Bird,
I'm not sure when I'll do my turkey because it looks like the Thanksgiving schedule will be "interesting" this year. However, I may try the brining thing overnight, simply because that sounds like a good way to thaw the bird! Then I'll be smoking with apple, crab apple and Bradford pear wood. Those are pretty mild, so I'll use a pretty good amount. The electric version of the smoker has only a small pan for wood chips, and it doesn't get hot enough to really generate any smoke, so I put the chunks right on the heating element. The only problem I have with the smoker is clean up afterwards. The water pan doesn't catch even a reasonable part of the drippings, and when they hit the wood ashes on the bottom of the smoker it makes a real mess that's hard to clean up. If the bird will fit on the second rack I may try putting a larger drip pan under it on the bottom rack. If that works for the bird, OK, but I really like to fill the smoker racks when I smoke ribs. Even if I line the bottom with aluminum foil I'll still have the ashes on the heating element. Ah well, at least what comes out has all tasted good so far.
Chuck