Thread: tips for making a barbecue

Hi Mick,

We used to have the standard plough disk setup, 3 bits of water pipe for the stand. Worked well as I recall.

Regards
Ray

Originally Posted by RayG

Hi Mick,

We used to have the standard plough disk setup, 3 bits of water pipe for the stand. Worked well as I recall.

Regards
Ray

Hi Ray, I've seen these before - not bad. I've got to go with gas though, I'm too close to the neighbours and not enough trees to cut down for firewood unfortunately !

Cheers

- Mick

"Heatlie make some neat, simple to the point of being Spartan, stainless steel barbeques"

Yep...and they are one of the few left that are actually made in oz. Beefeater are another.

i wouldn't bother with stainless, seen them before, they look ugly, discolour, suseptable to warping and way too expencive to buy ( unless your getting it for nothing)

ive made a bbq here and there for mates, relis, and the odd one for myself over the years, currently thinking about a bbq/smoker/spit, its gonna be a show stopper, no welds 100% rivited, thats another story, will post pics next year when it cools down and i can get the forge a burning.

here's a pic or two of a shashlishnitsa, russian bbq, easy as buggery to make, with my own additons to suite a spit, also have a grill and 5mm pl with X section to keep it true.

Sorry thats your view of stainless,I guess horses for coursers

Originally Posted by 19brendan81

"Heatlie make some neat, simple to the point of being Spartan, stainless steel barbeques"

Yep...and they are one of the few left that are actually made in oz. Beefeater are another.

I don't think it's a coincidence that those two brands also are the ones that have the BBQ's that I like most.

Why a SS plate, its over priced for the job and it does not work as good as plain old mild steel... SS is wank factor

It's a lot lot cleaner,and that's not a wank

We approve BBQ's for Australia and NZ, and chances are that a fair few of this board are cooking on product that we have had an involvement with. Most BBQ's for the Australian/European/American market come out of 4 factories in China and under a plethora of brandnames.

The most important consideration for even cooking is the thickness of the BBQ plate. The thicker, the better for an even heat. Mild steel is better to cook on than stainless steel.

If I was building another BBQ for personal use, I would choose 10-12 mm thick plate, the injectors to be sized @ 1.1 mm, clearance from top of burner to underneath of cooking plate @ 110 mm. A maximum of 6 burners otherwise the LPG bottle can freeze up too much.

I would probably also make my own burners out of 25 mm x 25 mm RHS with 1.0 mm slots cut into the top in groups of 2 with a spacing of circa 6 mm between groups. Better performance than cast iron burners, and cheaper.

Have a grid and tray below the burners so that if the burners are removed, you can cook with timber. Timber in my opine is the best form of cooking. Also remember that the burners require fresh air to operate successfully and also that the products of combustion can exit the BBQ easily. Hope this is of help.

Thanks cava - very informative reply and great to get those specs. Your suggestion with the burners is interesting... how long are the slots? and are they in the top of the RHS or on the top of the sides? It would be great if you could post a photo or sketch. What do you mean by better performance? (gas efficiency? heating rate?)

With the plate thickness - it seems it's a trade off between getting even heat (with a thicker plate) and getting more rapid heating and control with a thinner plate.

Cheers

- Mick

I cannot scan at the moment, so posting the drawings would be difficult. There are two ways of doing the burners as follows:

1. Cut across one flat side of the RHS ie 25 mm and down both sides circa 4-5 mm or
2. Rotate the RHS 45 degrees and cut down circa half way so that you in effect have cut 2 x 25 mm sides of the RHS (this is the better way). Mount the burner in the BBQ at a 45 degree angle. This is more efficient, with more air getting to the flame = better combustion and more heat.

You will need areation holes x 2 at the injector end and also an interrupter screw to adjust the aeration. Have a look at a cast iron burner for a greater clarification of this.

The plate thickness really is critical. Perhaps you could make the plates removeable and try with several thicknesses. However, having cooked on several thicknesses, thicker really is better. The heat up time difference would be circa 5 minutes and remember cooking on a BBQ is generally a social thing and they are deliberately designed for slower (read not too fast) cooking than fast cooking. Your choice Mick.

Sounds like a good idea to me. Just one more clarification though. You cut thru both sides of the RHS down to the centre line in groups of 2, each group 6mm apart. How much between the 2 cuts in the group, or do you mean the whole cut, thru 2 sides is a group. You appear to be used to using industry speak. We are just amateurs here.

Dean

Originally Posted by nrb

It's a lot lot cleaner,and that's not a wank

bull... its the cook who makes it clean nothing to do with the steel used.
All this BS about bacteria on a bbq plate goes out the window within seconds once the plate is heated!

"All this BS about bacteria on a bbq plate goes out the window within seconds once the plate is heated!"

yep. Your best bet is to clean the plate of any food scraps after use, but leave the oil and fat behind as this protects the plate. Then you can heat, scrape and wipe the old oil and stuff off prior to cooking. It wont take the whole plate long to go well over 100 degrees. Keep it there for 5 minutes before cooking and its officially sterile.

Clean plates that sit around for weeks or months between uses will rust.