Any Info on Used New Braunfels Smoker

[DATsBBQ]

Brown bear, black bear, cinnamon bear.... all the same, the North American Black Bear.

[mydogsowner]

That's a real problem you got there. I don't know what I would do if I saw a bear coming down the road like that.

What can you do legally to deal with it?

[BluDawg]

BluDawg: When you mentioned bears before, I thought you were just kiddin'. YIKES. What kind of bears have you got around you????

The only bears around here are in the zoo or skinny dippin in the stock tank Now Hogs that is a whole nother story.

[magnus392]

Well I did the mods...and I am undecided about the results. The temps seems to hold more evenly, but the firebox will flare instantly now. I am running a mix of Mesquite and Oak for my smoke.

[mydogsowner]

Which mods specifically? I am wondering why the firebox is doing that? When you say flares instantly, do you mean the wood/coals burn quickly, or something else?

I need to sand blast the rust off mine and repaint it. I ordered the blaster and am waiting for it to arrive. Then I was going to do a few cooks, then looking into modding it.

So I am very interested in your results.

[magnus392]

I'm not sure...I rescued it from the side of the road:D By flare I mean I rotated on a new batch of leg quarters then checked the firebox and when I did I lost most of the hair on my right arm! That has never happened with this thing before...

[n2dabluebbq]

hmm just from a standpoint of fire normally behaves, it seems that maybe it is being starved and when you open the door, you are letting it breath and therefore getting the "flash" fire.
question, did you make/use a charcoal basket? after years of cooking with wood only on mine, i went ahead and went with the charcoal basket. i use it coupled with smaller sticks/chunks of wood. have not had a problem with temp spikes or continuous monitoring since.

[magnus392]

Well, after employing some google foo I learned what a charcoal basket is and how to use it with a smoker, lol. I learn something every time I come here. I haven't had real trouble with spikes before, and didn't notice temp spikes after the mods on this run. I had previously gotten 4+hours easy, and with the new mods I upped that to 6hrs. Heck I didn't even know smoke color mattered... So I am learning all sort of things to look for and work on next time.

[Jarhead]

Get a drop or two from a metal supply co. or welder. I used #9x3/4 flat expanded metal to build mine for the UDS.
Cut the base to fit your firebox, fix up the sides and weld, wire or hog ring them together.
Get at least 4 bolts with double nuts and washers. Long enough to give you air under the charcoal basket, above intake level.
Use the minion method and you should be able to get several hours out of a load.
Look for thin, blue smoke. That is your friend. White is bad.
I have a NB Bandera and it works great on that as well.

[ROACHDADDY]

Looks like a good 'un for 50 bucks"SCORE" not sure of the year but NB was Bought out by Charbroil if it ifs one of the early ones it should have thicker steel then what they are selling now. If this is your first stick burner a word of advice after a cook and things have cooled down clean all the ash out of your Fire box it will last a whole lot longer. Wood ash contains LYE and when it absorbs moisture becomes Highly Corrosive and will rust the fire box out in no time flat. That one looks fairly stock and there are some Mods you can do to really increase the efficiency like; extending the stack on the inside to bring it down to grate level and Adding a baffle at the fire box to move the heat closer to the center of the pit to eliminate the hot spot close to the fire box. good luck and I hope you show us what you can do with it always like seeing pix of great BBQ.

What is the advantage of this?

Curious?

[DATsBBQ]

Heat rises. By lowering the stack to grate level you retain more heat in the cooking chamber. Two advantages that I can think of to this mod.
1. Less fuel usage to maintain any given cooking temp.
2. More even heat distribution.