In order to get and maintain a 225 temp on the indirect grate side, what are the approximately damper positions and how much charcoal do you use to reach that temp?
-
-
Welcome to The Pit Mickey. Someone will be along shortly who can help with your PK.
-
Not sure which grill you have but for the 360 I close the bottom air intake vent on the indirect side and open the vent above it. Build fire in other end, chimney full of B&B briquettes or lump. Open the air intake under the fire and throttle it there. Close the exhaust over the fire and let all the smoke/heat exit out the indirect side.
I leave the exhaust vent over the indirect side open and throttle for temperature with the intake air.Comment
-
There's no right answer - you'll have to experiment and actively manage your cook to get the result you want. But here is how I do it on my original PK.- You've probably already seen this. If not, check out the manufacturer recommendations for indirect cooking near the bottom of this page. https://www.pkgrills.com/the-pk-gril...lassic-silver/
- I keep the bottom vent under the fire wide open the whole time and only use the top vent to control temp.
- When starting things up, I keep both top vents open and overshoot my target temp by a bit, then close the fire-side vent and start limiting the indirect side to bring the temp down. By overshooting a bit, I make sure the capsule is nice and hot and that I'm not rushing to get the food on before the grill is hot. The capsule can be a heat sink that makes things hard if you rush it. Once it's hot, it's got great thermal inertia and really helps you out.
- As far as the amount of charcoal, that has to be split into 2 things:
- The amount of total charcoal is not about temperature, it's about duration of the cook. I've tried a few different charcoal basket options, but ditched them in favor of just piling the charcoal and wood chunks right on the grate. And I usually just fill up the end of the grill to about 1/4 to 1/3 of the length. That's enough for an all-day cook, and if I don't need that much I just close up all the vents when I'm done and leave it for next time. Much easier than trying to exactly predict how much I'll need or add more during the cook.
- The amount of charcoal you light at the start controls how hot you get and how fast you get there. I usually start 6-8 briquettes (or the equivalent amount of lump) in a chimney and dump that into the corner and let it light the rest, controlling with the vents as above.
- I love cooking on my sidebox stickburner, but for smaller cooks the PK is so easy and efficient I still use it a lot. And I don't hold back on the amount of wood I add to the PK. Instead of all charcoal plus a few wood chips, I might have a third or more wood in there.
Comment
Comment