BBQ and the Works

I love instructables and whenever I get an email from them there is always 1 or 2 cool projects in it that really interest me in some way.  Well today’s email didn’t disappoint and had a nice writeup on someone’s terracotta smoker.

http://www.instructables.com/id/DIY-Smoker/

I previously had attempted this myself but the hot plate I picked up didn’t work very well.  It only got up to about 190 so things would take forever.  I then attempted a charcoal version based off something else I had seen but that didn’t work that well and while trying to figure out the right amount of air to allow in I cracked one of the 2 pots.

Though I may be attempting something like this again.  Recently we were cleaning out my wife’s grandparents house and I found a portable electric grill.  The burner on it was significantly bigger then my previous one.  I went ahead and tested it out and I turned it off after the inside got to 250 degrees.  So now having a proper heating element, I now have to pick up an Arduino so I can then monitor the temp and turn the burner on and off as needed to keep the temp I want.

Hopefully this summer will be the time I can jump back on that project.  Will be quite fun and a good warm up for the metal smoker in the future.