I have used mine for both direct and indirect cooking and the only problem is the need to remove the whole thing if you want to add lots of coals. I do remove the whole thing and put my chimney on the lower grate and fire it off.

I still prefer this to the stock grill, now will the 18.5 fit in a WSM? eek!

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I have used mine for both direct and indirect cooking and the only problem is the need to remove the whole thing if you want to add lots of coals. I do remove the whole thing and put my chimney on the lower grate and fire it off.

That seems like too much work. Why not use the grate lifter (if you bought it) and simply remove one of the grates to add coals? You could 'spin' the entire grate to add coals in another place, for indirect cooking, or you could rake them into place.

I usually take the whole thing out to use my chimney starter and then i use the grate lifter to add coals. The chimney starter will not fit down into the pie shapes, that is the only drawback.