Forewarning: I'm new and will try to refrain posting too many threads at
once. However, I wasn't getting what I wanted from a google groups
search so I figured I'd ask since there's a deadline associated with this.

I've smoked meat a few times with an electric smoker. The results were
OK, but I was comparing to BBQ around here in Austin. That smoker
stayed back in New York with my folks. I'm now looking into my options
for starting the BBQ again. And of course I'm kind of cheap.

What tripped this was an empty propane tank on Craigslist. It looked
pretty long, and it had a hole in it. Since I didn't plan to pressurize
it, I figured that was fine. My first thought was to make a BBQ pit out
of it. However, it seems nobody else has considered this--so there's
probably a good reason. I remember joking about converting an old air
compressor tank into a BBQ, so it had been on my mind.

In the past I had also considered converting oil drums or building a
brick pit. The idea with the brick put was to also make a think pizza
oven kind of thing for pizza and shortbread. I don't know if I'd get
away with that. It sounds like the oil drum conversions are imprecise,
but there are some plans out there.

I'm trying to find something where I can do smoking primarily, and
perhaps some grilling for veggies. Is the propane tank idea infeasible?
What do people think of alternatives? Should I just get the Weber bullet?