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wide eyed and legless

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Just to keep on the Guten hijack I found Murphy China freight the cheapest
all up under the $500 for the 30L but never went ahead

So WEAL how is it you might have to start a new thread because some people will get the sh&*ts for some reason

You said the boil started straight away after the mash was that youre mistake or ???
feed back would be great

If I had a BRAU or a GF it wouldnt worry me as I would be set for making wort just more options now

Have been tossing up making my own Q Kev style wort maker which is another option

Above post by rude from the thread Braumeister 50L for sale

The mistake I referred to was mentioned in post 429 Keg King Robobrew 35 litre single vessel brewery.
The mistake was too much liquor going into the boil after the mash, which after taking the reading the following day was only 1 point out on the SG.
The reason I went ahead and purchased one of these was 1) To use when making a bigger beer 2) I was sceptical about the mash efficiency of the Grainfather and wanted to see for myself.
The efficiency did turn out better than I expected, but I will be brewing again with a 6.6 kg grain bill to see if I can still get a decent result on mash efficiency, but I will be giving it every chance in achieving this by hitting the pause button and giving it a stir a few times during the mash cycle.
Having the return fixed with a camlock fitting means I can quickly carry out this part of the operation on the Gruten.
If a good seal is required around the bottom mesh then a couple of dollars spent on a silicone pressure cooker seal will fix that, (like it is on the Grainfather)
The Achilles heel of these units is the elements, they are cemented in on the Robobrew and the Guten and I presume also on the Grainfather as the company which I believe makes all three in their profile say their R&D team have developed 3 different models, so if the element burns out that is the end of it.
This is where the Braumeister comes into its own, each part can be replaced.
So the element has to be taken care of, the Guten has a dial in wattage so with a jacket and maybe a hood it will not need to run on the full 2500w plus the automated boil can be timed for a 1/2 hour for a vigorous boil and then a gentle boil for the rest of the boil op.
I would also like to point out I am not getting any monetary favours from the manufacturers, like most people I just like to try and get the best for less.
 
wide eyed and legless said:
like most people I just like to try and get the best for less.
So buying a 2nd hand BM like in the original post?
 
I am not sure whether buying a second hand BM can always be considered a saving, unless it is at a very low price.
I bought mine directly from a retailer in Germany 20% discount straight off the top, cost me about $1700 and or including I cant remember now 80 Euro postage.
 
Thanks for the update

What do you mean the element is cemented in ? any chance of a photo ?

Are the elements SS & how is the boil good rolling , vigorous ?

So the controller is user friendly good to hear
 
Here you go rude a video of the inside so you will see the element etc.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcTXiv0XWW0
Another one of the unit in use, and yes it is a vigorous boil but as I mentioned you can drop the power to get whatever boil you want.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWldKJG4YhA
 
Notice it is the same pump as the Grainfather.
16758576329_ba67aab354.jpg
 
whats the pickup on the bottom like?
In one of those videos it looked like an arm to a small false bottom or something (was covered in trub/hops)
 
FYI those style elements technically ARE removable
They're just a complete pain in the arse to remove and clean up, impossible to source off the shelf and you need the special heat transfer cement to put them back in
 
Nothing is impossible, but how to get the cement off would be the first problem, can't be burned off that would interfere with the makeup of the s/steel, is there a solvent which can dissolve it, I don't know,I pulled one out of the bin at Keg King, so they haven't got a solution for those cemented in elements, I put it back cos it certainly did look to be a major problem to get the cement off. You would think that there would be a way of fixing the element in situ without using the cement.
I did ask Foshan Shunde whether they had had any issues with burnt out elements but they denied they had, I know GF and Robobrew had problems with them, but one doesn't know if all components are equal, ask a Chinese company if they can make it cheaper (meaning knock a few dollars off) they will take it literally and make, as in manufacture it cheaper.
 
So I tried a bigger grain bill in the Guten unit, 6.6 kilo, I have downloaded the Grainfather instructions but decided I would make a thinner mash, dead space in the Guten is 2.5 litres, using the calcs for the Grainfather 2.7 x 6.6 + 2.5 (3.5 on GF) =20.32 but filled up to 25 litre mark, mashed in and could see the first problem, I was only just under the overflow pipe, wasn't keen on liquor going down the overflow so stuck a piece of silicon hose into the top of the overflow pipe being careful to keep the height of the hose under the malt pipe lifting holes.
This worked so all the mash liquor is draining through the grain bed, second problem I wanted to give the grain a stir, paused the op but as soon as I went to take of the top mesh some husks came out. Decided to give that a miss and carried on, end of the mash sparged with 9 litres of water, giving me a roughley 28 litre boil volume pre boil gravity came in at 1.052 predicted using a 70% efficiency was 1.051 gave a 1 hour boil no chilled ended up with just under 24 litres in fermetor overshot again, am going to have to make a measuring stick, 2litres of trub left in the unit and OG came in at 1.062 predicted 1.063.
So efficiency is nothing to worry about, the other thing I was concerned about was residual sugar coating the bottom of the unit, I had read with the Grainfather to keep scraping the bottom of the unit to prevent any build up but when emptied found everything to be sound, easier to clean than the BM so happy with the purchase.

008.JPG
Clear wort
009.JPG
Trub
 
wide eyed and legless said:
Nothing is impossible, but how to get the cement off would be the first problem, can't be burned off that would interfere with the makeup of the s/steel, is there a solvent which can dissolve it, I don't know,I pulled one out of the bin at Keg King, so they haven't got a solution for those cemented in elements, I put it back cos it certainly did look to be a major problem to get the cement off. You would think that there would be a way of fixing the element in situ without using the cement.
I did ask Foshan Shunde whether they had had any issues with burnt out elements but they denied they had, I know GF and Robobrew had problems with them, but one doesn't know if all components are equal, ask a Chinese company if they can make it cheaper (meaning knock a few dollars off) they will take it literally and make, as in manufacture it cheaper.
Not to be too rude, but you picked this up for around $500? I could barely build similar for that sort of cost. Do you know if they are going to be locally stocked? Or otherwise how painful was organising shipping and costs?
 
malt junkie said:
Not to be too rude, but you picked this up for around $500? I could barely build similar for that sort of cost. Do you know if they are going to be locally stocked? Or otherwise how painful was organising shipping and costs?
Weal works at Crazy Clarks. Everything is under $500.
 
malt junkie said:
Not to be too rude, but you picked this up for around $500? I could barely build similar for that sort of cost. Do you know if they are going to be locally stocked? Or otherwise how painful was organising shipping and costs?
The company organises shipping, sent out Friday received on Monday, only grouch was paying by PayPal, unless PP charges are different in China I got a surcharge of 6% not 4% which is what PP charge here, but as cheap as it is how could it be a complaint, another forum member has bought the 50L for $690 delivered. I did ask for another member if they could send by EMS but they use some forwarding agent who takes care of the deliveries, and realistically at those prices it is a seller's market so no room to negotiate and they know it.
They are locally stocked under different names, but then you are paying the shipping + costs + the margin the wholesaler puts on + the margin the retailer puts on, + money spent on advertising. Remember they are around $150 each by the container load.
I was thinking of calling the unit the Clever Clarke at Crazy prices.
 
Can be a trifle hard to understand the Guten instructions on programing the timer for step mash, here is a video of setup.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qsTg9OOYXQ
 
Just ordered a 30L one myself, quote was '233usd, delivery cost to AU is 163usd', that did not include the wort chiller, the chiller was only extra $16.80 USD so I figured a no brainer to add that also.

Got a bit stung on the payment, options are Western Union which I think charge was $40USD or paypal which is 6%, I have a prepaid USD mastercard which I loaded at better rate than banks give so I thought would use that via paypal, all fine except paypal then slapped me with a $17+USD fee of their own for doing so.

I ended up paying around $580AUD for unit, wort chiller and delivery. Given a GF is ~1150-1300 it still seems very good value, particuarly given they look to be very similar and quite possibly even built in the same factory!!
 
That's amazing value if the unit is good and after purchase service exists.

$17? Pocket change, considering.
 
Well done Leyther, just download the Grainfather user pdf and make a note that the dead space is less.
China updated its consumer protection laws a couple of years ago manticle so it covers o/seas buyers, I would expect the reason was their economy was slowing but they were still raking in millions with internet buyers, plus Alibaba and Aliexpress look after the buyer better than eBay does
 
WEAL - quick Question, do you use the GUTEN for boiling your sparge water? I'm thinking I probably need something else to do this, in the GF docs it talks about using a SS fermentor but I don't have one of these, the best I can probably do for about 10L is a couple of large pans. Sounds like I should have ordre heater too, might go back to them see if they can add before shipping.
 
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