Big chips, small chips?

[Ruedeleglise]

Just starting smoking some salmon using larger Alder wood chips rather than the smaller ones that I have used before. I had the smoke production down to a fairly fine art with the small chips, but with the large chips.......!!! First of all I had trouble getting them to smoke, but then they went off like a bonfire out of control!

i have reduced the air flow into the remote “tower”type of smoke generator I have got,  and turned off my extractor fan on the top of the unit. Possibly there is less smoke now. But the tower and the tube to the smoke chamber has got quite hot. Do bigger chips ignite and smoke more readily once ignited?

[Wade]

Yes the larger the chips the more they are likely to burn rather than smoulder. You could restrict the air flow to the chips but that would also restrict the air/smoke flow through the smoker too. Have you tried giving the larger chips a quick blitz in the coffee grinder to reduce their size?

[Ruedeleglise]

Hmm what a good idea...wonder what the wife will think of that! Our coffe grinder isn’t that big I think I would be blitzing all day. I bought from smokwood shack but the chips are very big indeed. Shame as I have bought three 600g bags!

[Ruedeleglise]

No go with the blitzer  or coffee grinder! I really don’t want to be divorced after nearly 50 yrs!!

Changed to the only other chips I have, Beech. Hope I am back on course as this is the first time I have strung 2 sides vertically! The large chip fiasco lasted 2 hours but most of the smoke appeared to be coming from the generator and not through the chamber! Also as my generator is a good 60cms from the chamber with a copper pipe connecting them, there was no heat build up in the chamber above 20c. Fingers crossed! Now to finding where I can get 5mm to 15mm max chips. Any ideas?