Bradley smoker pre heat

[bologna man]

I have seen several topics contain some talk of pre heating, maintaining heat during smoking, and opening the door to take a peek at the smoking process or to coat the product inside. I have come up with a way to help with this problem that works well for me. What I do is take a few thin fire bricks,(I cut mine to cover the bottom) heat these in my conventional oven to a temp that is about 150 degrees hotter than my smoke temp, (you have to test this for your self and vary temps) then put these brick in the bottom of thee smoker and close the door and turn the unit on. In no time the unit is up to temp and ready to go I leave these brick in, this helps when you have to open the door, the bricks having a lot more mass to contain heat. Maybe you guys might want to give this a try it works for me. One other benefit is if you get moisture collecting in the bottom the brick helps to absorb some of it. one other thing I got a lower catch pan to put under the puck heater to catch used pucks.
Rod

Rod

[MallardWacker]

Rod,

I too have heard discussions on having some mass that will store heat, even on the other Q forums.  When you say fire brick are you refering to the brick that they make the insides of a fireplace out of?  Do wrap them, do you think they might give off anything while heating up?  I wonder if anyone has tried something like large pieces of clean metal, ie. cast iron.

SmokeOn,

mski
Perryville, Arkansas
Wooo-Pig-Soooie

If a man says he knows anything at all, he knows nothing what he aught to know.  But...

[BigRed]

Fellow Smokers!

I realize that EVERYONE has their own favorite technique but am I missing something? Does it make any difference regarding preheating since most of the time "low and slow" are the principles we follow?
I have not been doing the BS as long as the majority of you but preheating has never been an issue. I know where 220 degrees is ( when my heat control is working and not being replaced) load the briskettes in the tower throw in my meat and com back 8 to 12 hrs. later depending on what I am smoking/cooking. To me that is the benefit of a BS.

BigRED

[MallardWacker]

BigR,

I am kind of like you.  Leave the "BS alone and let it do it's thing", but it seems that there is so much talk about baisting, mopping and so forth that most folks think they need to do this.  Some of the directions go as far as every 20 minutes to baist.  With the BS there is no way to do that(IMO).  However on Rod's side I do find my self, especially with ribs, finding myself looking at the product toward the end of the smoke or if if have other things in the smoker that take much less cooking time in the same batch as the meat, I tend to look at them.  Thus the discussion on loosing heat.  I am for preheating, this makes the task of bringing up the cooking temp quickly and more steady when I reach my desired temp.  The thing with heat mass that it would be of a stability factor more than anything if you had to do something with the product(s) when you are in the cooking process this would allow you a little more grace in opening the door and not effect the cooking time so much.  Typically I DON'T EVEN THINK of opening the door, realy only once about half way through.

SmokeOn,

mski
Perryville, Arkansas
Wooo-Pig-Soooie

If a man says he knows anything at all, he knows nothing what he aught to know.  But...

[BigRed]

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by MallardWacker</i>
<br />BigR,

I am kind of like you.  Leave the "BS alone and let it do it's thing", but it seems that there is so much talk about baisting, mopping and so forth that most folks think they need to do this.  Some of the directions go as far as every 20 minutes to baist.  With the BS there is no way to do that(IMO).  However on Rod's side I do find my self, especially with ribs, finding myself looking at the product toward the end of the smoke or if if have other things in the smoker that take much less cooking time in the same batch as the meat I tend to look at them.  Thus the discussion on loosing heat.  I am for preheating, this makes the task of bring up the cooking temp quickly and more steady when I reach my desired temp.  The thing with heat mass that it would be of a stability factor more than anything if you had to do something with the product(s) when you are in the cooking process this would allow you a little more grace in opening the door and not effect the cooking time so much.  Typically I DON'T EVEN THINK of opening the door, realy only once about half way through.

SmokeOn,

mski
Perryville, Arkansas
Wooo-Pig-Soooie

If a man says he knows anything at all, he knows nothing what he aught to know.  But...


<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Mallard!
I agree with preheating issue and the opening the door as necessary but I have usually only cook one thing at a time. I need to try and smoke more than one meat product at a time. Just have not built the courage to go for more than two. I do want to try smoking meat loaf.
Thank the Lord we all have different ways of getting to the same end result. Thanks for the info.



BigRED

[BigSmoker]

BigRed,
I smoked a ground buffalo meatloaf on my ceramic cooker.  Since it was in a glass breadpan it did not take on a lot of smoke flavor.[:(]  Let us know if you do this.  I would like to see if the smokey flavor will absorb better in the Bradley.

Jeff
www.bbqshopping.com
Some say BBQ is in your blood, if thats true my blood must be BBQ sauce.

[bologna man]

The reason I said about the pre heat with bricks is that after you have heated the Bradley to temp and open the door to load there goes your heat. With the bricks at about 150 Degrees hotter (the reason for the hotter temp at first is to heat the smoker up and when temps equilize between brick and interior temp you are at your desired temp. This hotter temp was obtained by trial and error over several cooks) than cook temp as soon as you close the door the heat returns quicker and thus you can get a better hand on cook time especially in colder weather. I know low and slow is the thing but the brick idea does not effect the low slow idea but instead evens the temps out. I have done this brick thing on the last 20 smokes and it has been a benefit in keeping the temps in the smoker more constant. I use a time and temp recorder from an old industrial furnace to check temps over a period of time and with bricks the temp swing is not as big and recovery time after open door is 3 times faster.
Rod


Rod