BM Brew length options

[laithclark]

I have a question about the BM as I'm keen to get one its a question of the right size which I think would be the 50litre for max flexibility.

I know I can get a short malt pipe to take a 50l to 20l, but can I then make a 10l length using the short pipe so I can make small experimental brews too?

I would be really interested to hear from any BM users out there

thanks

laith

[BrewerBen]

I have the 50L and so far have only brewed with the short malt pipe. I don't think you'll be able to get the brew length down to 10L as there may not be enough water to cover the elements, it may not even be enough water to fill the malt pipe. When I have used smaller qtys of malt for lower gravity ales I've also noticed a hole form in the malt bed where the pump is. My tendency for a lower gravity brew is to up the brew length to around 28l to increase amount of malt.
Brew length wise the BMs are much more flexible than the volume indicated in the name but 10l I think is just too small for the 50l to be able to work, there is a 10l malt pipe for the 20L BM though and you may be able to push the volume to 25-30 l depending on gravity.

[laithclark]

Thanks for that, I am still keen as it looks a great bit of kit and should save a bit of space too!

[Waffty]

I thought the short malt pipe for the 50L was 25L? According to Braumeister it is.

http://speidels-braumeister.de/shop/en/ ... r-50-litre

##For 25 l brew with 50-litre Braumeister
## markings on the drawbar at the bottom: 20 l, 25 l, 30 l

But some sites seem to also list it at 20L ?

http://www.vigoltd.com/Catalogue/Braume ... ster-93017

[BrewerBen]

I normally brew to 25l or above with it

[McMullan]

I have a 20L. Occasionally, I regret not going for the bigger 50L, for its higher capacity. But the 20L is easy to handle and compact enough to brew in the kitchen without any issues.

[Wezzel]

I'm glad I went for the 20l. Because it's so easy to use I can brew really regularly and build up a good stock of different brews.

The short malt pipe is good for 10 or 12 litre test batches.

[Matt12398]

I have a 20L. Occasionally, I regret not going for the bigger 50L, for its higher capacity. But the 20L is easy to handle and compact enough to brew in the kitchen without any issues.

The exact reason why I wish I'd gone for the 20 litre rather than the 50 litre.

[laithclark]

Thanks for all your opinions it seems everyone has the same thoughts/issues/considerations when it comes to brew length!

Still not sure which way to go but I think I may just stick to 20l brew lengths as I always have but get a short malt pipe to brew smaller batches

[Waffty]

I'm brewing 22L lengths at the moment ie a Cornys worth + a bit over for some bottles. I have a 50L version and brew with the 25L short malt tube.

My thoughts of the 50L are, it's big and it's heavy, it has two pumps and two elements, so it takes more time to clean and it's bulky to move around. The plus side it, if I ever want to move up, then I won't need to make a new investment, having the two pumps is a bonus, as on one brew, the one pump got blocked and stopped, this would have been game over on the single pumped 20L system but on my 22L length, the second pump was more than able to carry on with the brew. By the same token, with the two elements, on my 22L length, things happen quicker. So to me the trade off of resilience and temp speeds and the ability to scale up further, far outweigh the initial issues of setting up and cleaning.

The above said, If I had the money, space etc then I'm sure I could make use of all sizes in the family work, as there are occasions where 10L would be ideal, as would 20L and potentially 50L.