[IBU] Building 10 Gallon System - Questions

Mon Jul 7 09:48:21 CDT 2008

Thanks for the info Andy - I'm in the same boat as you.  If I recall from brewing w/ Andy, I believe he has the Therminator plate chiller by Blichmann Eng.

I recently purchased the sabco false bottom (long overdue) as I had been using a 10" flat false bottom.  I would suggest the Sabco fb over all others as you get a better fit into the kettle and of course the diameter is larger (=more surface area).  It's great but doesn't solve all the issues as I found out this weekend.  I believe I was around 12-14oz of hops of which 5oz were whole hops.  Like Andy, I can recirc and go right into the fermentor if I want but I do go into the kettle for a few minutes to make sure things are rolling.  Surprisingly I was able to get a decent flow rate w/ all these hops in the kettle until the end with about a gallon left.  All of the pellets seemed to have filtered through and did kill the flow through the Shirron w/ about a gallon left.

I believe the shirron is a great chill plate for the price compared to others on the market.  I'm not engineer but it would appear the footprint is a bit smaller on the shirron than Andy's Therminator.  I would also speculate with my single engineering neuron that the flow rate on the shirron is more limiting than the Therminator and a counter flow chillzilla.  I suspect it's this extra restriction that allows for the chilling efficiency.  Nonetheless it is very efficient going from 212 to 72-75F with July water temps.

In the future, I will rig up something very similar to the image below - for my pellet hops.  I still plan to use a good proportion of whole hops (as they last) but will use pellets inside such a bag towards the end of my boil.  I will use a larger bag to hop utilization may not be a huge factor.  I pulled this image from the NB web forum for reference.  Discussions indicate no loss of hop utilization w/ this gizmo below.  On the other hand, maybe this fellow only uses 1 to 2 oz for a hop "demon"....   I'm thinking a larger bag will do the trick to allow for better utilization.

I can also speculate I should be able to collect more volume from my kettle as I often find the hops just suck up the liquid.  Tired of funds into an expensive hop brew and only getting a few gallons from it.

[cid:image001.jpg at 01C8E016.5E08B370]

________________________________
From: ibu-bounces at iowabrewersunion.org [mailto:ibu-bounces at iowabrewersunion.org] On Behalf Of Cleghorn, Andy
Sent: Thursday, July 03, 2008 11:49 AM
To: Mike Young; Iowa Brewers Union; amesbrewersleague at yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [IBU] Building 10 Gallon System - Questions

I would like to hear what you come up with as I have not found a good solution.  I really need to since I have not been able to find any deals on leaf hops.  I have a plate chiller and have been using a pie pan false bottom in the boiler.  If I have at least 2oz of leaf hops, I can use as many pellets as I need.  I do recirculate mainly to sanitize the chiller and to set a bed of leaf hops over the screen to help filter.  I recirc for about 5 minutes or so without any cold water and then about another 10 minutes with the water on to catch some of the cold break in the kettle.  It isn't necessary to do that to get the temp down, I can run from boiling right to the carboy and be chilled far enough.  If the ground water is really warm I put an immersion chiller in a bucket of ice water and pre chill my cold water before it goes into the plate chiller.  I have only done this a couple times in the summer.

I have tried screens and other mesh to filter the stuff out, but haven't had much luck.  I had a stainless scrubber that looked like a Chore Boy and connected that onto my drain, but it had a tendency to plug up.  We stuck 10 gallons of barley wine once that had about 20oz of pellets in it.  With that and the hot break their was about a foot of gunk in the bottom of the kettle.  I ended up using a racking cane and taking it off the top.  Not fun.  I have never plugged up the chiller.  I back flush when done then recirc boiling water through it.  I have an older one that is thicker.   I don't think it is the Shirron.  I could not heat sanitize it because it has some plastic around the edges.  Like the threads, the plates are sharp and the plastic helps to keep from cutting yourself.

March pumps work pretty well.  I have had a few.  I still have a brass one, but the plastic ones seem to hold up to the boiling temp ok.  They are a bit brittle and if you are not careful you break the pump housing so mounting it securely in an out of the way spot is a good idea.  They are not water tight, so don't put it in a place where it could get water with out some type of cover.  If it is under a burner I would put on a heat shield, too.  You do need to get to it to oil it occasionally.  They will push quite a ways, but won't lift a foot.  Put it at the bottom or you will have priming problems.  The valve may be handy, but all you have to is either take the discharge hose off or lower it down to get the liquid to push the air out.

Two things I would do differently with mine.  Mine has a higher hot liquor tank and then the mash tun and boiler on the same level.  I added a couple inches of space between the tun and the boiler, but didn't do that between the tun and the liquor tank.  The burner from the liquor tank is too close to the top of the mash tun and it gets very hot.  It sounds like your configuration will be different, but just be aware of how close things are together.  Mine doesn't make a lot of difference unless I am doing back to back brews.

The other thing is about the quick connects.  I have the 1/2 NPT and female quick connect mounted on the kegs and the pump and then the barb male fittings on the hoses.  If I was going to do it again, I would go the other way.  1/2 male NPT quick connects and barb females.  The female fittings stick out too far from the kegs and I have broken a couple.  Also the females cost more and you use less of them if you put them on the hoses.

If anyone knows of a place that would sell that super fine S/S screen like the Hop Stopper uses, I would be interested in buying some and experimenting.

________________________________
From: ibu-bounces at iowabrewersunion.org [mailto:ibu-bounces at iowabrewersunion.org] On Behalf Of Mike Young
Sent: Wednesday, July 02, 2008 1:42 PM
To: Iowa Brewers Union; amesbrewersleague at yahoogroups.com
Subject: [IBU] Building 10 Gallon System - Questions
After brewing three 5 gallon batches of beer in the last three days, I've decided that I need to build a 10 gallon all-grain brew system.  I've got a couple kegs that are waiting to become my hot liquor tank and boil kettle and I just ordered two Bayou Classic SQ14 burner stands w/ burners today from Amazon that I've read will support a keggle just fine.  I'm planning on putting my hot liquor tank and boil kettle directly on the burners and building a wooden stand to elevate my mash tun cooler above the boil kettle so I can gravity feed my wort into the boil kettle.  I'll mount a march pump on the bottom of the wooden cooler stand and use that to pump my hot water into the mash tun.  I was also planning on using the pump to push my wort through a Shirron chiller (not purchased yet) to cool it down.  That being said, I've got a few questions to ask my fellow brewers:

When using the Shirron chiller, what type of pickup tube do you use so the chiller won't get clogged?  I use pellet hops exclusively, and have seen several different options that I could use (whirlpooling, Hop Stopper (too expensive), and a hop bag).  The idea of a hop bag seems nice, but I don't really want to give up hop utilization.  whirlpooling seems nice as well, but I've read several posts online where people have problems.  I've seen several people that just use a piece of copper tubing directed at the side of the kettle and pinched slightly.  What do you guys use that works well for you?

Also related to the Shirron chiller, do you have to recirculate the wort back to the boil kettle to chill it down, or do you find that just running it through the chiller and straight into the fermenters works well for you?  I'll probably do some initial testing when I get my system built, but it would be nice to know what to expect.

I'd also like to know what everyone's experience with the March pump as been.  From what I've read, you want the pump to be below the liquid you are planning on pumping since it isn't self-priming.  I found the following link which explains add a little valve that makes it easier to prime.  I think that's probably what I'm going to do: http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/photo/1456549408053500498HeldvV

I think that's about all the questions I've got for now.  If anyone has any helpful hints I'd be glad to hear them as well.

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