Backlane All Grain!

[Backlane Brewery]

Well, a fruitful weekend!
Went to Tradelink Plumbing Supply in St Kilda Rd on Saturday morning, picked up an easy hooker, some pipe, t-piece, clamps, comp. fitting & in line ball valve= $52.00 This was apparently trade price, the guy who served me has a mate who brews & was interested/pleased to help.
Then to a catering supply place in Carlisle St- 20l SS pot=$14.99
Dropped it off at the brewery then went over to Johnno's place to watch/help/learn while he did a partial mash brew. Very interesting, he even managed to get it a bit stuck so I could see what that looks like. The NASA burner in full flight is a beautiful thing, and his brews were very good too.
Sunday, out to Bunnings- they have cheaper plumbing fittings, which pissed me off, :angry: but they also have cheap Eskys. 40l=$39.98. Also do copper for $6.00 a metre, the guy said he will happily cut & bend it for me on site, so a $30 immersion chiller will be the next purchase.
Thermometer off ebay should arrive this week. Will be putting it all together on Good Friday, and working out grain bills for the first brews.

Maybe will have to change the name to BackGrain Brewery soon!

 

[mikem108]

Nice work and good to see you have freindly hardware staff. In the football stadium sized place I have to shop at you have to run and tackle an assistant just to get the same answer "its in the plumbing section" Yeah I know that but where?- I love all the other excuses
....we don't do stainless
...we don't sell washers
....there's nothing in 3/8" etc. etc.
I had to go to about 15 different places to get some of my brewery happening.

 

[ausdb]

Sunday, out to Bunnings- they have cheaper plumbing fittings, which pissed me off,

Interesting in Perth Tradelink are normally cheaper

Also do copper for $6.00 a metre, the guy said he will happily cut & bend it for me on site, so a $30 immersion chiller will be the next purchase.

Ring a few of the refrigeration wholesalers and check their price on 1/2" and 3/8" copper before you buy. Also I am really suprised Bunnings are offering to to help you do anything, their service here in the West is pretty average!

Cheers
Ausdb

 

[warrenlw63]

Interesting in Perth Tradelink are normally cheaper


Cheers
Ausdb

[post="49940"][/post]​

Got the same impression ausdb, Melb. Tradelink are cheaper too.

You can also glean quite good (expert) advice from them. OTOH Salespeople at Bunnings are just a bunch of numbnuts IMO. :angry:

Going to Tradelink is like going to your HBS for beer stuff. Going to Bunnings is like going to BigW for your HB stuff.

Warren -

 

[Backlane Brewery]

The real stinger was the easy hooker- paid $26.00 for a metre long one, then saw (what looked to my untrained eye like) the same thing for $11.00. The ball valve was only $10.00 though.
Overall, within budget, within time frame, and confident I can put it together and make it work. Went for idiot proof as far as possible, like t-piece & clamps to hook up the manifold rather than solder or screw fittings.
Now I need to work out a few 15-18l grain bills, for a pale, a bitter & a stout. There are no HB shops within miles of where we live, so I want to get a few made up and save having to travel every time I brew. Any suggestions gratefully accepted.

 

[Ross]

Before splashing out on copper tube at $6 a metre, try your local scrapyards... I sold this all the time before I sold up... & got a 10m coil from another scrapyard for $10 a few months ago when I made my chiller...

IT WAS ACTUALLY 15m...

 

[warrenlw63]

Just be a little wary of the origin of the copper.

I bought 5 metres of 2nd hand copper from a former colleague for $20. Bargain? Yes. However I made a counterflow chiller from this copper and managed to infect every batch I used it for. This was after some very thorough cleaning.

Scrapyards are a good idea just be a little mindful of what "may" have passed through the copper. :excl:

Warren -

 

[Backlane Brewery]

Thanks for the tip, Ross, but again, this is a function of where we live...as far as I know there are no scrap yards left in inner Melbourne, you'd have to head way out to the 'burbs to find anything like that.
$6.00/m for 1/2 inch may be expensive compared to what you can find it for, but it's within budget and easily available.

 

[Justin]

Backlane, I'd go longer than 5m for an immersion chiller-don't skimp here because if it's not long enough your either going to have to join it or start again. By the time you factor in the lengths to come out of the bends and then up over the side of your kettle your 5m's is going to run out real quick-you'd be surprised how much length a couple of coils chews up. An example, I bought 2m of 1/2" pipe from bunnings which was just two/three coils of pipe-the bunnings bloke looked at it and guessed-yeah thats about 2m of pipe-when I got home I unrolled it and it was 6-7m long .

I have 8m of 3/8" and a couple of metres of 1/2" that I attached to the 3/8" with some creative soldering and it's enough for my chiller with Tassie temp water but with only 5m's you'll only have a few coils before you need to straighten out up over the sides. I'd consider 9 meters (half an 18m coil) to be the minium for an immersion.

My opinion only, do what you like but I reckon others will back me up here.

Cheers, Justin

 

[Backlane Brewery]

Cheers Justin, think I got the 5 metre idea from the brewiki chiller gallery- maybe it was for a CFWC? Happy to take advice from someone who's been there/done that.
Still lots more to figure out- our water is cold, but fairly low pressure, which I think should be OK. Will I need to stick a big length of wire or something down it to cause extra turbulence or not? Will we need to make some sort of pre-chiller? How will the plastic hose fittings attach to the copper?
This is one reason why we decided to do this upgrade in stages, rather than rush at it like a bull at a gate.

 

[AndrewQLD]

I used a whole 18 mt of 1/2 inch coil foe my immersion chiller, cools 40 lt wort to just above tap temp in 30 minutes. The bigger the better and the quicker it will cool.

Andrew

 

[warrenlw63]

Did the same thing Andrew.

The more the merrier. Tradelink sold me an 18m coil IIRC it cost me about $65. half inch copper tubing comes in two grades.

Once again only guessing here I think you can get water grade and gas grade. Gas being the slightly higher quality (??) Water grade was a little cheaper. That's the one I wound up buying.

Warren -

 

[Ross]

Just be a little wary of the origin of the copper.

I bought 5 metres of 2nd hand copper from a former colleague for $20. Bargain? Yes. However I made a counterflow chiller from this copper and managed to infect every batch I used it for. This was after some very thorough cleaning.

Scrapyards are a good idea just be a little mindful of what "may" have passed through the copper. :excl:

Warren -

[post="49951"][/post]​

Good point warren - but the tubing I'm talking about is brand new refrigeration tube - generally still sealed in it's packet.

Here's my chiller - wrapped it around an old oil tin & then attached to a boat bilge pump. I emmerse this in cold water & recircultate (tank water here, so no wastage wanted). This chills my brew down to 18c in about 20 mins. Also lets you chill right down to lager temps if you so desire - took all of 30 mins to knock up once I had the bits.

 

[Gough]

Yep, another vote for the 18 metre length. Mine works really efficintly. Very happy with it...

Shawn.

 

[Backlane Brewery]

Ross, trying to see how you attached the hose to the copper- worm clamps?
This is all good, guys, thanks a lot. Keep it coming.

Still looking for recipes, BTW. Found a pale of Palmer's that looks good, and managed to scale down one on Beertools

 

[GMK]

backlane

Dave at goliath's - no affiliation - www.brewgoliath.com.au - sells complete counterflow wort chiller all made up for around 85.00.

Some mates have one - and think they are really good and excellent value - sure beats trying to build one your self.....and usually cheaper.

 

[Ross]

no clamps at all - didn't need them...

Just used a couple to make the coil a bit more rigid, but these wern't probably really needed either...

 

[Backlane Brewery]

I have no idea if I did this right. Also, I am assuming that the mash is 60 minutes at 68oC.

Anyway, advice/comments welcome.
edit- have just noticed the IBU is about a third of what I want...


Brewer: BLB
Beer: APA Style: American Pale Ale
Type: All grain Size: 18 liters
Color: 4 HCU (~4 SRM) Bitterness: 11 IBU
OG: 1.040 FG: 1.008 Alcohol: 4.1% v/v (3.2% w/w)

Grain: 1.70kg American 2-row
31g American crystal 10L

Mash: 80% efficiency

Boil: minutes SG 1.048 15 liters
0.77kg Light dry malt extract

Hops: 5.8g Centennial (10.5% AA, 60 min.)
9.3g Liberty (4% AA, 45 min.)
8g Liberty (aroma)

 

[warrenlw63]

Good point warren - but the tubing I'm talking about is brand new refrigeration tube - generally still sealed in it's packet.

[post="49969"][/post]​

Sorry 'bout that Ross. If you can get it new at those sort of prices. It's a bloody score mate!

Your chiller looks the goods. :super: I do a similar thing. I usually only run tap water for about 20mins. Then I've got an aquarium pump in an esky with an ice-slurry and metho. I just recirculate this for another 20 mins. This usually gets ales down to about 18c. In winter I can generally achieve lager pitching temps. with the same practice.

If the weather's really hot. I run the tap water through a pre-chiller first. This gets it down a few degrees. Then just use the standard ice-water and pump methods.

We're on water restrictions down here in Melbourne so you can't be too greedy.

Warren -

 

[shmick]

Thanks for the info warrenlw63,

The 2 different types of common copper pipe have different wall thicknesses - it's nothing to do with quality as such.

Thinner walls = cheaper = easier to bend without cracking = cheaper = cheaper

I've built an 8m immersion chiller and a 13m CFWC from 1/2" Cu.
The 8m IC works ok for small/partial boils. Cools 13litres in 15mins.

The CFWC would definitely benefit from being another 5m longer or by using 3/8" Cu.

Our home tap water runs at 20C and the chilled wort ends up about 25C - a bit higher than required.
I now run the cooling water thru the immersion chiller sitting an ice bath first then on to the CFWC. If I run the kettle tap full open my wort ends up 15-18C and when 1/2 closed about 10C.
The faster the cooling water flows with this set up the warmer the end result (less time in the ice bath?).
I'm not that fussy, 16-20C seems to work for me for Ales.