Firetruck Brewery Idea

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jgriffin

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I watched the Firetruck Brewery episode of Monster Garage last night. One interesting idea i saw, is how they maintained the temperature of the fermenter, by inserting a stainless coil, and pumping chilled glycol through it.

Which sparked an idea on lagering outside the fridge. Just drop in a coil in the fermenter similar to a mirical box coil, and pumpt thorugh some radiator fluid with a water pump and a resevoir sitting in the fridge or freezer. That way you don't need a whole fridge for lagering, and could even hook up a thermostat that turned the pump on and off.

Whadda ya think?
 
Watched the episode this afternoon.
Saw the stainless coil they used and know what you are thinking.
However to maintain a fermenter at lagering temps sitting outside a fridge in summer would mean it would be pumping glycol through the coil in the fermenter almost full time.
Easier and less hassle getting another/bigger fridge.

Beers,
Doc
 
Funny about that I was thinking about the exact same thing today.
I was thinking that the cooling effect may be too localised around the coil.
 
Doc said:
Watched the episode this afternoon.
Saw the stainless coil they used and know what you are thinking.
However to maintain a fermenter at lagering temps sitting outside a fridge in summer would mean it would be pumping glycol through the coil in the fermenter almost full time.
Easier and less hassle getting another/bigger fridge.

Beers,
Doc
Doc, one of my customers has a side company that makes those industrial fridges that people like butches, Woolies etc use. Basically it's just big hunks of aluminium sandwiched foam. So i reckon i could get some free off-cuts, enough to make some small fermenter boxes. Just thinking the coil would be easier than throwing in ice blocks and a fan.
I've already got 3 fridges and a freezer (house fridge, house freezer, keg fridge, and bar fridge for yeasties & bottled beer) so the woman would shoot me if i got another.

Hoops - i wondered about the same thing, but if the fermenter was insulated well, i don't see it being a problem. Just wrap some foam about it and the temperature delta should be reasonable.
 
i have the SS Coils for 30.00 ea - 15m...

Ken...

JG interested in a fermenter box ....
 
jgriffin said:
......the temperature delta should be reasonable.
Well I have no idea what temperature delta is, but I was thinking that there may be problems with stratification (separate layers of hot and cold) but maybe active yeast would cause turbulence and help even out the temp.
 
Dont forget they were donated $18,500 or so worth of goodies. And with a workshop like that you could just about make anything.
Top party idea though, having a truck like that. Imagine rolling up to a bbq with that. :lol: :lol: :lol:

cheers
 
GMK - no comments about your posts and selling stuff... but in all seriousness, would these fit in fermenter?

Hoops - delta is "change in" if that makes sense. Going back to physics at uni, the temperature statification only occurs when there is a large difference in temperature between two diffenent sections of the liquid. It happens in nature in large water bodies as the temp difference between the bottom and top layers of the water differ significantly.
Now if the coil was suspended vertically, i wonder if it would actually cause a slight agitation of the wort as the warmer parts of the wort raised above the cold ones, helping to even out the temperature difference. Add in a good thermal barrier (i.e insulation) and i reckon it would work pretty well.
 
if youve the gear available jgriff give it ago and report back to ahb.then we will all have an idea if it works well or not.sometimes ya gotta think out side of the square to see if your ideas work.

cheers
big d
 
jgriffin i have been toying with the idea of going to an industrial fridge maker for some offcuts, to make a box for 3 fermenters & put a heat pad under the middle one & using a waterbed thermostat with the probe inside the box in winter time (as i only have winter brewing blues) as a tennager i made portable offices out of the same material and how warm they were inside on a freezing cold day inside a windy uninsulated factory i will always remember
 
the ss coil sounds like a possible solution to northern brewers, i've been looking at using a peltier device to keep things cool, i know more beer sell fermentors this way. or maybe combine both, use the peltier deivce to cool the liquid and pump it around the coil?
 
From what I have read about peltiers, I believe that they are very inefficient at cooling... you may find that you only get a very small effect from it.

Or what I have read could be all a load of crap... if you are keen, try it!


dreamboat
 
you could make up something similar to a water cooling system for a computer, the coil in the fermenter, a pump, a radiator and fan, and resivor.

Then you would only have to keep the water in the res cold, by using ice block, or something.

maybe an idea.
 
kman said:
you could make up something similar to a water cooling system for a computer, the coil in the fermenter, a pump, a radiator and fan, and resivor.

Then you would only have to keep the water in the res cold, by using ice block, or something.

maybe an idea.
kman, i was thinking of mounting a small radiator in the (unused) freezer section of my keg fridge. THat would get the glycol very cold.
 
Looks like your idea is already used in wine fermenting.
From St Pats website....

cooler_lid.jpg
 
These are used by specialized tank manufacturers or for cooling the bottom of large tanks below the cooling jackets or for open fermenters in which it is not necessary to attach the plate to the lid.

TCcoolingplate.jpg
 
I have used peltiers before and ok for tiny things, eg a glass of beer, but it didn't do anything to the fermenter temp. I cant remember what it did to the average temp of the fridge (old and didn't work) so i used peltiers in a blower (given to me) but it just didn't have the power to do the job. and that said i used a swag of power to run
 
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