BPS Bottom Vents

frjeff

New member
Soon to begin putting kit together (drum being sandblasted today).

On the bottom vents: has everyone found them to be a good tight fit (little air escaping in when slider is closed)?

I had a dream last night that mine were letting in way too much air when closed and that I could not get temps down. So, perhaps I ought to place a bit of high temp sealant between the vent and drum.

Any basis to this idea or was it simply a nightmare?
 

jimsbarbecue

Moderator
Staff member
I do have sealer between the vents and the drum and recommend it as it can not hurt. I did get my second Big Poppa Drum second hand, I like to think I adopted it and am giving it a good home. That said: I noticed on mine the vent to drum did not seem as tight as I would like it. ( I am the son of a machinist ). I use Rutland clear 500 degree sealer. I recommend you put the sealer on the vent assembly and then attach to the drum and clean any excess off before it dries. The slider fit is a nice fit as you will notice when viewing from the backside . The issue is not all drums have the same circumference and as little difference as that is it can effect the fit.
 

sheepdad

New member
lol... Jeff, if your mind will be at ease, I say go for it !! I like the feeling of " I guess I didn't have to after all " a whole lot better than " dang, I knew I should have !! #$%^ $%#%^ "
 

Salmonsmoker

New member
As with Jim's kit, the vents weren't the same radius as my drum. I formed them to a slightly tighter radius so they matched the drum. I didn't use a sealant, but that's not a bad idea. I use high temp red silicone (650F)around my cookers. It's food grade.
 

scooter

Moderator
Staff member
I have two BPS Drums and one has tight controls on the vent while the other, the same type that Jim has reacts the same way you're describing Jeff. I've been thinking of using sealant on the vents so I'm glad to see what Jim said about his experiences so will be doing the same as him with the sealant


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk while driving
 

jimsbarbecue

Moderator
Staff member
Sealing the bottom vents

Here is the vents where you can see the sealer.

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This is our new to us drum that these vents are on, I called it the "Sterling Stainless Signature Edition"

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I did add a Guru/Stoker adapter for this test and use in the future. the part used is called a waste nut if anyone
wants to know. They come galvanized and black iron. We have black iron on the inside.

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The lid rocks a little so in part of the test we used clamps to insure it was fitting flat. Later I will fix the lid

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Here is the stoker Graph . Started the drum with less then a full load of charcoal. Light one weber starter cube and then used the Stoker to bring the drum to 225. Our other drum with the Stoker remove and just the 3/4 opening will run between 200-225. So I choose to start there. You can see the first 90 minutes the Stoker keep the temp. I then removed the Stoker and the temp rose only to the point it would level at. Removing the lid clamps had no effect. Then I closed the stoker adapter hole which is a 3/4 port and slid open one of the newly sealed bottom vents to expose one of the 3/4 inch holes. The graph shows that it ran the same as expected. It did not run at these temps before I sealed the vents. Now that is working how I knew it should, we up the temps to 325. I left the one bottom vent at one hole open and reinstalled the stoker and set it for 325. The graph shows every time I open the lid. A little hard to see but the fan show when it is on by the blue line at the bottom.

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All test were run with the top vent wide open. The vent on ours has 1/2 holes vs 3/4. with the 1/2 inch holes wide open is 12.56 and a 3/4 wide open is 18.84. Do not know if it would make a difference just wanted to point that out.

Did sealing the vents make a difference. YES, for the couple of minutes it takes I recommend it 100%. The BP slider is such a cool idea and this makes it work to perfection in our drum. I would seal them just to be on the safe side. To give you a idea before with only one hole uncovered it ran over 300º with the top vent half closed.

One other point as I said the nest was not all the way full like a inch or inch and a half down from the top. It was what was left in the open bag. All new charcoal and the drum cleaned out for the test. The graph shows I started around 8:30 am and snuffed the fire at 5:30. Looking in the drum I could see it was close to being out of charcoal. Half the time at 225 the other at 325. About 9 hours and the green line across the bottom is outside temp which was about 60
 

frjeff

New member
Great post and info jimsbarbecue! Thanks, my bottom vents will be sealed for certain.

Does the Guru give you all of the neat graphing? How cool and good to know.
 

jimsbarbecue

Moderator
Staff member
The graphs. Come from a program called Stokerlog and works with the Stoker. The BBQ Guru with a CyberQ 2 has a program also that has graphs The Stokerlog program is free software that interfaces with the stoker. As you can see in the middle of the cook it was only monitoring temps and using no blower. My future plans is to use it on the drum with the vents being the primary control of the fire on the low end of a temp scale. So if I want to run at 250. I would have the vents (on our drums that's I'd one hole uncovered) and have the blower hooked up to assist only if the temp ran low.
 

sheepdad

New member
Great post Jim, I like to be able to graph a cook like that. I keep a cook diary with times and temps but always seem to forget to log something along the way. I've been thinking about a stoker/guru mod for awhile now but you shed some new light on the subject. Just having the stoker/guru available to kick at a minimum temp would be great for me.
 

scooter

Moderator
Staff member
Jim, I want to add an adapter for my stoker on the SS drum. How does your stoker fit onto that adapter? The adapter from Rock's doesn't look as removable as yours does.

DSC02461-L.jpg
 

jimsbarbecue

Moderator
Staff member
that adapter is from the BBQ Guru folks and Rocks make a adapter that fits the BBQ Guru mounts or you can use 1 1/4 copper sleeve connector to use the regular stoker adapter
 

TCalhoum

New member
Hey every one. I have been drum smoking for a while, but just purchased my first bps kit. I have a stainless drum. My drum circumstance is a lot different from my previous formed bottom vents. I was wondering what you all have used to bend/form the vents before bolting them on?
 

fwidsmoker

New member
3/4" ball valve

Jim, I want to add an adapter for my stoker on the SS drum. How does your stoker fit onto that adapter? The adapter from Rock's doesn't look as removable as yours does.

DSC02461-L.jpg

That's basically what i did but i used a 3/4" ball valve w/ the 3/4" Guru connector. It works out great... i can connect a Party Q i have or the new Pitmaster IQ i'm getting. Great idea Jim.
 

BabelBBQ

New member
Hey every one. I have been drum smoking for a while, but just purchased my first bps kit. I have a stainless drum. My drum circumstance is a lot different from my previous formed bottom vents. I was wondering what you all have used to bend/form the vents before bolting them on?

Did you ever get an answer or figure out a way to improve the fit? Just used my drum for the first time today, results were good, but had a hard time getting low enough temp at the start of the cook, and couldn't completely kill the fire by closing all vents when I was done. So if you have ideas on improving the fit, let me know.
 

BabelBBQ

New member
I took apart the drum a couple of days ago to repaint. I was in a hurry the first time and only did one coat. A few spots were not looking too good. So this was a good chance to add the silicone. I bought some high heat silicone from automotive store.

The BPS install video (which was helpful for the first build) mentions that for the bottom vents you may want to get some help so one person can hold the vent/bolts in place while the other leans into the drum to put on the nuts. I had my seven year old help the first time, but was alone this time. So here how I did this on my own.

I put the bolt in, and using the allen wrench provided with the kit and a cinder block to hold it in place I was able to reach in secure the nut and not have the bolt pop out.


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And the final product...

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I used a silver color on the top, mainly because I wanted to see how it would look. I think I like the all black better, but the lid is easy to repaint. I would consider doing the entire drum in silver too. Almost looks like stainless. It is just rustoleum Ultra which went on easier than the store brand black I used on the lid originally.
 
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