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In this video I want to give you some tips on how you can take a concrete well
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tile and some well tile caps and turn it into the firebox you need for your
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smokehouse. So this is the well tile here. It's a factory cast concrete quite
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durable and strong and long-lasting and the size isn't too important 24 inch 30
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inches fine. Inside you can see a grate here that's just to lift the burning
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wood up off the floor a little bit to give it some more air. The floor in this
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case is a concrete well tile. You could also just pour a slab of concrete on the
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bottom and then put the well tile on top if you prefer. Here's the concrete well
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tile lid. All of this is very straightforward. The tricky bits are the
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door opening that you'll need to cut and an opening for a smoke pipe which could
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be concrete or heavy steel as well. Well tile would actually make a great smoke
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pipe because it's got a fairly thick wall. So here when it comes time to cut
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this you're going to want to mark that out and use what's called a masonry saw
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It's a kind of a cut-off saw. Here's what it looks like. This is my own saw
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here. I've been using it for many years. It's got a 14 inch diamond wheel here
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It lasts a long time. You can rent things like this too. You don't have to buy one
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of these just to make your your smokehouse firebox but you will want to
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look for one that has a chance to hook up a garden hose. The hose hooks up here
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and it distributes water through these lines and it squirts it on either side
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of the blade just to keep the dust down. Without that there's huge billows of
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dust developed by this saw. So essentially you fire it up and you use
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it to make cuts. Here are four cuts that you've pre-marked on the well tile. So one
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down here, here, here, and here. The cuts won't be able to go absolutely right
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into the corner. I mean the top surface of the cut will be able to meet here but
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because the blade is round there's still going to be a little bit of uncut
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material right in the corner so that chunk isn't going to fall out. You will
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need to knock it out maybe with a hammer and use a little chisel to clean
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up the corners but that's essentially how you make this opening and on top of
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that is where your door goes because you do have to be able to restrict the air
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leading into the firebox. When it comes to making a hole for your pipe you're
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going to need some kind of a hole saw some sort of a masonry hole saw to drill
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the size of hole you need. Chances are you're not going to get a perfect fit
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with the concrete or steel pipe you're using so when you set the well tile in
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place where it's going to be ultimately and you stick the smoke pipe in there
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and you get that all kind of a lined up one of the last things you'll want to do
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is to plug up any gaps around the pipe using some mortar. Now nothing is going
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to be burning very hot in here as I've said in earlier on in the course it's
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just a smoldering fire so it doesn't have to be refractory masonry or
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anything like that because it's just an old cold smoldering fire but you do want
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it to be fairly well sealed here so that's you know you don't want any extra
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air to get in that's the main reason for wanting to seal this up so that you
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have as close to full control as possible over the flow of air into the firebox
