# Tour of my design and cooking rig build



## bbally (Feb 5, 2010)

Don't know if I ever posted the rig, when the MIL got sick things kind of went nuts. I have cooked on her a lot now. I am ready to contest with her.



With the smoker trailer back from powder coat I thought I would give a little *tour* of the unit. Even though it still has some work to be finished, the end is nearing on this 7 month project. And I wanted to show some of the close up thought that went into the unit and its trailer.


First the smoker unit is powder coated black with the new 1600 F coat. 
This unit will not peel its coating unless I use Liquid Oxygen again, which I have not done since the barbeque race at 29 Palms. Which I won! (another story)








She is really built well, a reverse flow design with a 4 degree induced draft 
angle to be sure with get draft. I had to induce draft with a built in 
angle as I intended to go across the trailer so the tongue could not be used to lift or lower for draft inducement. And I like my beer level, so I am not tilting my rig!
















She has a large side and a small side, both with expanded metal slide out 
racks. The expanded metal also makes up all the space inside between the racks so a full pig or two can cook in there. The reverse flow heating 
element is a piece of 22 gauge steel, arc at 8 foot radius and stitch welded with a grease trap at the firebox end to prevent grease flare.









She sits nicely in an angle iron trap. Bolted for security to the angle 
which is welded to the trailer. The cooker carries a wood rack under the 
smoke chamber, and we used expanded metal to create a charcoal storage area under that. The firebox also sports a rack shelf under it for my gloves and strikers.


You can see the mount hole for storage of the weed burner starter welded to the trailer floor. The half inch nipple is for the valve and propane 
supply to the weed burner. The upright half inch pipe goes to a propane 
lantern for light without all the racket of a genset. 







Here you can see how the expanded metal traps the charcoal for transport. 
The rings are for the two propane bottles. The one inch steel line coming 
up is for the house propane regulator to deliver the flow of fuel for the 
lanterns and heaters and stoves.























The armadillo is waiting to open long necks! 

Continued::::::::


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## bbally (Feb 5, 2010)

*Tour of the Rig Continued*







The rack goes all the way around the firebox. Lots of things can be 
stored under there. Mostly my welding gloves for handling stuff that is 
hot.









This shows off her twin 55K btu commercial propane two eye range. I 
love appliances! And she has got a nice set! As I expect her to 
have!









Her deck is completed powder coated in the metallic gray as is her underside.









I put a set of Dutch Oven stacks on her, these are able to handle three 16 
inch lodge ovens in each stack. The door allows ash to be cleaned out. 
There is a 1.5 inch air insulation area between the trailer floor and the base for the charcoals. The hollow spot is for the lights. I have not 
wired it yet.












I doubled up on the Dutch Oven stacks, the jacks take her off the axles for 
functions. And the ramp allows my food to roll on board. But more 
important she is wide enough on the deck to haul two Harley Heritage Soft Tail Classics anywhere we go!









I am very happy with the project so far. I wish it would go faster, but 
correct is more important than fast!









View of her counter weight system.









Her ramp slides in and jacks fold up. She is ready to roll on to the 
next party!


I sure enjoyed designing and building her, Hope you enjoyed the *tour*


'til we talk again, really get a little done every weekend on the project and 
it will come to fruition!


Chef Bob Ballantyne


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## JamesS (Feb 5, 2010)

Beyond spiffy! That's quite a rig.


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## Mama (Feb 5, 2010)

WOW!  I'm impressed!


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## FrankZ (Feb 5, 2010)

Amazing.. simply amazing...


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## wanna be (Feb 5, 2010)

*Thats Awesome!!*

You have obviously spent alot of time,thought and money on this project and it seems to be paying off for you.You may have stated the gage of the metal you were useing for the body of the smoker and I didd'nt catch it.Is it heavy plate steele?I have also never seen the dutch oven cookers you have. Can you take the bottom pot out without takeing the top two out first?I have never been to a BBQ cooking contest but it looks like something I would really enjoy.I posted something a while back about pimping my BBQ and you are the guy I would really like to get some advice from.I really liked the tour.How about some picks of the inside? you described some pretty cool ideas.


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## bbally (Feb 5, 2010)

Ok you asked... this is a small one I designed.  This is for my deck.  I do fully engineer the units.  So the reverse flow is designed to efficiently transfer the Infrared from the gas stream to the metal heat plate.

Had some metal sitting around and decided to design out another reverse flow. Unlike my trailer mounted rig I scaled this one way down for everyday use.








The inside of the roll back plate is the important part to me. It must go past any door or hatch opening to remove the infrared energy correctly. This plate sets the difference between even heat and hot spots.







The angle iron sitting inside will be the shelf once the expanded metal is tacked onto it.







The firebox can be loaded from the top or the side, the side is set up with a flip panel haved to remove ashes easily. The shovel is shaped to the radius of the firebox for a one pul removal of debris.







She is starting to look like a cooker. Just using weld chipping hammer handles. They are so cheap to purchase as harbor freight that making you own is a waste of time.






The large rectangular stack does several functions, being the exhaust stack is its main job, but on the back it has a door and there are three dowel hangers in it so I have hang come bacon, rounds or links in there for a family size cold smoke of some cured meats.

This is one of four being built. Then I will take them down to powder coat. My boss and a couple employees are each getting one of the units along with mine. All the pipe is scrap from the pipeline work we do during the spring, summer, and fall. Winter we do get to play a little.

I will add more pictures as it gets better looking.

Chef Bob Ballantyne


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## Uncle Bob (Feb 6, 2010)

Great work!!!


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## vagriller (Feb 6, 2010)

Bob,
Do you sell these too, or just build them for your own use? Looks like a lot of fun to build and use!


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## bbally (Feb 6, 2010)

vagriller said:


> Bob,
> Do you sell these too, or just build them for your own use? Looks like a lot of fun to build and use!


 
I have built 8 to date.  This is the best so far.  I don't sell them, except when I am done with the old one I will sell it to someone to recoup a little of the money tied up in the unit to build the next unit.

This one is about $22K as it sits now.  With the Harley Softtail Crossbones up on it the value goes up another 24K.

 They are so expensive to make that I never really got into the commercial side of it.  And there are plenty of good builders out there (Klose pits) that do it for a living.


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## sear (Feb 20, 2010)

thats friggin awesome
im in the market for my first smoker, something smaller tho
i need to get a welder and start learning too ... your rig came out real nice


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