Hook, I'm not controlling the heat at all other than a piece of tile. I batted this idea off a few people and everyone told me I'd have trouble with it getting too hot. This is not the case at all. I spoke to an engineer after the build and he went into a bunch of thermal dynamics stuff that was way over my head but it gave me an idea of why the opposite was true. The box itself doesn't get any hotter than the smoker in the first hour or so because the heat is being transfered to other parts of the smoker just like heat would be transferred down a wire or a pipe. All this radiant (or transient?) heat transfer keeps the box cooler than it needs to be to bake which is just the oppostie of what you would think. But after a time, the metal closest to the firebox becomes saturated with heat, then and only then, will the temperature rise to the point that you can bake.
In all honesty, I wouldn't suggest building something like this for baking because its just to inefficient. As a warmer, it would be great. I just put some ribs on and I'm going to try and chart when the saturation point is reached. If it takes 3 hours or less then I'll be pleased cause this would allow me to toss bread and stuff in it so it would be ready when the meat is. If not, I'm going to consider scrapping this idea and doing something else now that I have a better understanding of how the heat works. It was all just an experiment with some scrap so I'll just be out some time and less than ten dollars.
You would think after four years in the tenth grade they would have touched on this important aspect of thermal dynamics. Public schools! :mad:
