Braumeister NEXTGEN Build

[eamonnfoley]

anyone know of a 2400W element that will suit a 1/2" BSP. Most I've seem suited to 1", or weldless.

Reason being I have a spare port on my pot, so wouldnt mind going electric without having to drill it. Might contact your guy at Helios and see what he can do.

 

[Tony]

I dont like your chances of getting one that will screw into 1/2" BSP.

 

[booargy]

anyone know of a 2400W element that will suit a 1/2" BSP. Most I've seem suited to 1", or weldless.

Reason being I have a spare port on my pot, so wouldnt mind going electric without having to drill it. Might contact your guy at Helios and see what he can do.

Let us know what they are worth COMPACT SCREW-IN IMMERSION HEATERS

 

[angus_grant]

Steve: I was having a look at your first page to see how you handled fitting the ball valve and not interfering with the heating element. I noticed you used one of the skin fittings to drastically reduce the inside protrusion. A very nice solution. I assume you had to cut down the length of the threaded part of the fitting sticking out of the pot so the ball valve didn't stick out a ridiculous amount. Or at least mine would if I just put it straight on.

I see on quite a lot of the 3V systems they have hop blockers or pickup tubes to minimise sucking up the trub left over after the boil. Does not having either of these devices cause problems for you? I have been using a hop sock for all my extract brews and wonder whether that has affected the hop utilisation. It certainly leaves very minimal crap left over in the boil

 

[matho]

Steve: I was having a look at your first page to see how you handled fitting the ball valve and not interfering with the heating element. I noticed you used one of the skin fittings to drastically reduce the inside protrusion. A very nice solution. I assume you had to cut down the length of the threaded part of the fitting sticking out of the pot so the ball valve didn't stick out a ridiculous amount. Or at least mine would if I just put it straight on.

I see on quite a lot of the 3V systems they have hop blockers or pickup tubes to minimise sucking up the trub left over after the boil. Does not having either of these devices cause problems for you? I have been using a hop sock for all my extract brews and wonder whether that has affected the hop utilisation. It certainly leaves very minimal crap left over in the boil

yeah mate I did cut down the thread and I also reduced the size of the flange on the inside so I could get it closer to the bottom of the pot. I use hop socks when brewing with pellets and that reduces the amount of trub at the end of the brew, I haven't found too much of a difference in bitterness using hop socks.

cheers steve

 

[angus_grant]

:icon_cheers: One more little piece of the puzzle solved. Solving puzzles is proving to be the easier part. Actually building it is the hard bit due to lack of spare time. he he.

I hope to knock up the ball valve assembly tonight then. Once that is fitted I can start doing some BIABs using my boil controller software (which I think it pretty cool stuff) for hop additions alarms. The boil controller software imports beer.xml files straight into a grid and has an overall count-down timer as well as individual count-down timers for each addition (hops, whirlfloc, spices, whatever is in the beermate recipe). It even highlights in red additions which have less than 10 minutes left. No double configuration for me!! B)

And the software also controls the heating element via SSR's so it will then turn the element off when boil time is complete. At some point (possibly late 2014 - he he) I will automate a pump to start pumping water through immersion chiller to start the cooling process as well.

 

[angus_grant]

Even more progress. Wow, stuff is happening. I wired the element up and some test boils proved that I did need to work on insulation to actually achieve a boil. It would sit on around 98 degrees bubbling mildly. So off to BCF, $15 for a double camp mattress and another $15 for some bungee straps. 30 minutes with a texta, scissors, and a scalpel and voila:

So things are somewhat improved. The temp ramping is a lot quicker with 80 degrees achieved about 15 minutes faster than before with no insulation but still did not achieve a good rolling boil. Was slightly stronger than before though. I had my pot sitting on two silicon pads from the kitchen and when I shifted the pot, the wooden bench was quite warm. So I cut up some of the camp mat as a base insulation and that achieved a slightly stronger boil but still not a good rolling boil. Bench was still a bit warm so perhaps another layer of mat.

As soon as I put the lid on, bam good boil which is obviously not a solution. So I think I will have to go with floating a pie tin or something to cut down on the surface area to achieve a good boil. Edak has built a domed lid for his system with a hole in the top and drainage system to drain off the condensation which seems a very good solution so I will start looking out for stainless bowls.

What worries me is that this was only with 20L of water, not 28L of wort...

At least it is progress!!! B)

 

[Edak]

Even more progress. Wow, stuff is happening. I wired the element up and some test boils proved that I did need to work on insulation to actually achieve a boil. It would sit on around 98 degrees bubbling mildly. So off to BCF, $15 for a double camp mattress and another $15 for some bungee straps. 30 minutes with a texta, scissors, and a scalpel and voila:

So things are somewhat improved. The temp ramping is a lot quicker with 80 degrees achieved about 15 minutes faster than before with no insulation but still did not achieve a good rolling boil. Was slightly stronger than before though. I had my pot sitting on two silicon pads from the kitchen and when I shifted the pot, the wooden bench was quite warm. So I cut up some of the camp mat as a base insulation and that achieved a slightly stronger boil but still not a good rolling boil. Bench was still a bit warm so perhaps another layer of mat.

As soon as I put the lid on, bam good boil which is obviously not a solution. So I think I will have to go with floating a pie tin or something to cut down on the surface area to achieve a good boil. Edak has built a domed lid for his system with a hole in the top and drainage system to drain off the condensation which seems a very good solution so I will start looking out for stainless bowls.

What worries me is that this was only with 20L of water, not 28L of wort...

At least it is progress!!! B)

Looking good Angus!

Yeah I found that I needed the domed lid to get a really strong boil (the difference is amazing). No dome = not a good boil (it moves about and has some small bubbles). I have a 11%+ boil off rate with this configuration and end up with about 50-100ml coming from the drain pipe. I also boil about 27-28L and usually have 80min boils, which I could reduce.
I got my big bowl from a catering supplies place and it was about $15. The hose is that really solid reinforced stuff from Bunnings which I cut zig-zagged teeth into so surface tension wouldn't prevent it going into the drain.

 

[angus_grant]

yeh, it sits on 98.7 to 99.0 degrees and can't seem to kick that last little bit to get into the boiling area. Just lotsa bubbles coming off the element and a lot of convection. As soon as the lid goes on, bam starts boiling so it looks like the domed lid will be the next thing on the list.

Thanks for the tip on the hose. I might see if I can wrangle a ex-sheety mate to weld up something for me.

It's great to be making progress. Our little fellow seems to be settling down for his night sleeps a lot better so that frees up spare time to work on projects.

 

[angus_grant]

Question for everyone: I know there are the Arduino shields available for Matho's kit. I have been using a breadboard to prototype my wiring. I am now ready to move this wiring onto a more permanent board and install it into my enclosure. I don't really think I want to use a PCB company as they cost around $30 and when all I really want to do is join up some ground, 5V connections and wire up a DS18B20 then a PCB board seems a bit of an overkill. And not really playing into the whole Miser thing...

So how about one of these boards from Jaycar as the final installation board. Or perhaps this board? Any other suggestions?

 

[bonj]

Question for everyone: I know there are the Arduino shields available for Matho's kit. I have been using a breadboard to prototype my wiring. I am now ready to move this wiring onto a more permanent board and install it into my enclosure. I don't really think I want to use a PCB company as they cost around $30 and when all I really want to do is join up some ground, 5V connections and wire up a DS18B20 then a PCB board seems a bit of an overkill. And not really playing into the whole Miser thing...

So how about one of these boards from Jaycar as the final installation board. Or perhaps this board? Any other suggestions?

That looks fine. You want some sort of veroboard/perfboard.

Veroboard has strips of copper joining each hole in a row (like the second one you linked). They are easier to use because you don't need to bridge the pads for each hole. To cut the strip, use a drill bit in one of the holes.

 

[angus_grant]

B) :beer:

Cheers Bonj. Off to Jaycar tonight then!! And sneaky tip about the drill bit.

Need to get my FermController software and hardware up and running to get a few batches done for Xmas drinks. My ferment Fridgemate got re-purposed to control our old air-con unit in the little fella's room. little bugger is already stealing my homebrew gear and he can't even crawl yet... he he

 

[angus_grant]

Yet another silly question.

Below is the wiring diagram for my data acquisition module. You can see the 1.5K Ohm resistor. Am I able to insert the resistor into the screw terminals with the power and signal wires? Or does the circuit require the resistor wired up before the terminals? I would be able to get away with not getting any extra wiring boards if I can insert it directly into the screw terminal.

 

[Zizzle]

Yes you can put it in the screw terminals.

But the datasheet says 4.7K for the pullup, where did 1.5K come from?

 

[angus_grant]

Last night I thought it over and over and the resistor is just to limit flow between power and signal, so crossed my fingers and wired it up. Bingo, it all worked..

The DAQ board has temperature reading from the DS18B20 built in to the board firmware and all the board documentation and datasheets talks about 1.5k resistor. Perhaps they have built-in resistors on the board or something? No idea. The DS reads 0.3 degrees lower than my digital thermometre and reads a consistent temp. I never really thought about the DS18B20 data sheet stating a 4.7K resistor is required.

So I can only figure there are some resistors on the board or they are doing something on the board to allow dropping the required resistor down to 1.5k.

 

[stux]

Was looking at the new craftbrewer 100L kettles, and I think they look perfect for a single/double/triple batch BrauMeiser

http://www.craftbrewer.com.au/shop/details.asp?PID=4769



The dimensions are apparently 460x600, which is just 20mm wider than a true BM50, and an extra 40mm in height + a domed lid. The extra height combined with trimming some of the wasted space should mean you can bump up to a 60L batch, and with a short malt pipe still be able to do a 20/23L batch, and regular doubles or super strong doubles.

The numbers just don't work out very well with my current 50x50 98L pot... and it seems like a waste of a very good pot when you don't really need the quality.

I've had a fiddle with the braumeister volume calculator...

View attachment Braumiser_Volume_Calculations_100L.xls

First two sheets are the large and small option. I'm not sure my understanding of the requirements is 100%, but basically, the CB pot seems to have a domed lid, which means the malt pipe can come right up to the rim of the pot, so I went with a 350x600 maltpipe for maximum batch sizes.

This means you can re-use a true BM seal, and it leaves 50+mm on either side of the MP for elements and plumbing.

I *think* the height excluding filters is the gap between the two filters... so I set that to height - 8... is this too little? The idea is that the wingnut and clamp down works can actually be above the rim of the pot, as there is a domed lid. And the BM uses 100mm gap at the bottom, but perhaps that can be trimmed to 6-8cm to get a bit more maximum capacity?

with a 2.8L/KG (worst case) 14.5KG of grain, which neatly gets right into the zone for a triple batch... I think. I'd prefer more capacity, but I figure, for triples you're aiming for quaffing beer in the 1.048-1.052 range, and I think that's about the right amount of grain, would depend on actual efficiency.

For doubles you can do no-sparge, and really push the OG if you want.

For a single, I'd use a small pipe, perhaps 30cm high? Not 100% sure about that, should work well up to about 6KG of grain, but I'm not sure about the volume of water required... is it too much? what sortof boil-off would you expect, Every extra cm of MP height requires more initial water...

Was thinking, perhaps its a good idea to either have an over-flow outlet half way up the MP, or perhaps a block of something inert to displace more water

Any thoughts?

 

[Zizzle]

Last night I thought it over and over and the resistor is just to limit flow between power and signal, so crossed my fingers and wired it up. Bingo, it all worked..

So I can only figure there are some resistors on the board or they are doing something on the board to allow dropping the required resistor down to 1.5k.

Rubbish. This resistor is between the 5V terminal and the data line. No other resistors in the circuit.

The resistor is a pull up resistor. The 1-wire devices operate the data line in a open-collector/ open-drain manner. That is they cannot pull the data line up to logic high. That is what the resistor is for.

This scheme is what allows the 1-wire bus to operate - multiple devices can exist on it and won't fight each other (i.e. one cannot be pulling the data line high while allow is pulling it low)

It means that when your 1-wire device is setting the data line to low, it has to sink the current though the resistor. Usually about 1mA with 4.7K - so you have about tripled it. Shouldn't be a problem but it's still a strange modification.

 

[angus_grant]

Well I am just going off the datasheet of the USB DAQ device. All their instructions and wiring diagrans talk about 1.5k resistor and it seems to be working when wired up.

The instructions do not mention running multiple temp probes on the same pin and there is no way to pass a device id in the com-port call, so maybe that is why they use a 1.5k resistor. ??

 

[Malted]

Any thoughts?

Yes that does look like a good sized pot for what you are planning.

I see no reason why you could not run the malt pipe to the top of the pot (providing the lid gives sufficient room). You never run it with the pot totally full so it would be fine. The wort just flows over the side of the malt pipe into the lower volume of wort between the two vessels so it would be all good.

50mm either side of the malt pipe is slightly more than a BM so should be fine. (~48mm either side on a 50L BM)

BM uses a 110mm gap from the base of the main vessel to the bottom of the bottom filter plate to allow for the centre element. This seems excessive but your gap will depend upon the element you source given that most have a large no bend zone near the ends of the elements. The expensive one I sourced will sit up only 30mm or so from the bottom of the pot whilst I have seen some that are 90mm or so.

An overflow in a long malt pipe to allow smaller batches to be made with that MP may lead to channeling through the grain bed. You would need many holes/overflows and then they might be a bugger to seal when you want to do a full batch. Not saying the idea won't work but the reality is that it may be a lot more moving parts etc that would require cleaning. If you went that way, perhaps a malt pipe with a number of holes at a certain height and then slip a clamping band around it that has silicone sheet on it's inside so that one band can cover and seal all the holes for use in full batch mode? You would just slip a piece of SS tube over the centre rod, so that you can limit the height that the top filter plate rises up (i.e. keeping it below the ring of holes). So it would go vertically like this: top filter plate, SS tube over centre rod, MP hold down, wingnut. This way, perhaps you could build one malt pipe that could do singles or doubles?

A minimum of 10mm of liquid above the element (in the spreadsheet) might be cutting it a bit thin. I think the short malt pipe would still do a very large single batch because if i set the height above the element to 20mm, your minimum water volume jumps up to 31L. The shorter you make the MP, the wider it is relative to height (i.e. shallower grain bed which could negatively affect clarrity of wort). I would be inclined to position the centre element (if you have one) so that you could decrease the diameter of the short malt pipe to be able to decrease the total volume and also allow a good depth of grain bed. Who says a short malt pipe and big malt pipe can't have differing diameters if the centre element allows it? (downside is that you would then need two sets of filter plates and filters).

Even with a 50L BM, the short MP produces a volume of wort that is essentially larger than a single batch (30L is kind of best for it). The 50L produces most effectively at 50L, the short malt pipe is a bit of a compromise.

Pushing the OG is not as easy as with a 3V system. Sure you can do a double batch grainbill but your gravity is still limited by the fact that you have a minimum amount of water to be used. Mashing a double and boiling down to a single is what would be better for a high OG batch. Depending upon your elements, you'd risk scortching the wort (that is why low watt density elements are the element of choice).

Edit: the high gap between the ellement and the bottom filter plate on the 50L BM could also be so as to not scortch the grain when the pump break kicks in. From what I have been able to eyeball, the centre element seems to be a higher watt density than the outer element.

 

[stux]

Thanks for your thoughts

As you worked out the real question is bottom filter plate height and small malt pipe height/width. Really think its worth pursuing the same diameter to allow reusing filter plates and seals.

Anothe idea I had re the pipe 'overflow' was to perhaps have the long malt pipe be an extension to the short malt pipe, sortof like a PVC pipe end joint. The trick would then be if fabrication is cheaper that way than getting two simple malt pipes.

I think I'll need to model the process a bit better to work out optimum small pipe size. What efficiency do you get when using the small pipe?