How to flush ashes from bowl ?

[anonymouslemming]

Hi all,

In preparation for my Smokenator hopefully arriving this week, I'm reading a fair bit on here. One bit of advice I see is to sweep ashes from the bowl at around the 4 hour mark. How would I go about doing this ?

I have a Weber one touch gold 57cm kettle. I can use the bottom vent control to sweep the blades back and forth, but this kicks ash up into the air. Am I supposed to remove the meat while doing this to keep it ash free ?

I'm sure I'll have many more questions as I live in the UK, and we don't quite have the range of coals and woods that some other places do

[ncsmoker]

Hi lemming and welcome to the Forum. I also have the OTG. Go ahead and use the vent control just sweep the ash slowly and they won't get up to the meat. Since the ash is all in one place under the SN it only takes 4 or 5 sweeps to get rid of them, then reset the vent where it was and load reload the SN. This is when you reload coals for long smokes for pork butts and brisket. Don't worry about the 4 hour time frame in real cold weather with the vents open you may need to reload and sweep the ash at 3 hours in warmer weather with vents closed more you may be able to go 5 hours. You'll learn by experience. Try different charcoal briquets till you find one your happy with, don't use lump as the various sizes of it doesn't allow the SN to burn it evenly.

Hope you enjoy your SN as much as I enjoy mine with my OTG. Happy smoking!

Tom

[1luckytexan]

I've noticed the 'final setting' after sweeping needs to be from left-to-right if you are using a mostly closed position. I think most people run with the lower vent wide open so, that advice would be unnecessary. But I noticed it is possible for the vent(s) to be partially covered by left-over debris if your last move is r-to-l . I use a partly closed position because I feel it helps reduce effects from wind. I might change my mind though as i am also new to the SN.

I like to use Stubbs charcoal briquets when I can get it.

[anonymouslemming]

Thanks loads all. Can't wait to try it this weekend.

[anonymouslemming]

Jan 18, 2015 18:29:41 GMT -5 ncsmoker said:

Hope you enjoy your SN as much as I enjoy mine with my OTG. Happy smoking!

It arrived today, so I think I'm going to test it with some chicken thighs on Friday