Cigar Asylum Cigar Forum - View Single Post

T.G · 07-15-2010, 09:13 AM

The 18" from the cold smoke photos is an old standard three-vent model, the 22" shown with the bricks is a one-touch.

I have a set of bricks for both, but hardly ever use them in the 18" because on a grill that small, you lose about half the grate area to the coal and brick - not much left to cook on. Lastly, the lack of the hinged grate section on the 18" grates I have makes it a pita to do anything with the fire once you have loaded the pit with meat.

As for control, the old standard three-vent gives better draft air control, and seals better when closed down, but you have to lean under the kettle to see how they are set, and the one under the fire would have to be periodically cleared by poking a stick through the ash. that accumulates on it. Lastly, you have to lift out the drip pan, bricks and grates (after awhile it gets old doing this) to empty the ash from the standard 3-vent. Whereas the one touch, you can just set the lever from above, and on the golds you have the metal shield that you can mark in percentages as I described above, and you can clear the vents and even empty all the ash out of the kettle by simply cranking the vent handle over and back a few times.

The one touch is far more convenient, and the convenience to me outweighs the slight sacrifice in draft control over the old 3-vent. 22" gives you a good cooking grate size where you only lose about 1/3 of it to the coals and bricks, so you can fit quite a bit on there.

07-15-2010, 09:13 AM	#924
T.G Grrrrrr Join Date: Mar 2009 First Name: The Other Adam Posts: 15,559 Trading: (37)	Re: What's in your smoker? The 18" from the cold smoke photos is an old standard three-vent model, the 22" shown with the bricks is a one-touch. I have a set of bricks for both, but hardly ever use them in the 18" because on a grill that small, you lose about half the grate area to the coal and brick - not much left to cook on. Lastly, the lack of the hinged grate section on the 18" grates I have makes it a pita to do anything with the fire once you have loaded the pit with meat. As for control, the old standard three-vent gives better draft air control, and seals better when closed down, but you have to lean under the kettle to see how they are set, and the one under the fire would have to be periodically cleared by poking a stick through the ash. that accumulates on it. Lastly, you have to lift out the drip pan, bricks and grates (after awhile it gets old doing this) to empty the ash from the standard 3-vent. Whereas the one touch, you can just set the lever from above, and on the golds you have the metal shield that you can mark in percentages as I described above, and you can clear the vents and even empty all the ash out of the kettle by simply cranking the vent handle over and back a few times. The one touch is far more convenient, and the convenience to me outweighs the slight sacrifice in draft control over the old 3-vent. 22" gives you a good cooking grate size where you only lose about 1/3 of it to the coals and bricks, so you can fit quite a bit on there.