Dedicated Braumeister Guide, Problems & Solution Thread

[Roosterboy]

Thanks razz, I have no doubt they are quality units and the high price has more to do with currency and freight but if
I was a brewpub owner thinking of spending $ 22000 or $44000 on one I would want a service engineer at least in
Australia. I think Speidels should train a local.

 

[razz]

If you are thinking that way then a chat with the boys at Grain & Grape would be the go, they started off with a 200t model and have bought another (maybe 500 lt?)

 

[Sean_72]

Call out to the geeks.
I received my wifi module for the Braumeister, had no problems connecting and updating the Braumeister with the new firmware via my laptop but when trying to connect the Braumeister to my network I keep getting 'Error OAFD'. Any ideas? I have googled OAFD with no luck, Outside Air Floor Duct was the main response.
I have double and triple checked the password I entered, turned the Braumeister on and off, even tried putting the IP address of the router in directly.
Any ideas?

 

[razz]

Perhaps give Grain n Grape a call, they have them in stock and the boys over there a fairly knowledgeable

 

[kcurnow]

Does anyone know what kind of connector the wifi / firmware update port on the gen 2 braumeisters is? It looks to be some sort of Screw in mini DIN fitting. I'm looking to get a cable so I can update my firmware.

 

[banora brewer]

Hi guys, I used to own a 20 ltr braumeister but had to sell it, I'm getting back into brewing, not sure what to get, another braumeister or the grainfather.

 

[razz]

Never had an issue with my BM50 until today. The unit was at 89 degrees and climbing nicely to a boil when I noticed the boil timer had started. I'm guessing that the temp had been steady for two minutes and it did what it is programmed to do. No bigy, I had to abort the program and ran the unit in manual mode.

 

[Goose]

Hi guys, I used to own a 20 ltr braumeister but had to sell it, I'm getting back into brewing, not sure what to get, another braumeister or the grainfather.

I am not really qualified to comment on the GF as I only own a BM, but I will anyway. As I see it the major advantage is the controller on the BM which is pretty much set and forget after dough in to the point of removing the malt pipe prior to the boil, while with the GF you need to manually enter each step after the completion of the last.

One thing I prefer on the GF though, is the top down flow of wort through the grain bed. This has the advantage filtering the fine particles effectively which stay at the top of the grain bed when the malt pipe is removed. On the BM, the fines are trapped at the bottom of the malt pipe and alot seems to fall back into the wort as soon as the malt pipe is removed. The result is you end up boiling cloudy wort.

Flamesuit on because I know that what is important is the clarity of the wort to the fermenter, not so much the boiler, but I'd still rather be boiling clarified wort which to me is part of what a RIMS system should achieve.

 

[thewobblythong]

Never had an issue with my BM50 until today. The unit was at 89 degrees and climbing nicely to a boil when I noticed the boil timer had started. I'm guessing that the temp had been steady for two minutes and it did what it is programmed to do. No bigy, I had to abort the program and ran the unit in manual mode.

This is a known firmware issue. apparently something to do with it taking too long (slowly) to get to the boil temp, and the unit triggering into boil mode to 'avoid boiling dry'. at least that was what I was told. returned mine to Grain & Grape and they did a free firmware update and it's seemed to fix it.

 

[Bridges]

Ok 20l owners how many of you have seen grain and grapes method for getting 38litres of wort from the 20 which they've had on facebook for a while? You'll see in pics 4 and 5 the handy trivet they use whilst sparging. After a bit of searching I reckon I've tracked it down to ikea. Surprisingly only $5.

One day next week I'm going to be right near an ikea so I'm going to grab myself one. Just putting it out there if anyone else is interested as ikea stores are not everywhere and they don't sell on the web I could probably help out any interested parties. Let me know maybe I'll set up a seperate buy thread. I'd guess post would be around $10 or so.

 

[Bridges]

bumpity bump bump

 

[Black Devil Dog]

I've recently been having issues with the pumps on my 50l BM. The pumps are the blue Vortex ones
.
I bought the unit second hand about 18 months ago and noticed during the last half dozen batches or so, the pumps had occasionally been making rattling noises, especially at 70 + deg C.
During the last couple of batches, the pumps were struggling to push the wort over the top of the malt pipe at the higher temps.
After eliminating other possible causes, and reading about similar issues on the Braumeister forum, it seemed like either the impellers or pumps were going to need replacing.
I spoke to the good folk at Grain and Grape and decided to replace the impellers, being the cheaper option and all. I Also replaced the gaskets while I was at it.
Well after installing them and running the pumps for a for a while, it seems to have fixed the problem.
I'm not sure if the impellers were damaged in any way by the previous owner, I doubt it, as there were absolutely no visible signs of damage on them, or whether they became a bit unbalanced over time.

Fingers crossed that this has fixed the issue long term.

 

[reddog]

by crankcasy » Sat Jul 09, 2016 5:25 pm
Hopefully one of you guys will be able to help me out I am trying to update my BM software to 1.23 so it will accept the wifi module and solve the boil timer issue but I keep getting the following error message:

COM7...
COM8...
No supported programmers found

I have tried with two different computers one running Win 7 and the other Win 10 but I always get the say error, does anyone have any ideas?

 

[Audion]

Hi guys,

Small problem.. need to replace the temp.probe but cannot get the nut off from underneath... any tricks?

Thanks,

ken

 

[Coalminer]

Hi guys,

Small problem.. need to replace the temp.probe but cannot get the nut off from underneath... any tricks?

Thanks,

ken

Hi Ken
Make sure you lubricate the thread before trying to remove the nut
as the stainless parts will seize if they are of any reasonable age
Lubricate the new parts with something like Tef-Gel (expensive but well worth it- get it from a marine shop and the nut will never seize again)
I just replaced my sensor and had heaps of problems until I freed up the old one with WD-40
It seems our German friends don't see the need for anti-seize on S/S
Interestingly Speidel was surprised that I managed to get 88 brews out of the original sensor!
Removal would have been a lot simpler if the new sensor came with a new nut and washer considering the price

https://www.whitworths.com.au/main_itemdetail.asp?cat=174&item=59735&intAbsolutePage=

There is another similar cheaper product called Duralac but it dries out after a while and is not as good
but the one linked never dries and is usually used between dissimilar metals such as S/S fittings on an alloy boat

 

[Cervantes]

Interestingly Speidel was surprised that I managed to get 88 brews out of the original sensor!

So how many brews do they expect to get from a temperature probe?

Maybe I need to get a spare in now just in case.

 

[Dan2]

So how many brews do they expect to get from a temperature probe?

Maybe I need to get a spare in now just in case.

:unsure: Good point.
I'm about to start #70
I don't remember reading in the manual about life expectancy on the temp probe.

 

[dicko]

I have done approx 120 brews on my 20 and have not replaced the probe.

G'day Dan2 long time no see mate...I have been busy with things other than brewing.
We should catch up for a chin wag and even a beer or two.

Cheers

 

[Dan2]

I have done approx 120 brews on my 20 and have not replaced the probe.

G'day Dan2 long time no see mate...I have been busy with things other than brewing.
We should catch up for a chin wag and even a beer or two.

Cheers

That's good news - I've got at least 50 more in it then!

-re catch up - I'll give you a buzz.
Looking forward to both chin wag and two beers!

 

[neal.p]

Hi,
I'm looking at buying a 20L Brau to do 5L (20L/4=5L) recipe development. I'm thinking of adding different hop/yeast variations or even doing a separate mini-mash on the stovetop to add to a portion of the boil. Any opinions on whether the volume and variations are sound? Demi's seem like the only option at 5l but I've never used them for beer before and they look like a pain for ferm and cleaning.

And with the Brau itself, I've seem some rigs on the net that use Brau > hose > pump > HopRocket/filter > hose > plate chiller > hose > fermentor. Is anyone using a similar setup?

As for Brau mods, other than the installation of a Ball valve, are there any others which you must have? Is the ferm jacket required in Sydney?

Cheers,
Neal