Mash Tuns

[boybrewer]

Hi All ;
I have been able to source 70 lt and 50 lt eskies very similar to the Techni Ice eskies they have similar properties to these eskies as they will hold ice up to 3-4 days $100 for the 70 lt and $90 for the 50 lt.They come in 2 ( two ) colours red and blue .If you are interested put your name down. This is for Melbourne brewers pick up will be around the Mt Waverley area .

1. Beerbelly 50lt Red
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
9.
10.

 

[WarmBeer]

Damn you!!!

Just bought my 40lt Techni Ice on Saturday.

Grumble, grumble, bloody bulk buys, grumble, grumble...

 

[boybrewer]

Damn you!!!

Just bought my 40lt Techni Ice on Saturday.

Grumble, grumble, bloody bulk buys, grumble, grumble...

Sorry mate I saw your blog the other day I was hoping to get prices and such before you purchased one

 

[roller997]

Hi All ;
I have been able to source 70 lt and 50 lt eskies very similar to the Techni Ice eskies they have similar properties to these eskies as they will hold ice up to 3-4 days $100 for the 70 lt and $90 for the 50 lt.They come in 2 ( two ) colours red and blue .If you are interested put your name down. This is for Melbourne brewers pick up will be around the Mt Waverley area .

1. Beerbelly 50lt Red
2. Roller997 70lt Blue
3.
4.
5.
6.
9.
10.

 

[manticle]

I'm interested - just chasing a bit more info. I'm assuming they're not actually techni ice if they are 'similar to' - can you provide specs? The techni ice have caught my eye for upgrading from my 26 but if I can get one cheaper it's a definite consideration. I was probably looking at the 60L techni so I'm not sure whether to go 50 or 70.

I'll remain slightly non commital but colour me interested.

 

[boybrewer]

I'm interested - just chasing a bit more info. I'm assuming they're not actually techni ice if they are 'similar to' - can you provide specs? The techni ice have caught my eye for upgrading from my 26 but if I can get one cheaper it's a definite consideration. I was probably looking at the 60L techni so I'm not sure whether to go 50 or 70.

I'll remain slightly non commital but colour me interested.

I will contact the group tomorrow and get some specs on them . I have seen them they do hold ice for up to 5 days and have the insulated lid

 

[manticle]

Last question (finance related) - do you have a rough idea of when this buy might occur?

Cheers.

 

[boybrewer]

Last question (finance related) - do you have a rough idea of when this buy might occur?

Cheers.

I was looking at around the first week of May but if your finances don't allow it I will try and hold on a bit longer . I can probably push for a date in mid May .

 

[brettprevans]

great prices, but... and i dont want to sounds like a naysayer, but.... h34r:
at the recent mega barleywine brew day, we used Fents' techni ice mash tun. and we thought the fluid dynamics of the rectangle tun was terrible. we all preferred our cycindrical tuns. now of course with a differant false bottom or manifold (we recon the a manifold over the bottom might have been better) it might make a big differance.

just throwing that out there for you to consider. dont be put off by my comment above, plenty of peopole use eskies as tuns and think they are great.

im actually tempted to buy one of these to use as a normal esky.

 

[WarmBeer]

great prices, but... and i dont want to sounds like a naysayer, but.... h34r:
at the recent mega barleywine brew day, we used Fents' techni ice mash tun. and we thought the fluid dynamics of the rectangle tun was terrible. we all preferred our cycindrical tuns. now of course with a differant false bottom or manifold (we recon the a manifold over the bottom might have been better) it might make a big differance.

just throwing that out there for you to consider. dont be put off by my comment above, plenty of peopole use eskies as tuns and think they are great.

im actually tempted to buy one of these to use as a normal esky.

Any of you Barleywine Boys care to expound on your theories behind these fluid dynamics?

Was it a case of round peg in a square hole? Or the manifold/falsie being too small for such a huge mash tun?

What was the major problem, low %efficiency, or stuck sparge? (I'll bet the latter given the 14 hour brew day )

 

[manticle]

My current esky is rectangular. One single stuck sparge ever which came from a loosening of one side of the manifold. I bet you were all tanked when you came up with that theory.

 

[brettprevans]

Any of you Barleywine Boys care to expound on your theories behind these fluid dynamics?

Was it a case of round peg in a square hole? Or the manifold/falsie being too small for such a huge mash tun?

What was the major problem, low %efficiency, or stuck sparge? (I'll bet the latter given the 14 hour brew day )

not entirely sure what the problem was. the wort seemed to like going down the sides and then pooling in the middle and not draining. didnt help that the falsie kept bloody moving and in the end we had to hold it down with a brew paddle. lots of stuck sparges, so the eff% was crap (fix the sparges and you'd get good efficency).

i recon a big slotted or braided manifold would be the go in a big esky. but then again i dont hink fents has ever had any issues. so?.....

as i said i thought id make the comment and you guys can make up your own minds. plenty of people use them.

 

[WarmBeer]

not entirely sure what the problem was. the wort seemed to like going down the sides and then pooling in the middle and not draining. didnt help that the falsie kept bloody moving and in the end we had to hold it down with a brew paddle. lots of stuck sparges, so the eff% was crap (fix the sparges and you'd get good efficency).

i recon a big slotted or braided manifold would be the go in a big esky. but then again i dont hink fents has ever had any issues. so?.....

as i said i thought id make the comment and you guys can make up your own minds. plenty of people use them.

Sweet, thanks mate.

About to upgrade from my initial BIASIAE system (Brew-In-A-Sheet-In-An-Esky) to a 40lt Techni-Ice with BB Falsie. Unfortunately, wife has wrapped the esky pending my birthday in a couple of weeks time h34r:

 

[Fourstar]

I'd say the issue would be the sheer size of the tun + the size of the manifold * the weight of grain used (25-30 odd kg of grain in the tun).

The flow for the initial few L it was perfectly fine but once we recirculated (even with the pump operating at 1/2 ball valve) the grainbed conpacted pretty quickly and the runoff rate became almost a trickle. We also tried without a pump and manual recirc with little sucess as well. The keg mastun on the otherhand (which was well overfilled with grain) and a dome falsie managed a fine runoff rate at full flow and 10 mins recirc. Personally i'd err on the side of caution and go for a 50L tun at maximum, especially if you plan on using the beerbelly falsie or something of similar size.

We also tried raking the mash to counteract any channelling or glueing of the grainbed. Still, no dice!

I beleive Fents always does triple batches in his 100L tun which should handle it ok, the only other thing id be concerned about is the deadspace and temperature losses because of this, especially if you are only doing single batches. Once you try and work it to capacity like we did, thats when you will run into a world of hurt. I will be the 1st to admit we where pushing the boundaires of his tun. 3/4 full with grain, once 2.8L:Kg of strike water was added, we where almost overflowing.

My evaluation would say anything up to triple batches as fents performs you should be good to go with a 100L box. (although i'd probably go a 70L).

If i was buying one of these bad boys, i'd look at a max of 60L. Capable of double batches and probabaly not too much deadspace if you are doing single batches. Also, you can do a single batchspage if you are so inclined. :icon_cheers:

Now if it looks like i am bad mouthing these things, im not. If i was interested in upgrading my tun i'd probabaly buy up too, however make sure its kitted out with an appropriate sized manifold so you dont run into the probalems we had, this is a warning for any mash tun really.

Note: Some issues may have eventuated due to a possible uneven flour:husk ratio between the tuns, this was just a theory we had for the poor runoff rate but are unsure if this is really the case.

Cheers!

 

[Maple]

The other guys have covered this for the most part, but.....

snip... I bet you were all tanked when you came up with that theory.

may/should be added to the fold. although at the same level of 'tank'dedness' we did get 'er going out the ss 50L cylindrical MT, so we weren't to the blind point (then).

All said and done, people figure out ways to make just about anything work, perhaps the grain crush (customized to my particular system) won't necessarily play well in others systems. would I give up my bling for one of these, not a chance. would I get one of these if i was building from scratch, perhaps.

In fact, the pricing is good, I may be interested in the larger one for an esky. will wait on the specs and then cfo approval.

 

[Fourstar]

Another thing to note, a beer belly falsie being used in a 100L rectangular cooler proabably wasnt designed with that size in mind. We are retrofitting whatever we have available to us in an attempt to produce beer. Sometimes when you push these limits you get burnt like we found out.

Technically, with a shallower grainbed in a rectangluar mash tun you should have a better runoff. Personally i think the sheer grain batch size we where operating at was destined to fail with the manifold size we had at our disposal.

Put it this way, we had enough grain in the tun to make 120L~ of 1.050 wort, Six 20-23L batches! Keep in mind fents brews a maximum of THREE batches at a time at this OG in his tun. We where effectively doubling his typical output.

If the falsie was twice as wide, twice as long AND a baseplate, i'd say we would have been done and dusted on the brewday before then sun had set beyond maples backyard. :icon_cheers:

 

[Fents]

yep i'd say it was a case of too much grain, falsie not big enough and the pump as well recirc'ing. I've never feed my tun more than 20KG's of grain. I've never recird'd with a pump either mines all gravity feed. Let it be known though that i have brewed over 30 batch's in that tun ranging from 60-90Litres and i have never ever had a stuck sparge. Mind you im an ale specialist so not brewing massive RIS's and BarleyWines.

edit - i spoke to Dom @ BB about the size of the falsie in that tun when i got it and he didnt seem to bat an eyelid, although he did say if i have trouble to ring him and he'll make me a custom big one whichj i havnt had to do yet.

 

[Fourstar]

yep i'd say it was a case of too much grain, falsie not big enough and the pump as well recirc'ing. I've never feed my tun more than 20KG's of grain. I've never recird'd with a pump either mines all gravity feed. Let it be known though that i have brewed over 30 batch's in that tun ranging from 60-90Litres and i have never ever had a stuck sparge. Mind you im an ale specialist so not brewing massive RIS's and BarleyWines.

edit - i spoke to Dom @ BB about the size of the falsie in that tun when i got it and he didnt seem to bat an eyelid, although he did say if i have trouble to ring him and he'll make me a custom big one whichj i havnt had to do yet.

There we go straight from the horses mouth! Yeah, i'd say its the batch size to grain weight/filterbed density tring to be forced through a undersized falsie for that sheer weight. Atleast we have done a roadtest for beerbelly then! So, if you want to punch out batches big enough for 120-130L @ 1.050 in a 100L mash tun, get a custom sized falsie. :icon_cheers:

Speaking of, want me to drop the tun around friday night?!

 

[manticle]

Hi All ;
I have been able to source 70 lt and 50 lt eskies very similar to the Techni Ice eskies they have similar properties to these eskies as they will hold ice up to 3-4 days $100 for the 70 lt and $90 for the 50 lt.They come in 2 ( two ) colours red and blue .If you are interested put your name down. This is for Melbourne brewers pick up will be around the Mt Waverley area .

1. Beerbelly 50lt Red
2.Roller297 (70 L blue)
3. manticle (50 L blue) - dependent on specs
4.
5.
6.
9.
10.

 

[Fents]

Speaking of, want me to drop the tun around friday night?!

that would be choice cuzzy.