Home Made Conical Fermenter

[praxis178]

That looks like a pretty good job there TJ. How will you be addressing temp control, does it fit in a fridge or do you have some other idea to control temp for another side project, like a glycol jacket???

cheers

Fits my fermentation fridge, although I had (in a moment of insanity) thought about hacking up one of the pots to make a glycol jacket panel, decided sticking it in the fridge as originally planned was saner.....

 

[praxis178]

Not necessarily

If it were a commercial unit and big... yeah, of course. But in a home sized unit all he has to do is occasionally fill it up with boiling water; and drop in a heat stick (or work something out with a burner) to keep it boiling in there for a while.

Bugs might be able to hide in bad welds and seals from sanitising agent.. but they can't hide from heat.

A bit more effort is going to be needed with this than a "properly" welded unit, but as long as he's aware of the issue and takes steps to address it, there is no unavoidable reason it needs to be more infection prone than any other fermenter.

TB

Ironically that is exactly what I have planned, the bottom valve (which has to be removed for proper sanitation anyway) is sized such that with a 1" BSP muff I can screw in a standard hot-water system heating element and so boil the crap out of the lower half (the vertical seam is smooth as, only the bottom to wall seam isn't smooth), figure 1/2hr at 100C or so should do the trick.

 

[unrealeous]

Fits my fermentation fridge, although I had (in a moment of insanity) thought about hacking up one of the pots to make a glycol jacket panel, decided sticking it in the fridge as originally planned was saner.....

Forget a glycol jacket - a fridge is cheaper, far more efficient and after seeing your welds... 10 points for effort though

The only issue with a fridge is that a stainless fermenter with 45 litres of beer weighs about 60kgs. Now those of you who know me would know how strong and handsome I am, but I can't get lift a 60 kg fermenter into my fridge full without snapping a vertebrae. The solution was to buy a 7m hose so I can fill directly from the kettle inside the house into the fermenter.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

Ironically that is exactly what I have planned, the bottom valve (which has to be removed for proper sanitation anyway) is sized such that with a 1" BSP muff I can screw in a standard hot-water system heating element and so boil the crap out of the lower half (the vertical seam is smooth as, only the bottom to wall seam isn't smooth), figure 1/2hr at 100C or so should do the trick.

cool - handy that

I would be pessimistic however and assume that even your vertical your welds aren't as smooth as they should be and fill that puppy all the way up to the very top.

Also - boil it for longer than 30 mins. The whole point of needing to boil to get at stubborn hiding bugs - is that you are getting to bacteria that cant be got at by sanitising solutions - so the water probably cant get to them either, so I would assume as a base point, that you are sterilising with "dry" heat rather than wet, so you need to kill with ambient temperature rather than contact with boiling water. That's less effective and takes longer.

30mins is probably good enough ... but I would err on the side of paranoia if it were me.

TB

 

[jakub76]

fill that puppy all the way up to the very top.

Surely half an hour of steam would effectively kill all the nasties without having to use 50 litre of water and wait hours for it to get to a boil.

 

[FNQ Bunyip]

Thats probly going too work , so why not just add an a couple more sockets fit elements and do the boil in there as well ,, whirlpool , dump trub , chill , add yeasties and ferment ...

cheers

 

[praxis178]

Thats probly going too work , so why not just add an a couple more sockets fit elements and do the boil in there as well ,, whirlpool , dump trub , chill , add yeasties and ferment ...

cheers

'Cause then I'd have to do the boil in my ferm-fridge! Not a bad idea if the "pot" has a cooling jacket though. And like you I can't move 60kg without needing a week in traction afterwards.....

 

[praxis178]

cool - handy that

I would be pessimistic however and assume that even your vertical your welds aren't as smooth as they should be and fill that puppy all the way up to the very top.

Also - boil it for longer than 30 mins. The whole point of needing to boil to get at stubborn hiding bugs - is that you are getting to bacteria that cant be got at by sanitising solutions - so the water probably cant get to them either, so I would assume as a base point, that you are sterilising with "dry" heat rather than wet, so you need to kill with ambient temperature rather than contact with boiling water. That's less effective and takes longer.

30mins is probably good enough ... but I would err on the side of paranoia if it were me.

TB

Yeah 3KW element running for 2-3hrs is only going to cost me 34-51cents (IIRC my power is $0.17/KWH) verses $60plus of grain and hops etc. bit of no brainer really....

Well next week it's test time, a simple SMASH is probably the go.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

Surely half an hour of steam would effectively kill all the nasties without having to use 50 litre of water and wait hours for it to get to a boil.

if there was a lid that'd do... but I understood there to be no lid????

And even if there is a lid - while steam would certainly do the heating work- its still a case of assuming dry heat rather than steam in the bits that matter. So yep, I agree, if you had a lid you could save a bit of heating up time and energy by not filling it all the way up, but you'd still want to play it a bit safer with the working time for sanitation.

Have a look at this

http://www.engenderhealth.org/ip/instrum/inm11.html

Now this situation is different in that heat doesn't have to penetrate a bundle of wrapped equipment, and we are talking sanitiszing not strerilizing -- but with dry heat you really do need much longer than wet heat, and the temperature in this case is even lower than anything in teh range quoted in this article.

So I'd be boiling for at least an hour and maybe two.

Not every time he uses the fermenter - just every now and again to make sure that things that collect and lurk in micro gaps in the welds get taken care of before they build up to problematic levels.

TB

 

[black_labb]

a blowtorch along the weld lines (from the outside) could aid other sanitation methods, but it looks like you have it sorted using steam.

 

[praxis178]

if there was a lid that'd do... but I understood there to be no lid????

And even if there is a lid - while steam would certainly do the heating work- its still a case of assuming dry heat rather than steam in the bits that matter. So yep, I agree, if you had a lid you could save a bit of heating up time and energy by not filling it all the way up, but you'd still want to play it a bit safer with the working time for sanitation.

Have a look at this

http://www.engenderhealth.org/ip/instrum/inm11.html

Now this situation is different in that heat doesn't have to penetrate a bundle of wrapped equipment, and we are talking sanitiszing not strerilizing -- but with dry heat you really do need much longer than wet heat, and the temperature in this case is even lower than anything in teh range quoted in this article.

So I'd be boiling for at least an hour and maybe two.

Not every time he uses the fermenter - just every now and again to make sure that things that collect and lurk in micro gaps in the welds get taken care of before they build up to problematic levels.

TB

Oh yeah, made a nice discovery last night, a Big W 19L pot neatly (smooth sliding fit) fits over the top of the fermenter, so looks like I now have an OK lid option, not long term storage OK, but sanitation/fermentation OK.... right back to the grind stone.

 

[praxis178]

Had a thought, might be a good idea to pickle the welds, so with that in mind, anyone know where I can get my hands on about 2tablespoons worth of SS pickle gel? Or some places where I might ask on the Sunshine Coast?

Seems a bit wasteful to buy a 1kg tub just to do ~1.5m worth of weld seams.....