Soil Heating Cable on stainless

[DaveGillespie]

I've read that brewbelt type heaters shouldn't be used on stainless fermenters as you may get a shock from the ungrounded fermenter if something is not wired correctly.

I've seen some folk in the past use soil warming cable - would this have the same concerns?

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

I have been using a brew belt on my conical for years now.

It’s a good safety concern though.

But I would solve it by grounding the stainless instead of sourcing an electric heating element that was less likely to short.

An electrical leg/hand strap secured to the conical leg? You should be able to get something like that from a pc shop/ Amazon?

[themadhippy]

An electrical leg/hand strap secured to the conical leg?

no because often they have a protection resistor built in,use a proper bonding strap

[DaveGillespie]

Mines a 30 litre snake keg, so no legs on it. What would you do with that strap?

Tempted to just stick to the water bath method.

[themadhippy]

is there a lip big enough to take a 4mm hole? nut bolt and a crimp eye.

[DaveGillespie]

Aye, there would be.

Does the strap itself then need to connect to anything else?

[LeeH]

If the belt it leaking current then it’s not fit for purpose.

You don’t need to bond a FV with a BS951 clamp!




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[themadhippy]

no need for the strap if your using a nut and bolt,the strap was to show the correct alternative to the "An electrical leg/hand strap secured to the conical leg"

If the belt it leaking current then it’s not fit for purpose

in normal operation then there shouldn't be a leakage current,if however a fault occurs the metal case may become live,waiting for the unsuspecting brewer to grab hold.

[DaveGillespie]

Where does the other end of the crimped cable connect?

[Kev888]

To an earth. You may find that many ready-made soil heating cables have no earth in their flex, just live and neutral: in the case of the better ones thats because they are double insulated and the nature of the insulation is supposed to be sufficient protection; in the case of cheap/foreign ones they may just be dubious. Some heating cables may have an earthed braid screen inside, and so have an earth in their flex, but thats relatively unusual in cheap soil heating cables.

But either way, if you're concerned about the possibility of the metal vessel becoming live, then earth it well as themadhippy suggests.