Water pan placement

[Texas___Fight]

I am going to do some smoking this weekend and wanted some advice on water pan placement. I have seen various methods on placement from other boards and wanted to see what worked for you BBQ Gods. I'm running a Ok Joe's longhorn smoker

 

[Luke Duke]

I have never used a water pan. I would guess that you would put it in the smoke chamber as close to the fire box as you can.

 

[12thStudStan]

water side up

Water pans are often used as a heat retention/distribution tool as much as they are for a moisture source. As such, many fill them with sand or and cover them with foil for easier cleanup. Consider the heat flow in your cooking chamber without the water pan before deciding on placement. If you get it too close to the firebox or if the water pan is too large you might restrict the heat flow and cause additional problems. I would play around with placement as well as the size of the water pan to see what works best for your pit.

If you want to get semi-scientific about it use the biscuit test that I have referred to before. Get a couple of tubes of cheap refrigerated biscuits and lay them out all over your cooking grate on your fired up pit and check back later to see how they cooked. This will help determine your hot and cold spots of your cooking chamber as well as the effectiveness of your water pan placement.

I use a water pan sometimes in one of my horizontal offset pits that I smoke fish in and I generally place it in the center of the cooking chamber and use it as a moisture source only. I use an aluminum 1/2 pan because the flat bottom allows air to flow underneath it.

 

[Texas___Fight]

In reply to:

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[flaco]

I learned the hard way that it is easier to replace the evaporated water by adding it to the pan with a cup or hose than it is to put a pan full of water in what used to be a hot, smoking pit. There was a nice steam effect for a minute however.