. It may cause a rather nasty taste to other foods. I would not make it shiny new clean but at least wipe it off some.
Brad
Good catch and thinking!
Just a thought... If you are ever concerned that something will drip too much fat what you can do is put a tin foil roaster on the bottom rack, about the size of the item your smoking, to catch the fat drippings before it lands on the V-pan. I guess you could also make one out of tin foil as well.
I have never found the need to do this even when I have 2 or 3 butts in and some of the time my V-pan has a ton of goo on it when I'm done. I do completely clean my V-pan after every smoke for that reason though.
Mike
Brad
Sounds like it could have been alot worse, wonder why the temp ramped up so high?
C
Sorry to hear about the Bradley catching fire, glad you were able to extinguish it.
This is a good time to post this link: Is there any fire hazardous using this smoker, and how do I prevent it? (http://www.susanminor.org/forums/showpost.php?p=759&postcount=2)
Pensrock,
I will thoroughly clean and reseason it. I ran it today with nothing in it and it did not smell good.
Westexasmokerer,
I checked everything out including the high temperature cut off and it is working as it should. I firmly believe that the temperature gain was a result of opening the door about 4 times and each time a fire flared up for about 2 seconds until I closed the door and shut off th oxygen input.
I think everything will be OK.
I have learned from this and I hope others can also.
Brad
Glad to hear that you caught this in time. I turned my back on some dinosaur bones that I had transferred from the smoker to the grill. Took awhile for that one to burn off.