Kick Ass Hopper Design For A Mashmaster Minimill

[Oakers]

Hey fellas,

My Mashmaster MiniMill arrived today. I'm very pleased with what is a serious piece of kit. Of course there is no hopper supplied (and interestingly no instructions or schematics, but I can work that one out.) I'd like to press it in into action this weekend so I need to fabricate a hopper. The Minmill deserves a blingin hopper so I'm looking for any kick ass hopper designs that fellow MiniMill owners would like to share. I'm happy to fabricate in MDF or similar myself or even contract out a stainless design to the local metal fabricator. Any suggestions welcome.

Cheers,
Oakers.

 

[bignath]

Big Ass Hopper (trademark ) made out of a big water cooler bottle for the win! Piss easy to make up if you have access to a set of hole saw drill bits.

Admittedly, not exactly what you would call "bling" by any stretch, but very effective at holding 4-5kg of grain and guiding it through your rollers.

Awesome mill that one.

 

[breakbeer]

I like the acrylic ones they sell seperately, think I'll fabricate one @ work when swmbo gives in & lets me buy a mill

 

[Maheel]

made this to test with intentions to make a nice hopper..... still going strong 1yr later ...
using the cupboard contains dust nicley and i just vacuum it out

it kicks the grains ass....

click for the video

 

[Malted]

it kicks the grains ass....

click for the video

'Appears' to have more flour than I expected. Is this the case or are my eyes deceiving me? Not poking ****, it's a genuine question.

 

[Maheel]

maybe mate i dont really know ?

BIABing anyway so always plenty of stuff in the kettle along with commando hop pellets

 

[Amber Fluid]

I like the acrylic ones they sell seperately, think I'll fabricate one @ work when swmbo gives in & lets me buy a mill

Nah, I got one. I liked it at first but they only hold about 1.5kg grain and it broke within 1 or 2 brews. They are really fragile at the bottom where they screw into the mill.

Nevertheless, they are based on Chad's design and you can get a plan for it HERE.

Florian has a pretty good hopper as you can see HERE. Easy design to work with too.

 

[beerdrinkingbob]

'Appears' to have more flour than I expected. Is this the case or are my eyes deceiving me? Not poking ****, it's a genuine question.

I agree with malted, it looks all flour to me..

 

[reVoxAHB]

A few pics of mine:

Side door for access to gap setting & retaining screw:

Cheers
reVox

 

[Mattress]

A few pics of mine:

Side door for access to gap setting & retaining screw:

Cheers
reVox

Now thats just showing off

 

[Oakers]

Some nice looking bits of kit and improvisation. ReVox.....Now that's what i'm talking about!!!!! Although I might make do with the water bottle for this weekend that looks like the sort of think I'd like to build in the longer term. Please share more on the build process. It looks like painted MDF. Is that right?

 

[Camo6]

Hey all. Attempting to upload some pics of the hopper for my minimill. Simple MDF and pine construction with some aluminium sandwich board i had floating around. Probably holds about 10 kilo and feeds beautifully. Powered by a wiper motor hooked up to 12v battery which chugs away at a slow and steady 60 rpm. Bit slow but creates bugger all flour and lets me get everything else organised while it mills. Working on a pc power supply and forward/reverse switch but want to keep it all compact and mobile. One of the best additions to my brewery IMO.

 

[jlm]

Beers before mash in. The only way to brew.

Edit: Re Revox's mill.

 

[reVoxAHB]

Some nice looking bits of kit and improvisation. ReVox.....Now that's what i'm talking about!!!!! Although I might make do with the water bottle for this weekend that looks like the sort of think I'd like to build in the longer term. Please share more on the build process. It looks like painted MDF. Is that right?

Cheers. Yep painted MDF. I used silver hammer tone rattle-can paint. Took 2 cans.

I threaded my build elsewhere. I'll see if I can dig it up and copy and paste here over the next couple of days.

 

[alfadog]

slightly.... well... very off topic but how do you guys in Tassie go with getting grain in bulk, I may be moving down and am wondering if I can get good grain down there.

Cheers


Alfadog

 

[ratchie]

Filled with 10kg of grain.

 

[Oakers]

slightly.... well... very off topic but how do you guys in Tassie go with getting grain in bulk, I may be moving down and am wondering if I can get good grain down there.

Cheers


Alfadog

I haven't participated yet but there are bulk buys organised through this site. Tas Home Brewing Supplies in Hobart sells a limited variety of grain.

 

[Batz]

What's the big deal with large hoppers?

My old Valley mill needs to be topped up a few times to get my average of around 10Kg of grain milled, but so what, I'm usually right there watching it. What do you guys do? Go off and do something else while your grains are milling?

 

[gap]

What's the big deal with large hoppers?

My old Valley mill needs to be topped up a few times to get my average of around 10Kg of grain milled, but so what, I'm usually right there watching it. What do you guys do? Go off and do something else while your grains are milling?

Your Valley Mill still going strong too Batz.
Just about the only choice once.

 

[ratchie]

I still have to add to my hopper 60Lt batches so about 12kg of grain,I also normally do 2 batches so while the first is being milled I weigh out the grain for the second.