Weber 18-inch Smokey Mountain Cooker, Charcoal Smoker

November 2017 Update:All it takes is one WSM-18 to win a Rib Championship, even caveman pitmaster style when no foil or electricity is allowed. See pics.-----------------------------------------------------------------------My BBQ team Slap Yo Daddy BBQ from Diamond Bar, California, has been competing using these smokers which I bought off Amazon with free Prime shipping. They work flawlessly and are easy to use and clean up. Our WSMs regularly allow us to win Grand Championships even when we go up against other smokers costing over $15,000.The key step once your smoker arrives is to ensure you season it properly. New WSMs will tend to overheat until you are able to get grease and gunk on the inside and around the rim where the lid sits to ensure an air tight seal. The fastest way to season is to do the following: Phase One - cover the water pan completely with aluminum foil and run a full load of lit Kingsford briquettes and let it run as hot as it can with no water in the pan (over 350 degrees) to burn off any manufacturing residue. Clean out the ash and proceed to phase two.Phase Two - fill the charcoal basket 1/2 full of unlit briquettes. Then put in a 1/2 chimney of lit Kingsford briquettes in the middle. This will allow a slow burn for 3-5 hours at 72 degrees outside temperature. Adjust the vents to get 275 degrees on the dome thermometer. Put bacon strips, chicken parts, pork fat, or any other scrap meat you don't plan to eat. The key is to get fatty meats to generate lots of grease. Toss in a couple of tennis-sized wood chunks to generate smoke. Repeat Phase Two at least twice before you cook meat that you want to eat.Phase Three - When you cook meat you plan to eat, take a tip from me and don't use any water in the pan. When I cook, I just cover the water pan with foil top and bottom. I foil it twice so I can remove the second layer after the cook and refoil it. That way, I don't have to clean my pan. It works just as well, AFTER YOU SEASON YOUR WSM, when you cook without water in the pan. Dry heat allows the crust to form faster on the meat (called the bark). Once the crust forms on the meat, you can introduce moisture. I just spray water with a regular spray bottle to encourage bark formation after the initial crusting (Maillard reaction) has begun. To test for properly formed bark, use your finger nail and scrape the meat surface. If the crust has formed, it will not come off when you gently scrape it with your fingernail. If the crust comes off, the bark has not set (still wet) so don't spray until it sets. Let it cook longer and check back in 15 mins. You'll get much better results this way. We've won many awards with this technique.When it comes to cleaning your WSM, never wash the insides. Get a good grill brush and scrape down the insides and dome. You need the "aroma" which takes several years to build up. I NEVER mix my meat WSMs from my seafood and hotdog WSMs. Nothing destroys the aroma faster than cooking fish/seafood/hotdogs in a WSM used to cook chicken, ribs, pork, brisket, and tri tip. That's why you should buy a pair if you plan to cook seafood/fish/hotdogs. Better yet, get a Weber Kettle for those meats. Remember to always empty the ash from the bottom and grease on the foiled water pan to avoid fires and any rancid old oil smell before you cook. When you need to clean the grates, put the grates in a big plastic trash bag, put on gloves, and spray oven cleaner on the grates while in the bag and let sit for 1/2 hour. Hose off the grates. It's as easy as that. To clean the outsides, I use Simple Green spray.Enjoy your WSMs. They are awesome and built to last.--------------------------------------------------------------Updated March 18, 2014 - in response to questions on fire and temp management on the WSM-18, I added a link with more tips [...]OK. A reader notified me that Amazon deleted my link to my bbq team website where I feature easy recipes of the backyard cook.No worries, you can find it if you Google my team name. It's got pics and such. For the words, I cut and pasted the info for you as follows:Fire ControlBefore I describe how to season your new WSM, I want to explain the basics of fire control in a barbecue pit. Regardless of the pit you're using, they all have three major components that you'll need to learn to control to maintain proper cooking temperatures: 1) the air intake, 2) fuel you're using, and 3) the exhaust vent/chimney. I use Kingsford Blue briquettes so my description assumes you use the same fuel. If you use something else, your mileage will vary.I've used KF Blue since I started competing in 2008 and with over two dozen Grand Championships and 80+ first places including a first place USA in chicken in the Kansas City Barbecue Society Team of the Year 2012; I know KF Blue works well. Besides, I buy them on sale in the summer months for half price and stockpile them for my classes and contest year where I use over a hundred 20-lb bags annually. Yes, I do use other types of fuel like lump charcoal and pellets but I like to compete using KF Blue (no, they are not my sponsor) because I can fly into any city in America and drive my rental car to Walmart to pick up one bag of KF Blue and win a Grand Championship.In the WSM, there are three circular intake damper vents at the bottom that can be opened or closed as needed to allow more or less air to enter the pit. More air and the temperature goes up and less air causes the pit temperature to go down. The circular fire steel fire ring holds your charcoal and you can adjust the amount of charcoal depending on how long you need to run the pit.If you run it for chicken (2 hours), you only need to fill the ring about 1/3 way. If you want to cook ribs (6 hours), you will fill it about 2/3 way. If you're cooking brisket and pork butt (> 12 hours), you want to fill it all the way going past the top of the charcoal ring until it is overflowing. Be sure to remove the excess briquettes that have fallen over the side of the charcoal ring. Do a bit of Jenga and create a volcano shaped crater at in the middle of the overflowing mound of charcoal by removing excess briquettes and returning them to the charcoal bag. When you're ready to start cooking, carefully dump a half charcoal chimney of lit briquettes into the crater. Over the next 12-16 hours, the briquettes will burn gradually outwards as the temperature stays constant. I cook my long haul meats at 250F and everything else (chicken, ribs, tri tip, beef ribs, etc) at 275F.If you are using a full overflowing load of briquettes for a 12+ hour cook, the standard deep WSM water pan won't work because it sits too low and will bump up against the top of your briquettes. No worries. Just remove the deep water pan and use the silver aluminum heat shield instead. You need to unsnap the heat shield and wrap it in double layer of aluminum foil and use that ultra-light pan in place of the deep water pan. If you have access to a WSM circa 2008 and earlier, those older WSMs come with a shallow water pan that does not bump into the briquettes. Alternatively, you can go to Home Depot and get yourself a terra cotta planter base that's the same diameter as the WSM water pan. I don't like the terra cotta approach as it's added weight I have to carry when I transport my WSMs which have already accumulated over 100,000 miles of travel all over the US.Of the three components I mentioned: intake, fuel choice and amount, and the exhaust, the most effective component to maintain constant temperature is not the intake nor the fuel. It's the exhaust. Many beginners I come across are not aware of that. All seasoned pitmasters know how to intuitively draft their pit using "clean" smoke to color and flavor their barbecue meats. The draft refers to the vacuum effect when you open or close the exhaust vent of your pit.When you open the exhaust vent on the WSM, you allow hot air to leave the pit and this creates a vacuum suction to draw air in from the bottom intakes. Thus, by skillfully manipulating the top vent, you can control your WSM like a pro. Many beginners constantly fiddle with their intake dampers in hopes to maintain a constant temperature with less success than leaving the bottom vents untouched and fiddling with the top vent to control the draft within their WSM. In future articles, I'll address the mechanics of damper control on the WSM (e.g., old school versus automated blower systems) and the science on dirty smoke, white smoke, clean smoke, blue smoke, sour smoke, etc. For now, just give my technique a try and see if it works for you.Once you have seasoned your WSM using the steps below, follow my technique to light your pit and leave one bottom vent open and the top vent half open. Allow your pit to come slowly up to temp (it may take 30-45 minutes). If the pit starts to over temp, gradually shut down the top vent and it will calm down. New WSMs invariably overheat until after half a dozen cooks so be prepared to cook with top and bottom vents all completely closed in your first few cooks. If you have the top vent completely open and one bottom vent completely open and your pit does not come up in temp, you can open a second bottom vent, followed by a third. Usually when you open the second or third, it means you're out of fuel. You can toss 20 briquettes through the fire door and be careful not to snuff out the fire. If your fire is already out, you have to light your briquettes before you toss them into the WSM.Here's are a couple of tips if you need ramp up temps quickly. You can prop a ½ inch piece of wood to keep the WSM dome lid ajar. Alternatively, you can open the WSM fire door and let air in to crank up the temps. With both of these quick fix approaches, do not leave your WSM unattended as the temps could rise fast and you'll burn your meats.

2021 Update:The smoker finally got stuff growing inside after about 5 years, which made me sad. My final thoughts are The 14 was definitely the right choice for me. It gave food lots of smoke flavor we loved. The only drawback for these things is the monitoring of the heat as with very long overnight cooks the wood/charcoal can get critically low impacting the cook. This is also why the 14 was a good choice as was not heavy with food loaded to remove the top pieces from the pit and add more fuel.That’s really the main drawback with these things, the monitoring part. That’s why I didn’t replace the unit when it failed and bought a Traeger instead Ironwood instead. Still happy though with this purchase and it’s 5 year service life. Great intro to smoking foods.End 2021 Update.First off after reading all the reviews I was convinced to go with the 22inch version and call it a day. That would have been a big mistake - that is the problem with buying products online, you don't get a sense of the product. Fortunately I have a bbq shop near my home that stocks the 22 & I can tell you it is huge (like a New York style round trashcan) and heavy (50-60 pounds?) Looks like more for commercial purposes than home cooking.Once I saw that monstrosity, I realized my choice was between the 18&14 inch size. After much research and measuring, I realized the 18 inch version was too big as well (& must be equally heavy) - the 18 inch seems like the right size for someone who entertains for 40+ people regularly - overkill for someone wanting to invite his family over or cook for his own family. To put it in perspective, you can fit two pork butts on the 14 and 4 butts on the 18 - I recently did one butt and had enough pulled pork for 6 adults and 6 kids, and there were left overs that could have fed at least one more family (2 adults and 2 kids) - this means I can feed 12-16 with one butt and 24-32 with 2 on the 14 - more than enough. There is a reason Weber started making the 14" again - it is perfect for a small gathering.Also, the 14 uses less fuel and will cost less per use in the long run (for example if you smoke 2 butts in the 18 (versus its capacity of 4) u need to use more fuel because of the bigger space to heat up. Remember the unit is engineered/designed for use of Both racks (which makes the 18 more efficient for 4 pork butts versus the 22 for example).Another bonus is the 14 kept the temperature very consistent and did not overheat like some have noticed with the bigger models (must be all that charcoal) Finally the 14 is portable (and used around the world by bbq teams that compete) and easier to clean given its smaller footprint.My 14 had enough room for us to cook a slab of 5 pound brisket bought at our local warehouse club and an entire slab of baby back ribs cut up into 3 parts. The ribs were perfect and moist - the brisket was perfectly smoked and tender. I did this for my family and we could have easily fed another 8 people. Using the minion method of heating coal (in middle area) there is was enough fuel for an overnight cook 13+ hours at 200-210. I couldn't be happier with the 14inch size and am convinced it was the right call as it is efficient and portable. As a bonus cleaning it was easy as well. If you are on the fence, go with the 14" and use the 100 bucks saved on accessories and food. You will thank me as the others are overkill unless you have a business or cook regularly for 40 (18") or 70 people (22"). Happy smoking!

This smoker is absolutely fantastic, bought it a few months ago and just now got to writing the review after using it a couple of times. Only have gotten to smoke chicken and a ton of ribs on it so far and it is a breeze to use. I have been grilling my whole life but just now decided to get into the smoker game hardcore and this thing meets the match. I can fit about 2 good sized baby back ribs on the top grate and 2 on the bottom grate. All come out amazing with excellent smoke flavor and only having to add a few extra pieces of charcoal and wood during a 6 hour smoke. The only thing that I wish it had was side handles on the middle compartment so 2 people can lift up to add a large amount of extra coals, but other than that my only regret is not buying the bigger sized WSM!