BE SAFE !!!
BE SAFE !!!
NEVER,NEVER leave your smoker unattended!!!!! I did. I won't be too long winded here but I put a turkey breast in my smoker,I've been trying different heat and smoke sources and ended up with the base from my turkey deep fryer hooked to a propane tank out side with the hose and regulator that came with it. turned the heat up to 235° put a pan of chips on and went in to hook the new tv up,its x-mas morning. And yada-yada(for you seinfeld fans)a guy comes across my yard telling me my shed is on fire! Long story short the hose must have burned thru because of the higher temps(I don't really know cause I wasn't watching it) and the whole inside was on fire! about an hour later and many buckets of water and the help of my family It was out .It looked like the inside of a jack daniels whiskey barrel. The moral of this story is you can never be too safe and at 54 yrs. old thought I was.I feel very foolish but thought I would share so no one else goes though this.It is no fun. Happy Holidays and be safe. orf...
there are no stupid questions but some of mine come pretty close
Re: BE SAFE !!!
So sorry to hear of your fire, near miss, and loss. I hope this doesn't permanently set back your smoker plans, but am sure that it will delay them.orf wrote:NEVER...
Know what...? I'm scared to death of turkey fryer bases. Those things put out a stack of BTUs (...oops. ...mega therms.) in a real hurry. I tried one for home brewing recently and decided that, although it heated up the water for the wort twice as fast, it scorched the wort itself too. (...even with a mineral oil buffer between fire and wort). More "fun" happens when the water you're heating boils over, runs down into the mineral oil pan, and blows hot oil all over the place and you!
So... keep us posted on reconstruction recovery efforts. Best wishes, and thankful thoughts that nobody but the turkey got hurt.
Experience - the ability to instantly recognize a mistake when you make it again.
Ross, I think we had the Therminol discussion about 6 months ago. Just to clarify for others: mineral oil is a mixture derived from low volatility petroleum products which has a rather high flash point. Instead of flashing, it smokes when you heat it with a propane torch or open flame.ssorllih wrote:I am scared spitless at the thought of open fire and hot oil. Once you heat that oil past the flash point anything can happen.
We used it in polymer plants for heat transfer, for that reason. In over forty years with Monsanto, Champlin, and Celanese, I never saw anything worse than smouldering insulation with the stuff. Even a pipe break was not so much a fire hazard as it was a thermal hazard and a spill. True, the smoke could get thick when the were wrecking out a sixty year old polyester spinning operation and cutting torches hit saturated insulation, but that's not anything done during sausage smoking.
The biggest hazard is skin contact with the stuff when it's hot. ...just like when you fry chicken or potatoes. THAT was my cautionary tale.
Experience - the ability to instantly recognize a mistake when you make it again.
Yeah. The good part about the charring was that it would seal off small leaks.ssorllih wrote:Russ , I wondered about that because I use drug store mineral oil for candle lamps. When I worked for Firestone we used heat transfer fluids in the tire cord production operations. Polymer leaks would char when they were exposed to air and low pressures.
I guess we should tell folks that frying a turkey, or chicken, or ANYthing, is inherently hazardous. Grease fires are more likely than mineral oil fires but yes, either one will burn under the proper conditions. ...and so will YOU, guys & gals, so be careful.
Experience - the ability to instantly recognize a mistake when you make it again.
Use a turkey frier quite a bit down here for a bike club I belong to down here (VNV organization) I do not have one but the last one I used, I would buy and recommend is an electric frier. Flame wise, SAFE! Have to use a smaller turkey but well worth the slight disadvantage. Works very well
Keep them safe until they all come home.
When you consider the food load that you put into a normal deep fat fryer compared to the overall volume of that fryer then it is immediately obvious that all turkey fryers are drastically over loaded. Everyone that I have seen was an accident waiting to happen.
The heat output of a fryer burner is as great as that for a large water heater. We need only 160° F for precooking and we need a good constant heat not an on-off cycle that fluctuates between 130° and 180°. Just like cooking of a stove we adjust the burners to provide only as much heat as we need to keep the pot simmering.
The kitchen ovens are an on-off control but the temperature control for roasting or baking is not as critical as for pre-cooking smoked meat.
The heat output of a fryer burner is as great as that for a large water heater. We need only 160° F for precooking and we need a good constant heat not an on-off cycle that fluctuates between 130° and 180°. Just like cooking of a stove we adjust the burners to provide only as much heat as we need to keep the pot simmering.
The kitchen ovens are an on-off control but the temperature control for roasting or baking is not as critical as for pre-cooking smoked meat.
Ross- tightwad home cook
be safe
Orf, You poor bugger! That would break my heart, after all the work you put into your smoker. Hope you can get it up and running again soon. At least noone was hurt
Ursula
Ursula
thanks to all. the burner wasn't the danger the cook was! new design will be safe and more efficient,more air tight =less heat loss=less btu's to begin with.instead of a hose going in it'll be a piece of pipe=non flam=safer.orf...
If the entire burner must be placed inside, replace hose with an iron pipe.
this is a line from the main site
If the entire burner must be placed inside, replace hose with an iron pipe.
this is a line from the main site
there are no stupid questions but some of mine come pretty close