Chimney cap on my WSM was installed upside down for 3 years, found out at a comp in Austin

I got into a conversation with a random pitmaster at a small backyard contest in Austin last fall who asked why my smoker's airflow seemed so restricted. He pointed at my chimney cap and said that flat side actually needs to face the wind, not away from it. So I flipped it around on a test run that night, and my temperature swings went from about 30 degrees down to maybe 8 degrees for the whole cook. Has anyone else had a dumb hardware detail like that screw up their fire management for way too long, or am I the only one who never reads the manual past assembly?

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blake43227d ago

Flipping mine did the same thing after two years of chasing temps like a crazy person... guess the manual was right about something other than the bolt sizes.