Mini Lauter Tun

[Borret]

Hey all,

Been a bit of discussion on Grumpys about the mini mash and mini all grain. Thought I'd throw on some photo's of the little tun I made for doing partials. Was welding up some stainless T pieces for my 50 lt mash tun I'm building and so made one with a long leg while I was at it to fit to this 5 litre bucket I got from bunnings. The stainlees tune is 12mmOD, 9mm ID with half inch stainless braid attached and a pvc hose pushed on the outside. Seal tot eh bucket with a standard airlock grommet. Haven't tried it yet and will probably do the mash in the metal pot and laddle it in for lautering but cost me 6 bucks all up and it should be better than a sieve. If I need more capacity it should still work alright ina 10 lt bucket as well.

Anybody do anything similar to this or have I gone to far?

Borret

 

[bonk]

borret, not at all mate. your not alone in doing this

i still use my 'mini' fermenters every now and then.

 

[pint of lager]

A couple of comments.

Add some sort of insulation around the outside, so the temp stays up at your sparge water. Bubblewrap will do the job. Or fit the lot iinto a cardboard box, and pack with crumpled newspaper. I used a 20 litre bucket with a manifold for a long time, worked fine.


Make sure you have a tap on the outelt so you control the runoff rate.

Keep up the good work Borret.

 

[Kai]

I don't have a lauter tun yet and am using a little esky for a mini mash tun. When I do get around to making/buying a lauter or mash/lauter tun, I might skip the manifold and just have some form of filter over the tap, as I won't be fly sparging.

 

[Borret]

POL

I have some polethelene foam sheet ( the closed cell spungy stuff) that I was going to wrap around it. Should do the job.
I had thought about a tap but was considering using an ajustable clamp on the hose. If this doesn't work then I will source a tap. Haven't seen a cheap inline food grade tap yet so if you have some idea's it's be good. May be ablt to bodgy a fermentor tap somehow or a irrigation one bu theya re not food grade.

Cheers

Borret.

 

[deebee]

I followed the advice of tdh aka GT on Grumpys forum, scrounged a couple of 5 litre buckets from the bakery and drilled a bazillion holes in the bottom of one with my smallest drill bit but one. Seriously, no **** I reckon there must be a thousand holes in it. That's the inner bucket. Bought a tap from the hbs for the outer bucket and called it a mash/lauter tun. Could always do the same with 10 litre bucket.

Limitations:
Maxes out at a shade over 2kg of grain unless you settle for a stiff mash.
Needs to be well wrapped up and heated beforehand to hold mash temperatures.
Has a dead space of about a litre below the false bottom.

But it works and it cost me a few dollars and an hour in front of the telly with a cordless drill.

 

[mikem108]

For a mini mash or a small experimental brew I've got a 15 L round esky from Kmart for about $30. Keeps the temp nicely.

 

[Borret]

For those who are interested.
I did an upgrade on the little tun and gave it a big brother to handle the grain billof my first partial. So now I have a ten litre one as well. A standard length of 450mm long braid fitted on perfectly for this size bucket.


Also, POL thanks for the advice on controlling the flow. I made the below clamp to crimp to go over the hose and do the job and I would have been lost without it. Even a a half a turn on the 6mm thread on one side made the difference between clear runoff and some small globs getting through. Worked a treat. I will look into some insulation before the next brew.


First Partial was on Saturday and was a wiezen bier which I was a bit dubious about cause of the stuck mash problems I have read about with wheat but it was not a prob. I'll put some shots here too of my proud efforts. I mashed in the stainless boiler in the oven and lautered and sparged in the bucket. Even snuck in a ferulic acid rest for the yeasties for 30min. Finished with 15 litres at 1049 OG and 16 IBU from 2kg of various grains and 1 kg wheat LME and tettnanger hops. Cold pitched with wyeast 3068 at 16 deg and slowly brought up to 19. Looks promising so far.




Cheers

Borret

 

[sluggerdog]

How did the temp go borret?

 

[TasChris]

One of the cheaper ideas for insulation is to use a camping mats, the high density foam things. They can be bought from el cheapo shops for a couple of dollars.
Just wrap them around the pot/bucket

 

[Borret]

Slugger.
I added a couple of litres of 80 deg water to the mash once it was into the tun which brought it up to mid 70 for mash out. May have dropped a little over the lauter. Then again another 7 litres of 80 deg for the second runnings. Seemed to be OK but obviously would be better insultaed.
I might hot wire cut (same as I use for cutting foam cores for model aeroplane wings) a polystyrene nest for it to sit inn and a lid. Will see what materials I have lying around.

Cheers
Borret