Braumeister NEXTGEN Build

[Maheel]

Kymba

how does the liquid get to the "bottom" of your "malt pipe" is there something joined to your barb in side the malt pot ?

 

[kymba]

how does the liquid get to the "bottom" of your "malt pipe" is there something joined to your barb in side the malt pot ?

I have a small length of silicon hose that jams onto the barb to get the wort to return close to the bottom, although I couldn't find it for the maiden voyage

Just thinking aloud, but I could even make a small copper sparge ring to sit on the bottom of the malt pot. When the malt pot is inverted it would then be on top of the grain. Would just need to funnel or pump some sparge water all up in there

 

[lukec]

Here is a link to short vid of my braumeisterssecond brew. Belgian strong ale.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NP0mbvcPpJU

The lid isn't finished yet but other that that all is going well. I'm pretty happy with it.

 

[matho]

Here is a link to short vid of my braumeisterssecond brew. Belgian strong ale.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NP0mbvcPpJU

The lid isn't finished yet but other that that all is going well. I'm pretty happy with it.

Awesome job Luke, well done

cheers steve

 

[[email protected]]

Hey Guys,
There seems to be quite a few here who are planning to, or have already built something similar to Matho's Brewmeiser clone of a clone if I can call it that?

Is it worth those posting here or move to another post just their volume ideas?

IE: what size batch are they after, what size kettle and malt pipe, how many elements, wattage, how many pumps?

I am planning on

1. 60 l batches ideally but may end up with 40l
2. Kettle 100l? - Haven't got enough info yet
3. Malt pipe 50 l - as above
4. 2 elements, 2000w and 2600w
5. Two little brown pumps 24 v


Swampy

 

[matho]

Hey swampy it has been dicussed before In this thread, its a balancing act to get it right, the figures quoted in the PDF are just a guide and can be changed a bit also there is a reason for the braumeister being those dimensions. I would start by working out how much wort you want and whats the highest gravity you normally brew, there are ways of getting higher gravities out of a system with a few extra steps but you want your system to work well for the majority of brews. With the finished volume and gravity you can work out the grain required, and then the size of the malt pipe and so on, you will probably go back and forth a number of times before you settle on some sizes, then if you want to use pots you are going to have to find the best fit and go with them. Hope this helps you get started on working things out anymore questions just post it here in this thread.

cheers steve

 

[[email protected]]

Hey swampy it has been dicussed before In this thread, its a balancing act to get it right, the figures quoted in the PDF are just a guide and can be changed a bit also there is a reason for the braumeister being those dimensions. I would start by working out how much wort you want and whats the highest gravity you normally brew, there are ways of getting higher gravities out of a system with a few extra steps but you want your system to work well for the majority of brews. With the finished volume and gravity you can work out the grain required, and then the size of the malt pipe and so on, you will probably go back and forth a number of times before you settle on some sizes, then if you want to use pots you are going to have to find the best fit and go with them. Hope this helps you get started on working things out anymore questions just post it here in this thread.

cheers steve

Hi Matho,

OK, thanks for that....I obviously missed that page. That thread (and this one) have been great to read.
Looking forward to putting it all together.

Cheers

Swampy

 

[angus_grant]

Well I have finally started chopping up my pots. Some small progress, but not bad considering I have a 12 day old boy in the house.

Will start chopping the bottom out of the malt pipe tomorrow, all things going well.

I will have a running blog on my build on my website and post summaries here.

The lifting points are 316 stainless eye bolts which I had to shorten down. I have not done a leak test yet, but can always use some silicon seals.

My malt pipe with the lifting points installed:

Inside shot of malt pipe:

Shot of the two pots:

I have about 45mm space between the pots for the pump inlet, ball valve, and heating element. Bit squishy but Matho fitted his into 35mm, so I should manage... <_<

 

[matho]

congrats on the son angus

it was a tight squeeze I had to take a bit off the skin fitting to make it fit but with an extra 10mm you should be right, there is also a bit of space where the pot curves around to the bottom.

cheers steve

 

[angus_grant]

And some electrical work today. Got the heat sinks and 25A solid state relays installed into the control box. Still have a fair bit of electronics to install into the box:
-> USB plug in box and USB data acquisition device
-> data plug in box data and power lines for thermo-probe
-> One dual GPO for input and output voltage for heating element (voltage will be triggered by relay which will be controlled software based on temps)
-> One dual GPO for input and output voltage for recirculating pump (voltage will be triggered by relay which will be controlled by software based on mashing schedule)

So basically there will be control software on Windows laptop which read temps from temp probe wired into the USB device. Software will use these temps to control heating element and recirc pump.

Some pics of the relays installed.

Heat sinks installed on rear of control box (possibly overkill for the recirc pump as it will almost always be on during mash, but necessary for heating element which will be switched off and on fairly often)

SSRs inside the control box.

Blog post

 

[Yorg]

Angus, have you already talked about your windows based software approach elsewhere? If not, can you say some more about it, and where you are at with it?

 

[angus_grant]

Haven't talked about it anywhere else. I'll wait until I get a whole lot more along in the build before creating a separate thread.

I have a Windows laptop and have done away with the NetDuino. I have purchased a USB data acquisition device which has 8 outputs which can be used as an Analogue or Digital inputs/outputs. I can also wire up a DS18B20 to one of the inputs and the board firmware reads the data signal and returns a temperature. So no need to bugger around with 1-pin communication, converting data, etc, etc.

The USB device creates a virtual COM device when plugged in so all commands and data is processed over the COM device. All data returned is in ASCII (you can tell the board to return data in binary). Commands are sent to the pins using a set of 1 character constants defined by the board manufacturer.

The control software is a C# application. dotNET has fairly nice support for COM devices. At the moment it is a very basic application which reads the temp and turns one of the solid state relays on until a target temp is reached and then turns off the relay.

I am going to wire up one of the GPOs tomorrow and then plug in our kitchen kettle. I have some sample C# PID code so will muck around with raising the kettle temp to various target temps and see how the accuracy of the PID code is. I am sure I will have a fair bit of mucking around with the various constants to get the PID code accurate. And then go through the whole process again when I get the heating element installed into the main pot.

USB device. JayCar also have a USB data acquisition kit which you have to solder up yourself.

 

[angus_grant]

man, where has the edit option gone?? I just changed over from my Mac to the Windows laptop and the Edit option is not there.

Code example for switching on Channel 4 which is the control signal for the relay:
[codebox]if (mCurrentTemperature < Convert.ToDecimal(this.txtTarget.Text))

{

IO8ComDevice.Write(Constants.IO8.Channel4.DigitalHigh);

}[/codebox]

Code example for reading temp from device in ComDevice_DataReceived event handler (temp is returned as "28.95?C")
[codebox]string DataReceived = IO8ComDevice.ReadLine();
mCurrentTemperature = Convert.ToDecimal(DataReceived.Split("?".ToCharArray())[0].ToString());[/codebox]

 

[Edak]

I am finally back home from an extended holiday in NYC and need to get this thing finished so I can brew some beer.

The biggest things I have left to do are the element and the base, but I still can't decide on whether I will get a 2250W or 2500W element. I am a little concerned about using the 2500W element and the pump on one power outlet, but I am also concerned about whether the 2250W element will have a slow ramp time for my 20L batches. I will buy it from TEE because Matho believes them to be a suitable supplier and they have been friendly to date.

Regarding the base, I have no welding skills/experience and am very curious about whether I could make a base using any other method. I have thus far spared no expense on using SS for everything else and need to build the base before I build the electronics enclosure.

Would like a little motivation/assistance here. :beer:

 

[Sam England]

The biggest things I have left to do are the element and the base, but I still can't decide on whether I will get a 2250W or 2500W element. I am a little concerned about using the 2500W element and the pump on one power outlet, but I am also concerned about whether the 2250W element will have a slow ramp time for my 20L batches. I will buy it from TEE because Matho believes them to be a suitable supplier and they have been friendly to date.

Regarding the base, I have no welding skills/experience and am very curious about whether I could make a base using any other method. I have thus far spared no expense on using SS for everything else and need to build the base before I build the electronics enclosure.

Arvo Edak,
I'm sourcing the parts at the moment as well and going along the lines of the Braubushka?? concept. This allows a gap under the malt pipe and you don't need to clamp it down through the centre of the pot. I'm then using 2 x 2200W elements controlled with separate SSR's so that I can have them wired on two power loops to keep the amperage down. My rig is also going to be a double keg batch (~40L), but capable of doing single 25L batches as well which means I can just turn one of the elements off or not use it at all. Still designing at this point, but it looks like it could be a goer. As for a base I'm planning on putting it on a designated trolley and building a secure enclosure with a PC fan on the heatsinks, so I can't really help you with the base design.

Good luck with it.

Cheers,
Sam

 

[Edak]

Arvo Edak,
I'm sourcing the parts at the moment as well and going along the lines of the Braubushka?? concept. This allows a gap under the malt pipe and you don't need to clamp it down through the centre of the pot. I'm then using 2 x 2200W elements controlled with separate SSR's so that I can have them wired on two power loops to keep the amperage down. My rig is also going to be a double keg batch (~40L), but capable of doing single 25L batches as well which means I can just turn one of the elements off or not use it at all. Still designing at this point, but it looks like it could be a goer. As for a base I'm planning on putting it on a designated trolley and building a secure enclosure with a PC fan on the heatsinks, so I can't really help you with the base design.

Good luck with it.

Cheers,
Sam

Thanks Blue, I have already finished all of the design and assembly of the pot, malt pipe, fittings and pump so I can't change my design now.
Perhaps a 2250W will be suitable but I didn't want to go any lower than the braumester (2400W) and wanted a nice trustworthy element which I can be sure will last many brews without tainting them. I suppose that I could run the risk of using a 2500W one, after all there are many other appliances which use 2500W and are available here in Australia. I am betting that they don't require special power considerations...

 

[ArnieW]

Thanks Blue, I have already finished all of the design and assembly of the pot, malt pipe, fittings and pump so I can't change my design now.
Perhaps a 2250W will be suitable but I didn't want to go any lower than the braumester (2400W) and wanted a nice trustworthy element which I can be sure will last many brews without tainting them. I suppose that I could run the risk of using a 2500W one, after all there are many other appliances which use 2500W and are available here in Australia. I am betting that they don't require special power considerations...

Hi Edak,

I've been running an electric kettle for about 10 years. A decent rolling boil on 40-50 litres can be achieved with a 3600W element, and 2400W for 20 litres gives the added benefit of faster ramping times and scope for a more vigorous boil if needed.

I don't think the 2250W element would be too small, but the 2500W won't be over the top either.

A correctly wired 10 A GPO circuit will have multiple outlets on a wire and breaker rated at 16A. While there is not meant to be any single device drawing more than 10A (2400W), it means you can run a 2400W heater and a desk lamp on the same circuit without any issue. Running that heater and an electric jug on the same one will trip the breaker though.

So under normal circumstances, either of those elements and a pump and a power supply with arduino etc will be fine.

There are two things that I consider vital for any electric brewery - breakers (not fuses) and residual current detector to ensure any earth leakage doesn't run via the brewer's ticker.

And the usual warnings apply <_< - if anyone is unsure about 240V, don't mess with it. Get a mate who does know to help and steer clear of the brew until the job is safely done. B)

 

[angus_grant]

I was wondering about the range of the heating element as well. The way I figure it is that
-> yes, circuits can take more than 10A being drawn, but not much more.
-> yes, kettles can draw more than 10 amps, but only for 5 minutes while they boil the water.
-> standard GPOs are rated for 10 amps

We are going to be boiling for 60 minutes flat out (at least), and there is more chance that in that 60 minutes something else may draw power on the same circuit and trip the entire circuit than the 5 minutes for the kettle. And the circuit being run at over 10amps for that hour is placing strain on wiring, GPOs, etc, etc. I am going to stick to a 2400W element.

Better to be safe than sorry, or at least having to switch the circuit breaker back on again, get the system to start up from where it stopped, etc...

And no-one has mentioned insurance. I've no idea if running a 15amp boiler on a 10amp circuit voids your insurance. But the boiler being home made (10A or 15A) probably voids insurance anyways.. :huh:

 

[Edak]

And no-one has mentioned insurance. I've no idea if running a 15amp boiler on a 10amp circuit voids your insurance. But the boiler being home made (10A or 15A) probably voids insurance anyways.. :huh:

Probably if it can be deemed to be the cause of the loss of property..

 

[Edak]

I have finally decided that I would get the H03797 from Thermal Products in Thomastown. It's about $138 in GST, 2400W and will be bent to my specification. The other crowd (TEE) wanted to charge me about $170 plus an additional $35 to pick up an element from them and that's highway robbery.

The one I am picking up is made of incoloy 800 so will be perfectly suited for wort.