# Is My Gas Burner Strong Enough?



## paulwolf350 (3/5/09)

Just boiled 12.5 litres of water in 40 mins, it held a boil for a further 15 mins without stopping, till I turned it off, but it was only just boiling. I am wondering if this will be big enough to do a 26 litre boil for 1 hour 

The bigest pot i currently have is a 15 litre jobbie so cannot test the full 26 litres yet, just wondering if I should persevere with this burner or plan on getting something better?

Paul


----------



## Steve (3/5/09)

paulwolf350 said:


> Just boiled 12.5 litres of water in 40 mins, it held a boil for a further 15 mins without stopping, till I turned it off, but it was only just boiling. I am wondering if this will be big enough to do a 26 litre boil for 1 hour
> 
> The bigest pot i currently have is a 15 litre jobbie so cannot test the full 26 litres yet, just wondering if I should persevere with this burner or plan on getting something better?
> 
> Paul




Paul - what kind of burner are you using?


----------



## Sammus (3/5/09)

12.5L in 40min? I wouldn't count on it being enough... unless that 12.5L started as ice, then maybe.


----------



## paulwolf350 (3/5/09)

Steve said:


> Paul - what kind of burner are you using?




Its a 2 burner cooktop out of a comercial kitchen, I just hooked it up to my BBQ regulator and fired it up, the burner is 200mm in the shape of an X

Paul


----------



## paulwolf350 (3/5/09)

Sammus said:


> 12.5L in 40min? I wouldn't count on it being enough... unless that 12.5L started as ice, then maybe.



Nah just regular old tap water

Paul


----------



## Sammus (3/5/09)

Maybe try a high pressure reg, pretty hard to get away with low pressure unless you have one of those 'mongolian' burners.


----------



## np1962 (3/5/09)

The BBQ reg. probably not helping, low flow rate.
May be worth trying with an adjustable reg. but no guarantees it will do he job.

Nige

Edit- beaten by Sammus. :mellow:


----------



## QldKev (3/5/09)

I would say no.. 
My 3 ring burner 29L goes from water filter temp to 69degrees C in < 30min

I wouldn;t recommend anything less than the 3 ring when it comes to the full boil.

QldKev


----------



## paulwolf350 (3/5/09)

QldKev said:


> I wouldn;t recommend anything less than the 3 ring when it comes to the full boil.
> 
> QldKev



thanks, I might try a higher pressure reg, my old man has one.
I dont think the burner would hold boil at the moment with 29l. if no good with new reg, a 3 ring it is. B) 

any idea what pressure I should be aiming at?

Paul


----------



## Carbonator (3/5/09)

I got a 3 ring with reg for sale, because I saw the light and converted to electric!

Cheaper, safer!


----------



## paulwolf350 (3/5/09)

Carbonator said:


> I got a 3 ring with reg for sale, because I saw the light and converted to electric!
> 
> Cheaper, safer!



Convince me! why is electric so much better?

Paul


----------



## Carbonator (3/5/09)

paulwolf350 said:


> Convince me! why is electric so much better?



Paul, from an end-user point of view, Elec is cheaper, because retail LPG is so damn expensive per heat gained/$.

Secondly, elec has no CO/user air poison issues when it comes to heating.

Sorry I can't be more specific, but I AM CORRECT!

OPEN FLOOR!


----------



## QldKev (3/5/09)

The floor is open 

how long does it take to boild with electric, how well do you maintain a rolling boil ??????

One Watt (W) is 1 Joule per second, 1W=1J/s. 
a kW=1000W=1000J/s. 
There are 60*60 seconds in an hour, so a Kilowatt hour is
3600*1000 J=3.6*10^6 J.
One mega-joule is 1 million Joules, 1MJ=10^6 J, so
1 kWh=3.6 MJ.

My 3-ring burner is the bottom end of the LPG systems @30mj/h as it only runs low pressure.

2400w element (max for 240v 10amp socket) = 8.6mj

I know heating externally is not as efficient as an electric probe in the water, but.....



QldKev


----------



## Carbonator (3/5/09)

QldKev said:


> how well do you maintain a rolling boil ??????



Just a guess with the 3 ring camping burner, a "rolling boil" over 6 hours will cost 25-30 litres of LPG and about $5 with elec.

Still OPEN FLOOR for opinions on this, as I have not experimented with different burners.


----------



## paulwolf350 (3/5/09)

At the moment I am still undecided which way to go, 

I did the sums and come up with the same results as kev
the manufacturer claims 32 Mj for the unit, i assume thats 16 Mj for each burner

16Mj is still more than a 2400 watt element (8.64 Mj)

but if it is going to consume 5kg of gas, it is going to cost a bit to run, I probably would be better off going electric right from the start

Paul


----------



## Ducatiboy stu (3/5/09)

there is a standard calc for how many Mj it takes to heat a certain amount of water to boiling point...i just dont have it...... :unsure: 



Elec may be cheaper, but gas will got it boiling quicker..


You also need to take into account that you will need a seperate 15Amp cct to run a decent elec setup...


You can buy a lot of gas for the cost of a 15Amp cct


----------



## troopa (3/5/09)

3600W element on a 15amp outlet gets me from tap water to 68degrees in about 40 mins 
Mashout with BIAB - 65 up to 75 degrees takes me 15-20 mins with the bag in the liquor stirring constantly and swinging the bag around to stop it burning 
From mashout - 75 to 102-104degrees takes nearly 30 mins. At this point i crank the variable controller i have back to about 75% to keep a steady temperature otherwise it gets WAY HOT

Thats for a 23 liter batch, (17ish% boil off)... damn my 400mm diameter pot

hmm my calculations suck but 3600w @ 1.5 hours running time at 10.8900c / kWh comes in under a dollar per brew ( i only brew on Saturday or in off peak times)
BTW for those that use electric and didnt know.. Energy Australia are now rolling out their smart meters to all houses around Australia and all you have to do is call em and they will install it within 30 days
This will give you Peak, Off peak and Shoulder rates
http://www.energy.com.au/energy/ea.nsf/Con...W+TOU+Res+Rates

Tom

edit: spelling and linky


----------



## Ducatiboy stu (3/5/09)

For those that are smart, I Would NOT get a smart meter, due to the fact that they use time-of-day metering..

Yep...you get charged a different rate depeding on the time of day you use power..... read the fine print

Older meters just rely on what you use over a 3 mnth period


----------



## QldKev (3/5/09)

LPG depending on purity has about 30mj per Litre, there is 2L per Kg

So my 8.5Kg refill has 510mj of energy stored.

510/30mj hr = 17hr run time(on full) 

Under $2 per brew, not really worth worrying about. 

LPG gives me portability, if I want to brew at a mates on the weekend no problems.
If I move I don't need to get another 15amp socket installed.

(There is a potential difference that if using high pressure LPG systems there is a higher % wastage. Making the cost per brew higher.)

-- I just checked my brew book and can confirm I have had 9 brews on the same bottle.

But we are now talking within $1 a brew. 



QldKev


----------



## paulwolf350 (3/5/09)

just googled this up, for the mathemeticians, to work out how much energy you need to heat water - 

You would use the equation Δ_Q_ = _m__c_Δ_T_ , where Δ_Q_ means change in energy (or energy required in this case), m is mass of water, c is specific heat capacity, and Δ_T_ change in temperature. 

Water's specific heat capacity (energy needed to raise 1kg by 1 degree K or C) is 4200J Kg-1 K-1, so, if we put your numbers in: so for 29 Litres, I will assume 29 kg. And we want to raise it 70 degrees, (nearly boiling)
= 29kg x 4200J Kg-1 K-1 x 70C (70 degress kelvin) 
= 29 x 4200 x 70
= 8526000 or 8.526 Mj

so assuming that these numbers are correct, a 2400 watt element is only just big enough, and my burner is crap - 13 x 4200 x 70
- 3.822 Mj in 40 min
which equates to 5.79 Mj for an hour or 1.6 KW 

even if it was 60% efficient it should boil my pot in 24 mins

Paul


----------



## troopa (3/5/09)

What fine print... its there in a massive JPG picture for you
Just reduce your consumption during 2-8PM monday to friday and youll save a Crap load of money every quarter

Anyway just pointing out something that others might not of known about

Tom


----------



## geoffi (3/5/09)

If you like twiddling your thumbs, get a three-ring burner.

My Nasa burner gets 45 litres of wort up to a boil from sparge temp in about 15 minutes.

It's the main reason I can get a double batch done in under four hours.

Tempus fugit.


----------



## paulwolf350 (3/5/09)

QldKev said:


> LPG depending on purity has about 30mj per Litre, there is 2L per Kg
> 
> So my 8.5Kg refill has 510mj of energy stored.
> 
> ...



Thanks kev, thats the sort of info I was after, I spent that long calculating and typing, I missed the last 4 posts

Paul

PS and also thakyou troopa for the 'electric' side of the discussion


----------



## QldKev (4/5/09)

Geoffi said:


> If you like twiddling your thumbs, get a three-ring burner.
> 
> My Nasa burner gets 45 litres of wort up to a boil from sparge temp in about 15 minutes.
> 
> ...



Actually a good point to mention yes there are more powerful burners out there, that will do a quicker job. I did mention that a 3-ring was the smallest burner that I would recommend "I wouldn;t recommend anything less than the 3 ring when it comes to the full boil" I wouldn't even think about using the 3 ring for a double. I have built a metal ring to stop wind blowing the heat away/ heat escaping around the base of mine. It covers about 75% of the diameter so only 1/4 is open. I should also mention that I'm in sunny Queensland so the outside temp I brew at is a lot warmer. :icon_cheers: 

Also the I believe the 2/3/4 ring burners will not run on a high pressure reg. But if you can borrow one give it a try and please let us know how you go. 

Can anyone confirm this: with the more powerful burners you will result in a larger waste of lpg/heat due to the rate of absorbsion. So even thou you get to boil quicker you get less batches from the LPG bottle.

I guess one more point in favour of the elec setup is you are less likely to run out half way through a batch. I have 3 LPG bottles so not so much an issue for me, but most people only have the one.

Some really good discussions here :beerbang: 

QldKev


----------



## BennyBrewster (4/5/09)

Presently I use a Nasa burner and it boils my 30 liter batches in under 15 minutes no worries. 

However I'm curious as to how much heat I'm wasting using the stand that burner came mounted on. I assume some science has gone into determining how far the stand holds a flat bottom pot away from the flame to get the most out of the burner. I'm using converted kegs and due to the concave bottom and the collar that it sits would be further from the flame than a standard flat bottom pot.

This is the stand mine came with.







I'm building a brew stand as we speak and am going to make my burner mounts adjustable (up and down). Do you think lifting the burner a little closer to the pot would be effective?


----------



## paulwolf350 (4/5/09)

QldKev said:


> Also the I believe the 2/3/4 ring burners will not run on a high pressure reg. But if you can borrow one give it a try and please let us know how you go.
> 
> Some really good discussions here :beerbang:
> 
> QldKev



You are probably right, but that is how he runs it for making lead sinkers, 3 ring and an adjustable high pressure reg, pretty sure it is adjustable from 0 - 35 psi in very small increments, might be something like one off a lpg oxy set. Pretty sure it is very inefficient and uses mega gas when turned up

what reg are you running kev, $2 a brew I can live with, just dont want to burn 1/2 a bottle a brew.

Paul


----------



## winkle (4/5/09)

I use a 3 ring and get around 10 x 20 odd litre batches for a standard 8.5kg gas bottle which I'm very happy with. That said I'm considering using a mongolian 10 jet since I can use the same reg, but I'm thinking it will struggle with double batches (40 litre +).


----------



## geoffi (4/5/09)

The NASA burners might not win on gas efficiency, but they are great on the time efficiency. In any case, I'd say I get four or five double batches out of one 8.5kg bottle, which seems pretty good to me. The amount of time you need to run it flat out is pretty short, as it pumps out so much heat and gets you up to your temps or boil so quickly.


----------



## bear09 (4/5/09)

Carbonator said:


> Just a guess with the 3 ring camping burner, a "rolling boil" over 6 hours will cost 25-30 litres of LPG and about $5 with elec.
> 
> Still OPEN FLOOR for opinions on this, as I have not experimented with different burners.




Get clever and get a plumber to come and hook up your 3 ring burner onto Natural Gas. Cheap as and limitless (well until we run out of fossil fuels)


----------



## geoffi (4/5/09)

bear09 said:


> Get clever and get a plumber to come and hook up your 3 ring burner onto Natural Gas. Cheap as and limitless (well until we run out of fossil fuels)




Only natural gas in my neighbourhood...


----------



## QldKev (4/5/09)

paulwolf350 said:


> You are probably right, but that is how he runs it for making lead sinkers, 3 ring and an adjustable high pressure reg, pretty sure it is adjustable from 0 - 35 psi in very small increments, might be something like one off a lpg oxy set. Pretty sure it is very inefficient and uses mega gas when turned up
> 
> what reg are you running kev, $2 a brew I can live with, just dont want to burn 1/2 a bottle a brew.
> 
> Paul



I'm running the standard bbq low pressure reg, from Bunnings. Just doing a brew now and ran out of LPG lol... OK didn't make 10 brews. 

also

4 or 5 doubles is about the same LPG usage as what I got from my 3 ring burner (9 x singles). So not much difference in the LPG usage, just a good time savings with the more powerful burner.

QldKev


----------



## QldKev (4/5/09)

BennyBrewster said:


> Presently I use a Nasa burner and it boils my 30 liter batches in under 15 minutes no worries.
> 
> However I'm curious as to how much heat I'm wasting using the stand that burner came mounted on. I assume some science has gone into determining how far the stand holds a flat bottom pot away from the flame to get the most out of the burner. I'm using converted kegs and due to the concave bottom and the collar that it sits would be further from the flame than a standard flat bottom pot.
> 
> ...



Never having used a NASA not sure. With the low pressure ring burners I know the most efficient spot is where the flame turns from blue to yellow.

QldKev


----------



## Dr Excess (11/5/09)

Can anyone tell me the power output of a NASA burner? Burners in the UK I've seen recommended come in at around 8.5 Kw/ 30 000 btu/hr and I'm looking to compare this with the NASA,

Cheers

D


----------



## white.grant (11/5/09)

Dr Excess said:


> Can anyone tell me the power output of a NASA burner? Burners in the UK I've seen recommended come in at around 8.5 Kw/ 30 000 btu/hr and I'm looking to compare this with the NASA,
> 
> Cheers
> 
> D



Grain and grape advertise the high pressure NASA burners at 40mj/hour or around 40,000btu.

cheers

grant


----------



## QldKev (11/5/09)

I thought the Nasa would have been higer than 40mj. I'm running a 3 ring burner which is rated at 32m/j ( 30,331 btu)

QldKev


----------



## geoffi (11/5/09)

I've seen NASA, aka turkey burners rated to between 150K and 200K BTU. They certainly heat an equivalent volume of water/wort several times faster than a three-ring burner.


----------



## chappo1970 (11/5/09)

QldKev said:


> -- I just checked my brew book and can confirm I have had 9 brews on the same bottle.
> 
> But we are now talking within $1 a brew.
> 
> ...



With my Rambo which is 50hj/hr I get 9 double batch brews per 8.5 kg. It will will boil 54lt of say from 70C at mash out in about 10-15 mins



QldKev said:


> ...with the more powerful burners you will result in a larger waste of lpg/heat due to the rate of absorbsion. So even thou you get to boil quicker you get less batches from the LPG bottle.
> 
> QldKev


Gauging by what else has been said on this thread 9 doubles per 8.5kg bottle is not over the top consumption wise. In fact I open it right up to hop it on to the boil and then back it way off to maintain a nice rolling boil.

Rambo Specs

*Description:* 
This is a Rambo HPA100LPKIT with Piezo Ignition.
Comes complete with 1.8m braided hose & medium pressure Regulator.
The perfect burner for AG Brewing

*Overall Dimensions
*Height 168mm
Width  312mm
Depth over control knob 498mm

*Included in kit
*1 x HPA100LP Medium Pressure Burner
1 x MPRLFT16 Med/High Pressure Regulator (not adjustable).
1 x RHS005 Stainless Steel Class 'd' Medium Pressure Braided Hose

Gas consumption 0.98kg/hr


----------



## Midnight Brew (18/8/11)

Digging up an old thread.

This was my experiment to find out evaporation rates and a test run of my setup.

Specs
All Grain BIAB
80L Ali Pot (Robinox)
32Jet Mongolian Burner
Adjustable Reg (Keg King)
70L of Rainwater at 12.5C

35C @ 15 mins
58C @ 30 mins
72C @ 40 mins (Strike Temp)
100C @ 60 mins

Lost 6L-7L of water to evaporation over 60 mins at a boil so around 9% evap rate.
So with a 90 min boil I expect to lose around 10 L.

Gas used: Just under half a 9kg LPG bottle so I'd be using around 2-3kg of gas an hour.

Things to consider:
Rainwater temp is lower then ambient tap water temp. Also use of hot tap water would have sped things up.
Garage door was open and it was a little windy so may have slowed things down.
These specs are for a double batch at around 55L of packaged beer, I plan on doing singles to start.

Question
Is this efficient use of LPG? If not is there anything I can do to make it more efficient? (Perhaps block up a few jets with bolts to divert the flame more towards the center of the pot)

Cheers
Midnight Brew


----------



## glassgrenade (18/8/11)

Not really. That's the level of use I used to get until i read a post about some bloke moving his mongoliana bit closer. Now I can get 4 double batches from a single bottle of gas, sometimes four and a half. Now I jut gotta find a cheap source of gas.


----------



## Pennywise (18/8/11)

Mash temps are a bit higher than 12.5 degrees so I think you'll have much better numbers regarding gas in an actual brew run


----------



## QldKev (19/8/11)

Midnight Brew said:


> Digging up an old thread.
> 
> This was my experiment to find out evaporation rates and a test run of my setup.
> 
> ...




How far is the jets from the base of the pot, the Mongolians need to be fairly close. ekul halved his gas usage wafter moving it closer.


QldKev


----------



## Smdafli (1/11/11)

G'Day guys

I too am working out what to purchase for my BIAB setup.
I am lucky enough to have natural gas plumbed to the back of my house and i've been looking for a burner to use with a CUB keg as my mash tun

found this on ebay but says it is on suitable for LPG. pardon my ignorance but does this mean I wouldn't be able to use it with my Natural Gas outlet??

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/4-RING-CAST-IRO...1e67e4373d#shId

Cheers


----------



## stux (1/11/11)

MikeyBoy said:


> G'Day guys
> 
> I too am working out what to purchase for my BIAB setup.
> I am lucky enough to have natural gas plumbed to the back of my house and i've been looking for a burner to use with a CUB keg as my mash tun
> ...



I assume you'd have to get it rejetted

Mongolian burners can be used on LPG or Natural Gas (as an option)
http://www.beerbelly.com.au/burners.html


----------



## ekul (1/11/11)

I don't think that will work, i think gas bottles and natural gas are different and need different sized holes.

As for your choice of burner- I used to have one of these and it was terrible, took so long to get to the boil and was really sooty. 

If you ever plan on upgrading to a bigger pot i would buy a nice big burner. I have a 32jet mongolian burner and it is great. I can do single (23L) batches with it but i also can do 100L batches with it. I reckon i could even do 200L batches with it if i had a big enough pot. The guy i bought it from said that it could be used to boil 400L if i wanted to. If the biggest size that you will ever consider is double (80L pot) then a 23jet mongolian will work well

Having the future in mind is a good thing to do. When i started brewing i was using a 2 ring burner like the one pictured, then i was using two of these because it didn't work very well. Then i bought a 4 ring burner and this was only just enough and extremely sooty. Then i wanted to do doubles and the 4 ring was only barely working. It took forever to get to the boil and when it got there is was very crappy. Brewdays would take 7-8 hours.

I got sick of it and bought the biggest burner i could find, a 32 jet mongolian. Doing things on the cheap can sometimes be expensive. As witrh all things, spending the money on the right piece of equipment first is the cheapest way to go  I got my burner from www.keeferbros.com.au They also have burners specifically for natural gas.

I have heard italian spiral burners are pretty good. Here's the cheapest one i've ever seen http://www.leeswarehouse.com/shopCart.asp?productID=636

Or you could get an over the side element and go electric.


----------

