Smokers, Grills, Pitts & More > Stick Burner & Trailer Smokers & Grills

Stick burners = cooking over flaming wood?

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Spicy Mike:
Here's a question. During the process of burning wood down to embers, the smoke emitted from the flaming wood is acrid and full of unfriendly gasses right? It's with this understanding that when I Barbeque I've got a separate fire barrel going which I use to dig the embers out of and trasfer to the drum. So if this is true, how do you guys use your stick burners? I understand burning a big fire down to a hot bed of coals, then loading in the meat but what then? Do you continue to add wood to coals to refuel it or do you have a separate fire going to dig the embers out? I can't see this working in a parking lot at competition.
Sorry if this is a dumb question but I don't think cooking over flaming wood is safe.

Mike (AZBarbeque):
I use Lump Charcoal to get to my bed of embers, then I just us strictly wood for the rest of the cook.  The key is to have good air flow.  You don't want the smoke hanging around too long.

bearbonez:
My pit is gas assist...essentially a weed burner built into the fire box. I just put in 4-5 split logs, get it burning good with the gas assist. Shut off the gas and add a log as needed to keep the temps where they need to be. My pit has plenty of airspace, but more importantly, the exhaust is always wide open.

kckid5az:
I just use wood and nothing else...it takes about an hour to be ready for meat, then add 1 log at a time as needed.

azkitch:
I've had the same thought processes on this subject myself. I've gotten the impression that the volume of fresh, or raw, wood in relation to the size of the fire is what's important. Little chunks, like plain ol' rubber ball size, in a UDS or small cheapie offset--like my Brinkmann S'n'P, don't seem to produce the thick white smoke so bad. If one has a large smoker, like the DPs, with a fairly large "oven", or cooking chamber, and a similarly large firebox, then a split isn't so big compared to the "furnace". At least, that's how I've wound up wrapping my head around this conundrum.

The other thing I've seen on a Q post somewhere, is that flaming logs are preferable to smoldering logs. Those larger offsets/pits can support flaming better. I keep thinking about trying out my Brinkmann with a flaming fire of logs, to see what the temperature does. Now that I have 3 thermometers, and extra wood in the form of oak and mesquite that I likely won't use as flavor wood, I may just try that.

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