I purchased two Big Green Egg’s (large and small) and just had them sitting on my patio.  I  thought quite a bit about what I wanted as an end product and will have to admit I somewhat went overboard a bit.  I'll have to admit though it was fun to design and build and I really enjoy working with it.  I'm an optometrist by profession, but a design engineer at heart I suppose.  I'm always tinkering with things to “make them better” (and yes, I do that with all my office equipment as well).  Sometimes it doesn’t work out of course.  Anyone else who has a tendency to do the same thing knows what I mean.  To build something like this yourself, you have to know some basic carpentry and have some knowledge of building materials, etc.

I originally planned to make the internal structure out of 2” square steel tubing (1/8"wall) and have it welded and painted by a shop here in my city that I have used before.  However, I decided to do a sort of “mock-up” of my Egg Center out of old 2 x 4’s I had around.  It is roughly 8½’ long by 30” deep.  It is 32” tall.  By the time I finished screwing and bolting together the frame, I decided the wood frame was "good enough" and I didn’t need to do the steel tubing.  I then had some 2” angle iron cut.  I spray painted them black with automotive paint so they wouldn’t rust.  I bolted these angle irons width wise and girth wise onto the bottoms of the frame and mounted 8 heavy duty 2” casters, on the ends of the angle irons, so the unit could be rolled around.  I also had some angle irons for the shelves to set the eggs on.  Hopefully you can visualize this from the photos with the doors open.  The height of the frame with the casters at this point was about 30”.  I bolted some short 2 x 4’s on top of the bottom angle irons and mounted the lower shelf to those so that the bottom of the lower shelf was roughly an inch off the ground.  There are some small cut-outs for the casters. 

I covered the frame sides, front and top with ¾” outdoor plywood and sealed it with outdoor type polyurethane (sometimes called “spar” polyurethane).  I also coated the 2 x 4” frame twice with a sanding in between to smooth the wood so as to cut down on dust accumulation.  I did not cover the rear ... my unit is backed up against the low brick wall around my patio.  I get good ventilation that way. 

I then covered the top with ½” concrete tile underlayment.  I also screwed 2 x 4’s all around the upper rim of the cabinet and covered those with tile underlayment as well.  I then covered the top and rims with nice outdoor type tile (actually floor tile).  The tricky part of this was to figure out exactly where I wanted to place the eggs, sink and gas burner so I could cut the large round circles out that they would fit into.  I laid out the tiles that would be in the area of the circles and marked them first.  I then went to the tile store and asked them to rough-cut the circular shapes out as best they could with their diamond cutter.  Heavy duty or floor tile is very difficult to cut smooth.  After they rough cut it I smoothed them down even more with my huge belt sander with the lowest # grit sanding belts I could get.  This was a tough job and took a long time.  I had numbered all the tiles initially so they would all fit properly.  Once I finished the tiles and they were fully grouted and cured for a couple of days, I still had some tiles that needed more grinding  or smoothing.  I found that I could use my hand belt sander (the rounded front end) with the coarsest grit belts I could find and actually do a better job than I did with my bigger shop unit. I then sealed the grout with a couple coats of silicone grout sealer. 

I wanted a wood appearance for the outside of the unit and wanted something that would tend not to rot, being outdoors all the time.  I looked at various patterns in 4 x 8 sheets of plywood, outdoor paneling, etc. but did not really find anything that I felt was satisfactory.  I ended up purchasing individual 3” tongue and groove boards made out of redwood.  We have several small companies here that do custom work of that kind.  I mounted the boards and finished them off with a light stain and a couple of coats of the outdoor heavy-duty polyurethane.  They come to about ¼" off the floor of the patio so you can't even see the castors.  Voilá. 

Now on to cutting the openings for the doors and mounting the eggs, sink and gas burner.  I ordered my doors from someplace on the internet and I can’t remember where now.  I know I ordered the gas burner top from the same place.  It may have been http://www.thegrillstoreandmore.com/island-access-doors.asp but I don’t remember them being as expensive as shown so I must have gotten them elsewhere.  They are similar to the Fire Magic brand.  Mine are painted black and the door frames are 20” x 27”.  The actual doors are 17” x 24”.  These are just about the same as access type doors for electrical boxes, etc., so I suspect a person could do an internet search for those and have them painted black at an auto body shop a lot cheaper.  I purchased stainless steel drawers for the right hand side of the unit from a local restaurant supply house and jury-rigged my own sliders, etc.  They seal pretty well when they are closed in an attempt to keep out insects, etc.  I currently keep my utensils in the top drawer, some wood chunks in one and cloth towels and things in the other one.  Since I have begun to use Trex’s steak cooking method I have considered converting one of the drawers to a “resting” drawer.  

I already had a garden hose hookup and gas hookup on the other side of the brick wall surrounding the patio and there was a hole at the bottom of the brick wall for drainage.  I ran the gas line, water line and electrical conduit through that hole and into the back of the unit to hook everything up.  I then ran a water drain line from the sink back out through that hole into a small “dry well”.  I actually don’t run that much water through it so it usually just waters the bushes there anyway.  Everything coming out and going in there is hidden by bushes. 

Oh, by the way, there is about a ¼” to ½” of open space between the circular top openings and the eggs.  You must have room for the heat to escape.  When you open and close the eggs you get some rocking motion, so I purchased some high temperature (black) automotive silicone from an auto parts store and tacked a bit here and there around the insides of the openings to cushion the eggs, yet allow heat to flow out.  Worked great!

I also hooked up small 120 volt computer type fans from a surplus shop so that I could move them easily into position for starting charcoal more quickly.  After my temps get up to about 700° or 800° I switch the fan off.  I also have now purchased a small shop-vac that sits underneath the small egg and is wired in so that I can easily vacuum up coals, dust, etc.  I use nothing but a MAPP torch for lighting my lumps. 

THINGS I WOULD HAVE DONE DIFFERENTLY. 

Yes, there are always, always, things one would do differently.  I would have gone back to my original plan with the welded square tubular steel frame.  The structure would have ended up actually being lighter in weight.  Even with the heavy duty casters, this structure is HEAVY.  I would never be able to move it to another home.  It will have to stay here, I’m afraid.  I can barely even roll it out to clean behind it.  I always tend to overbuild everything I do and I would want to cut way back on that.  I would use ½” or ¼” plywood and only ¼” tile underlayment, or possibly just ½” plywood with no underlayment as long as the top is braced well enough not to flex.  I would have the unit only 30” tall and have the eggs sitting up a little higher out of the unit to make room for the newer spring type bands for the eggs. 

I would also eliminate the gas burner.  It is nice to have but I have never used it in 2+ years.  I would probably prefer to have a restaurant style stainless  “food keeper”.  One of those with the sliding top like a roll-top desk.  I’m sure they probably have those at restaurant supply houses.  It is annoying to have flies and insects around in the summertime and one needs to keep everything covered up.  As far as the gas grill, one can always use portable electric grills, electric skillets, etc. if needed.  I often like plugging in a deep fat fryer.  Since I have two eggs, I currently use one of them to keep food items covered.  I also keep a fan going in the area in the summertime to cool down and try “breezing” the insects away.