My new budget Grainfather-esque setup

[Matplat]

I was planning on using loctite 577... says it is good for potable water systems, mild acids and alkalis... but you're making me worried... different kettle of fish i hope?

 

[Burt de Ernie]

What is the cost of this project up to at the moment?

 

[TheWiggman]

I was planning on using loctite 577... says it is good for potable water systems, mild acids and alkalis... but you're making me worried... different kettle of fish i hope?

I personally wouldn't use any liquid thread sealant. Teflon tape is a proven and effective thread sealer in brewing, just use that unless there is a good reason not to. By all means try it and good luck, but I'd rather keep industrial chemicals out of the brewing process where possible.

 

[Benn]

Apply the Teflon tape "with" the direction of the thread rather than against it so the action of threading the two members together doesn't cause any unraveling, scrunching or general unsightliness of the Teflon.

 

[Matplat]

What is the cost of this project up to at the moment?

Just totalled mine up to $260 and that is with welding being done for free. I have used the same 56l ebay pot and a bigW malt pipe.....

 

[takai]

Just did the sums, and it is as follows:
56L pot: $45
38L pot: $35
Fittings: $50ish (some lying around, most from ebay)
Bolts: $12
Element: $11 (Camco via Amazon US)
Element housing: $15
Pump: $60
Controller: $35 (spare housing, and HS lying around. PID & SSRs from eBay and a RCD from a mate)

So about $265 so far, with it just about complete.

As for the sealant, it has all been apart about twenty times today chasing a sodding leak in the bottom whirlpool fitting. Bloody silicone seals bulge out and dont seal up properly. NFI why it is just that fitting too, the ball valve is fitted in the same way and seals up fine :S Time to either get funky with a lathe and machine up some recessed washers (have recessed nuts, but not enough thread to fit), or find larger ID washers to limit the outward expansion of the seal.

 

[Eagleburger]

I have tried to minimise threaded couplings and just use barbs and silicon hose.

Some nice rigs here.

I have found for mash having flow over element is not important. I use 2 x 3000watt ebay chaepies and have only had scorching when doing protien rests with no PID control. ie starting at 50degC. Mashing in at 60+ and have never had a problem. I now put the two elements in series when mashing and have PID control. According to limited math that is about half the amps and I am ready to try a protein rest again.

 

[takai]

All of the upstream seals are fine, it is the lower seal into the kettle that is the pain.

 

[takai]

Problem solved on getting it to seal.

Ended up converting a BSP tapered fitting to parallel with more thread and then using the recessed nuts i already had.

Went for a bit of lateral thinking, and the TIG. Should do that more often.

Now i have to pull it all apart and re-threadseal everything, because with all the pulling apart and refitting a few little leaks have appeared. Will avail myself of a new roll of pink plumbers tape and go for gold.

 

[takai]

After some frustration chasing leaks and aligning everything properly it is finally ready to go. Currently doing a full simulated run to let the new controller learn the tune, and to give everything a test run.

Just need to find the label maker for the controller.

 

[takai]

Well brew day cancelled today, but only because my wife organised a birthday BBQ for me. Instead i took the opportunity to etch the kettle with volume markings. First i made up a vinyl template:

Then did the electrolysis etching process:

No more pesky rulers for me now.

 

[SBOB]

nice...you can start a side business selling vinyl ruler markings

 

[CoopsOz]

Yes, I'll be your first customer.

 

[Mr B]

How did you make that?

Pretty nifty indeed

 

[takai]

Made using a vinyl cutter, vinegar, salt and a 12v power brick. Piece of cake... once you have a vinyl cutter

 

[Mr B]

Hehe hep the cutting part was my area of interest.

 

[takai]

Inaugural brew went pretty much flawlessly and I hit all of my numbers pretty much dead on.

Mashed in:

Malt pipe out and draining/raining:

Chilling and hop spider draining post boil:

Built up a good rolling boil throughout, and boil off was spot on calculations.

Only a couple of niggles, the main one being that i forgot to turn the pump off at the end of the chilling process, so it kept the trub in suspension for longer and didnt form as nice a cone. The other is that the drainage rack can get caught on the legs and that just makes a bit of a mess, plus i dont have anywhere to put it for draining anymore as it is larger than the bucket i used to use.

All of that is simple to fix. The only other thing im considering is putting a short length of drilled pipe on the end of the malt pipe feed so that it distributes more evenly around the malt pipe. Thoughts on that, is it worth it?

 

[Matplat]

QLDKEV just has a straight piece of copper pipe sticking straight out to just under the surface.... that's what I went with....

I was thinking creating a setup similar to yours i.e. pipe running round the circumference, and use a soldering iron or something to jab a load of holes, then plumb in the HLT and use it for sparging... but i'm not sure if im bothered really...

 

[takai]

Yeah, soldering iron would work, although i hate getting plastic on the nib of my good one.

With the heavy silicone a 2mm drill bit would probably do the same though.

 

[takai]

All packs up quite compactly too: