Question: Anyone ever built/used an "Ugly Drum Smoker?"

[Bama323]

I ran across some instructions on how to build your own "Ugly Drum Smoker" yesterday online. For those that don't know what I'm referring to, it's basically a homemade smoker made out of a 55 gallon metal drum. They seemed to have gained in popularity over the past few years, but homemade drums similar to this have been used for many many years. Everything I've read seems to indicate if built right, they do a great job of smoking meats low and slow over long periods of time. My main objective is to find something relatively cheap and portable, that I can paint up in crimson and white colors for tailgating, and that will cook a large volume of food. This seems to fit what I'm looking for. If you have an experience with these, any advice would be appreciated! Thanks

 

[TommyMac]

I've seen a couple of them, but I'm not sure if they were exactly like you're talking about. These were used horizontally with a fire box added at one end. Never used one, but one of those I saw was built by the guys at a fire station across town from where I usually worked. As far as I know, they really liked it.