Well, I bought my Weber in late 1988 and it has had a busy life. When I was doing my CFS course in 1989, every summer weekend when I bailed out from Scampers it was merrily cooking one, if not two meals.
Last year the propellor thing which wiggles out the cack from its bowels finally died - but I found a supplier of new bits on the Interweb and now she's as good as ever!
Top tip to save the coals is to use the wire bits which clip to the main grid thing for roasting chooks and just put the coals in the middle. Also close everything off as soon as you've finished cooking and there should be a goodly number of reusable bricquettes still usable!
Should you choose to use the rip-off 'Jack Daniels' wood chips to add a smoky flavour to your snorkers, just use a SMALL quantity and soak them first! The first time I gave that a whirl, the neighbourhood went IMC!
Don't buy the 26" unless you regularly feed the 5000 as the volume of coals needed is proportional to the cube of the diameter! Thus a 26 uses huge amounts more than a 22".
The record I've seen in the back of the VC10K was 8 x 22" - plus one smoking thing which looked like an Atlas missile silo. The proud owner's wife was NOT impressed!