Robobrew V3 vs Guten

[wide eyed and legless]

I am looking at whether to buy a Guten, stick with my old 3 vessel brewery, or go with a robobrew....

Now that this thread has run for a while, I am wondering whether the Guten owners are still happy with their purchase?

3 years I have had mine without a glitch until recently when I had a water leak from the tap overnight the water had got into the electrics. Should have aborted the brew day and dried it out, went ahead and switching to mash out mode the unit popped, and burn't out the circuit board. Got the updated circuit board and screen and is now working again. A good tip is to run a bead of silicone around the groove no matter if it be a Robobrew, BrewZilla or Guten. Saves any leaking water from the tap getting inside.

 

[JDB]

3 years I have had mine without a glitch until recently when I had a water leak from the tap overnight the water had got into the electrics. Should have aborted the brew day and dried it out, went ahead and switching to mash out mode the unit popped, and burn't out the circuit board. Got the updated circuit board and screen and is now working again. A good tip is to run a bead of silicone around the groove no matter if it be a Robobrew, BrewZilla or Guten. Saves any leaking water from the tap getting inside.

Mine malfunctioned after 15 batches, suspect it was something wrong with the PCB as the screen was dead and buttons non-responsive. It was quickly repaired by KK and is back in action. I would buy it again, the 50 l is a good size, I can get two cubes at a stretch.

 

[Fro-Daddy]

My Robo V2 is flawless. The one issue I had with it cutting out I believe was caused by a crappy extension cord.
My Guten 70L is just as good, and once the overflow pipe issue is resolved I won't have any complaints.

 

[KegLand-com-au]

The BrewZilla units have lower watt density. This means you can brew lighter colours beers if you want to and you get less stuff stick to the elements after the boil. The screens in the BrewZilla are also a bit thicker. Several other parts of the brewery are quite similar. I would say the older Robobrew units were less reliable but the new BrewZilla electronics are bulletproof. I would like to think we provide quite a high level of service at KegLand but would totally understand if you find our review biased.

 

[Grok]

I brought a Guten 12 months ago. First 10 brews went fine then the unit started cutting out, powering down for 15-30 seconds at a time. This started happening when the unit was trying to heat beyond a 50c protein rest. Freaking annoying!!! I reported it to Keg King and they just said they would need to test it with water.. Sadly it only does it when mashing, so nothing got resolved. I managed to pull off a few more brews as it was intermittent, then the cutting out became permanent.

It sounds very much like the Thermal Cut Out button positioned near the heating elements is faulty and needs replacing.This is there to cut power in case it boils dry. You can do it your self if your handy with a screwdriver. Take the old one off and check the specs on it (on the face of it, under the thermal paste), then go to your electronics store and get one the same specs, don't forget some thermal transfer paste on installation, should fix the problem I reckon. The pics are from my Guten (before it was called Guten!) unit, I'd say yours will be the same, but check. Make sure its 16amp or more capacity and 240v.

 

[Keg King]

The Guten users will tell you themselves here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/300497734015828/
There's a great group of brewers there who support each other and make a lot of great beers. We don't actually run the group but we and our staff are in there to answer questions and share when needed.
The Screens in the Guten were improved last year and are now rock solid. We've also improved the lids with clamps for those that might want to distill one both the 50 and 70L systems.
Keg King Guten Breweries also offer built in power control, which is really great for mashing and distilling.

 

[Grok]

I brought a Guten 12 months ago. First 10 brews went fine then the unit started cutting out, powering down for 15-30 seconds at a time. This started happening when the unit was trying to heat beyond a 50c protein rest. Freaking annoying!!! I reported it to Keg King and they just said they would need to test it with water.. Sadly it only does it when mashing, so nothing got resolved. I managed to pull off a few more brews as it was intermittent, then the cutting out became permanent.

It sounds very much like the Thermal Cut Out button positioned near the heating elements is faulty and needs replacing.This is there to cut power in case it boils dry. You can do it your self if your handy with a screwdriver. Take the old one off and check the specs on it (on the face of it, under the thermal paste), then go to your electronics store and get one the same specs, don't forget some thermal transfer paste on installation, should fix the problem I reckon. The pics are from my Guten (before it was called Guten!) unit, I'd say yours will be the same, but check. Make sure its 16amp or more capacity and 250v.

 

[Grok]

3 years I have had mine without a glitch until recently when I had a water leak from the tap overnight the water had got into the electrics. Should have aborted the brew day and dried it out, went ahead and switching to mash out mode the unit popped, and burn't out the circuit board. Got the updated circuit board and screen and is now working again. A good tip is to run a bead of silicone around the groove no matter if it be a Robobrew, BrewZilla or Guten. Saves any leaking water from the tap getting inside.

Mine just "popped" yesterday, just on boil finish (luckily!) , where did you get the new updated parts WEAL?

 

[goatchop41]

Mine just "popped" yesterday, just on boil finish (luckily!) , where did you get the new updated parts WEAL?

I'm going to assume that you'd get those parts from keg king themselves, seeing as though they are the Aus distributor/seller of the units

 

[wide eyed and legless]

You can get them from the manufacturer or from KK, the wiring is different so you will need the wiring diagram. How come yours just blew?

 

[Grok]

I don't know why it blew, I was just standing near it and "POP", no fluid ingress involved. Upon investigation, the only issues I can see are a blown board terminal and a glass fuse (that I removed), and a somewhat cooked and damaged power wire with only half the strands attached that is screwed onto one of the elements tabs(see pics). Looks like it has become brittle through overheating, perhaps it built up resistance over time, not sure, you might want to check your own connections after some use with this type of setup. I might try a new wire soldered straight to the PCB (where the blackened area is) and a new fuse repair and see what happens.
Might also consider adapting the Brewzilla control panel/pcb, anyone done this?
Can't find any reference to parts on KK website, what $ did it cost you Weal?

 

[chesl73]

I bought a 40L Guten when Keg King first released them which I can't remember exactly but must be a good 2 years now.
I buy equipment from both Keg places so have no axe to grind either way. The Guten has been rock solid for me and been a great purchase, nothing at all to complain about, it's been very reliable.
I was doing basic BIAB on the stove at the time in small batches but couldn't justify the price of the Grainfather, so when the Guten came out at a great price I snapped it up and this was quickly followed by ditching the bottles and moving into kegs so all in all it was the best homebrew decision I've made.
On a side note, given the good options we now have with Guten and Robobrew, I would have thought that sales of the Grainfather must have dropped off dramatically from before the time when they were the only vaguely reasonably priced option, what did you think?

 

[CyriusBrew]

I......
I was doing basic BIAB on the stove at the time in small batches but couldn't justify the price of the Grainfather, so when the Guten came out at a great price I snapped it up and this was quickly followed by ditching the bottles and moving into kegs so all in all it was the best homebrew decision I've made.
On a side note, given the good options we now have with Guten and Robobrew, I would have thought that sales of the Grainfather must have dropped off dramatically from before the time when they were the only vaguely reasonably priced option, what did you think?

Right now, it is looking to me that I cannot make a wrong decision between Guten & Robobrew. I am finding issues with both, but they do not seem insurmountable. In kind, for their price point they are a better decision than grainfather for me.

I have been a three vessel brewer for years. I have money invested in pumps, hermes, etc...However, I just want to make my brew day easier and a bit shorter. It is looking to me like either of these options will fit the bill.

 

[Ballaratguy]

I don't know why it blew, I was just standing near it and "POP", no fluid ingress involved. Upon investigation, the only issues I can see are a blown board terminal and a glass fuse (that I removed), and a somewhat cooked and damaged power wire with only half the strands attached that is screwed onto one of the elements tabs(see pics). Looks like it has become brittle through overheating, perhaps it built up resistance over time, not sure, you might want to check your own connections after some use with this type of setup. I might try a new wire soldered straight to the PCB (where the blackened area is) and a new fuse repair and see what happens.
Might also consider adapting the Brewzilla control panel/pcb, anyone done this?
Can't find any reference to parts on KK website, what $ did it cost you Weal?

I’ve seen a post on the ace etc Facebook page where a guy hooked up a grainfather controller onto his brewery
Looks to be a good easy modification. Would also be able to use it as a wired remote (saves bending down to access the controls)

 

[KegLand-com-au]

I don't know why it blew, I was just standing near it and "POP", no fluid ingress involved. Upon investigation, the only issues I can see are a blown board terminal and a glass fuse (that I removed), and a somewhat cooked and damaged power wire with only half the strands attached that is screwed onto one of the elements tabs(see pics). Looks like it has become brittle through overheating, perhaps it built up resistance over time, not sure, you might want to check your own connections after some use with this type of setup. I might try a new wire soldered straight to the PCB (where the blackened area is) and a new fuse repair and see what happens.
Might also consider adapting the Brewzilla control panel/pcb, anyone done this?
Can't find any reference to parts on KK website, what $ did it cost you Weal?

It would definitely be possible to upgrade the electronics in this Guten to BrewZilla boards. The new BrewZilla 3.1.1 have all components rated to 121C or higher. The are significantly over-engineered in every way possible which is why the boards are extremely rare to get issues. To do the modification you would need to replace both the screen board and relay board:
https://www.kegland.com.au/brewzilla-generation-3-0-to-3-1-1-upgrade-kit.html

We have heard of people using these boards to upgrade the gutens but we do not have a specific instruction sheet for this as we have not done this ourselves.

The wiring on the BrewZilla boards is a bit different and things like the thermal cut out go through the relay board and we specifically do this so instead of your brewery just ceasing to function if the thermal cut out is triggered the screen will display the actual error message. This was one of the improvements done some time ago when upgrading to 3.1 model.

We do also use a slightly higher thermal cut out switch of 175C rather than 150C. So you can upgrade this separately if you felt that this was the issue:
https://www.kegland.com.au/replacem...t-switch-for-robobrew-brewzilla-digiboil.html

I would say the most common issue with thermal cut out switch going off is caused when solids are covering up the element. So if you get burned sugars/hops stuck on the element you will notice this happens much more. As mentioned above the BrewZilla has lower watt density so it's much less likely to get stuck stuck to the elements in the first place. However if you have a guten please also make sure to keep the elements clean and scrub them with stainless wool to ensure they remain clean. The other thing that can cause this is just large amounts of sugar or hops added to the boil at once. This can sit on the bottom and act like a blanket over the element and allow them to get significantly hotter than 100C. If you are using this false bottom screen that comes included with all the BrewZilla units then this will generally not happen:
https://www.kegland.com.au/robobrew-35l-gen3-false-bottom.html

So another option is if you have a guten you might be able to make your own screen and this might stop this problem of having the thermal cut out getting triggered.

 

[KegLand-com-au]

The Guten users will tell you themselves here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/300497734015828/
There's a great group of brewers there who support each other and make a lot of great beers. We don't actually run the group but we and our staff are in there to answer questions and share when needed.
The Screens in the Guten were improved last year and are now rock solid. We've also improved the lids with clamps for those that might want to distill one both the 50 and 70L systems.
Keg King Guten Breweries also offer built in power control, which is really great for mashing and distilling.

The power controller devices are simply not that reliable especially when being used in hot ambient temperature (ie right next to an element). so although this might seem like a good idea but in reality it's just not a good idea. As mentioned in the previous post the components on the BrewZilla boards are designed to tolerate 120C. The power control will likely burn out well before this.

 

[wide eyed and legless]

I don't know why it blew, I was just standing near it and "POP", no fluid ingress involved. Upon investigation, the only issues I can see are a blown board terminal and a glass fuse (that I removed), and a somewhat cooked and damaged power wire with only half the strands attached that is screwed onto one of the elements tabs(see pics). Looks like it has become brittle through overheating, perhaps it built up resistance over time, not sure, you might want to check your own connections after some use with this type of setup. I might try a new wire soldered straight to the PCB (where the blackened area is) and a new fuse repair and see what happens.
Might also consider adapting the Brewzilla control panel/pcb, anyone done this?
Can't find any reference to parts on KK website, what $ did it cost you Weal?

KK sell them I got mine from the factory, I really wanted the original without all the bells and whistles but they don't have them any more.
Yours looks different.

You can see the Guten one the other is the Robobrew before they copied the Guten

 

[Keg King]

The power controller devices are simply not that reliable especially when being used in hot ambient temperature (ie right next to an element). so although this might seem like a good idea but in reality it's just not a good idea. As mentioned in the previous post the components on the BrewZilla boards are designed to tolerate 120C. The power control will likely burn out well before this.

Guten systems have been in use now for years with the power control built in. They're absolutely fine even in the 'hot ambient temperature' because they were designed to function with that feature in place. But the money you're saving by not having a power control feature and instead just milking the nebulous concept of low watt density has got to be great for you but miserable for the control you're offering your brewers.

 

[Grok]

Meoww ---FSTTT --spit --scratch-- eoww!

 

[Grok]

Update! I have rewired a few things and bypassed what used to be the AC Live in tab for the pcb and installed a new fuse (which is only for the transformer used to get 12v DC for circuitry), boofed up some of the power feeds to the relays with more solder (a cheap-arse way of doing it BTW, still, it works!). Also reorganised the Neutral wiring off the elements with a copper buss bar, rather than all the wires looping around, and created a common Neutral wire stack(blue wires), less cluttered now and moves unnecessary wiring away from the hot elements, should of been designed better IMO. I might look at a small extraction fan in there as well, old CPU or graphics card fans are good for that sort of thing.
But the best part is IT WORKS!!!!!!

Also, added a good mod pic for the pump, just a brass Y piece with right angle swivel outlets, just garden stuff, and silicon hose, very useful to have a switchable manifold and flexi-hose there.

Summary: I would suggest that everyone should check to see if the wires to the elements are intact and terminals are clean and free of resistance crud, especially if you've had it for a while. It looked like to me that because there were 2 wires jammed into what should only be 1 wire terminal crimp body, that half the wires were not properly attached and therefor not quite enough current capacity, hence the high resistance heat at that spot and ultimate failure. That is why I put in the copper bridge and got rid of the double looped wires everywhere.

Weal, I found a link for the older PCB if your interested, presume its still current.
https://www.angelhomebrew.co.uk/en/59-spares