How to Make Grills

Making a grill for your backyard sounds like a major home improvement project, but you can create a grill quite easily in less than 24 hours in most cases. Whether you want a big grill for hosting huge neighborhood barbecues or a smaller one for firing up a quick steak dinner, you will love cooking out on your own personal backyard grill.

Things You'll Need

• Tape measure
• Shovel
• Cement blocks
• Bricks
• Bag of sand
• Mortar
• Bucket
• Trowel
• Grill grate

Instructions

1. Measure off the dimensions of your grill. You can make it as long or as short as you want, but generally you should keep the dimensions divisible by the length and width of a cement block. A cement block is usually 8 inches wide and 16 inches long. Use the tape measure to be sure that your sides are all even. You can mark off the sides in the dirt with a stick if you like.

2. Dig a trench for the cement blocks. Follow your guide that you marked when you laid out the measurements for the grill. Cement blocks are also 8 inches high, so your trench needs to be 8 inches deep, or a little more.

3. Fill in the trench with the cement blocks. Place them side by side in the trench. If they are uneven, add or take away a little bit of dirt so that they line up.

4. Fill the inside of your grill with bricks. They should also lie side by side. Once you have filled in the area, fill in any gaps and cracks with sand. This will be where your fire or charcoal will be.

5. Mix your mortar in the bucket. Usually this simply involves adding water to mortar mix.

6. Build your grill walls. Generally, you will need to use at least three rows of cement blocks. Use the trowel to spread mortar on the layer of cement blocks in the trench, then place the next row on top of them. Pat them firmly into place, and use your trowel to scrape off the extra mortar. Continue doing this until you have three rows of cement blocks above ground.

7. Fix your grill grate onto the top of the cement block tower you have built. Apply a thick coat of mortar on top of the last layer of cement blocks, then put your grill grate in place and then place the final layer of cement blocks on top of the grill grate. The mortar and the weight of the blocks will hold the grate in place. Now, you are ready to fire up your new grill.

Tips & Warnings

• Check the weather forecast before you start working since rain can ruin your grill if the mortar has not yet set.

• Check with local zoning codes before building a grill to make sure this type of contained cooking device is okay to build outside your house.