Makin' Bacon

[GrahamB]

Guy, how about using the lightweight one as a cold smoker. Build a firebox external to the cabinet and connect it with a piece of flue pipe? After all your work, it has to be good for something.

[pa_friendly_guy]

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM,,,,,,,,,,,,That is an Idea Graham, I never thought of that. I had planned and designed one of those for below the stone wall out back befor I decided to go with the file cabinet design. There is a bank where they took out some stone for the road years ago, I thought I could go down to the bottom of the bank they left and build a fire place and pipe it up to the top of the bank into a Ref. Maybe the file cabinet would work for that purpose. I think I would need to build a roof over it because it is light weight metal and I think it would rust out quickly. Maybe I should get the new cabinet and see how hard it will be to make a smoker out of it. I can't really see myself using more than one smoker. I have gotten along all these yours with out one you know. I don't think 2 will be needed for a long time yet. Of Course you never know, once I have one I my want to smoke everything. Matt seems to really love the taste of the stuff that comes out of his smoker, we will have to wait and see,

[matt walker]

It's true Guy, you'll be smoking everything your wife lets out of the kitchen. I think it's wise to go with the metal roller cabinet. After redoing my stoves over and over in the name of "experimentation", (read Learning Experience) I've found that it's a bit of a blessing to get a chance to redo it. You'll know how the cuts should be, the best way to do it, and you'll get a better finished design with less work. I love this project, and can't wait to see it smoking.

[pa_friendly_guy]

It has been awhile since I posted here on this thread. My youngest son got Married in Dec, then we had Christmas, Then New Years, then a 2nd Christmas with other family members. The smoker has been on the very back burner you might say. As you all know I had the smoker unit I was working on just about done, but I was worried about the nylon rollers in the file cabinet. I was able to get a new older file cabinet that is a much heavier unit, has 5 drawers instead of 4 and most importantly has metal rollers on the drawers. I got it for free on Freecycle. It was owned by the State Fish Commission, one of their officers had it and got a new one I am guessing. They told him to haul this old one to the dump, instead of that he posted it on Freecycle and I was able to get it. Win, Win, he did not have to load it and haul it away, and I got just what I needed for my project. Their Granddaughter apparently liked stickers, as you can see from the pictures.





The Fish Warden must have liked stickers as well.



I love the new unit, it is just what I was looking for, its old and heavy metal, it has nice sized drawers, and it has metal rollers, I love it.



Now I will have to start all over again making holes in the drawer bottoms and cutting in vents top and bottom, but I definitely think it will be worth it when it is finished. It may not be done until spring , cold out and other things seem more pressing at this point. I will keep you posted about any progress, but don't hold your breath.

[Jenny-the-Bear (grr)]

Now it's my turn to drool. What great info, on the Buckboard bacon. And the metal file cabinet smokers, that's just too cool. Now I want to make one. You know, if you need to smoke large amounts of meat at one time, or often have cuts too big for the regular file cabinet, there are bigger ones. This one in the photo might not be all metal, but I've seen older, all metal ones before, in various offices.


Probably something you might be able to get when a business closes down or remodels. Seems like I've seen big file cabinets like that in school offices, and government offices.