Hot Water Cylinder HLT - pics

[haz66]

Is there and reason why you reduded the the pipe for the temp probe ?
I was just gonna use 15mm and cap it.

By the way the HLT is looking excellent

Its just to give the probe a better fit - mine is about 6mm diameter and the reduced tube at the end has an inside diameter of about 7mm. I figured that i could probably pack it with something like thermal compound and/or maybe wind some fine copper wire around the probe or something to give a better thermal contact with the tube. I don't know if its worth it ot not really though, its not as if 25gals of water is going to change temperature very suddenly, so probably what I've done is overkill - I'd guess that a 15mm tube with insulation behind it would work out fine too, especially if the probe touched the tube wall.

Thanks! Its obviously not a nice stainless tank like your own, but for what it is I'm quite happy so far. Didn't manage to test it last night though, so it still remains to prove itself...

Cheers
kev

Cheers Kev

[leedsbrew]

I'm on with a new brewery build at the moment and I've just won one of these on ebay for £24 so I might be picking your brains on this one matey! Anything you would have done differently?


Cheers


LB

[Kev888]

I'm on with a new brewery build at the moment and I've just won one of these on ebay for £24 so I might be picking your brains on this one matey! Anything you would have done differently?

Good stuff! I think thats probably less than scap value too, so a real bargain!

About the only areas I had issues were with the rim being quite thin/weak and with fitting the mechanical immersion flange:

I decided that for an HLT being left largely in place it would be okay as the rim is unlikely to get bashed, but if I was going to be up-ending the thing and so on, or using it for a boiler with more need to get in for cleaning, then I'd seriously consider reinforcing the rim. People suggested soldering on tube and that sort of thing, or I could have cut it back to the cylindrical part and made a wooden hoop to go around it or something like that.

The flange was fine to fit generally, but a lot tougher to tighten up leak-proof than I'd expected, perhaps because I'd not really got the right tools. If it was a cylinder without the foam insulation I'd probably go for a solder-in flange instead - cheaper and as someone else said fewer crevices for cleaning - but to me the insulation is one of the useful aspects of the cylinder I got so i didn't want to strip it off. Maybe the backer-type elements (needing smaller holes/spanners etc) would have been another alternative.

Aside from that not much really, if it were a boiler rather than a HLT I'd have considered a second element just because that much wort takes a while to heat, and if I were bothered about the aesthetics I may have left more space between the cylinder and sight tube to fit some sort of wrapping or cladding. Also I improvised a lid from some tin foil, but a more permanent one may be better.

That said I'm still working on the rest of my all grain kit so I've only really use the cylinder as an extract boiler so far, and couldn't say for certain yet how it works as an HLT. It worked very well indeed for the boil though - partly to test it I gave it a good 90mins on the first go with no problems - It wasn't filled to capacity but even so the roll with the one element was satisfyingly vigorous, probably because of all the insulation.

Cheers
kev

[leedsbrew]

Wicked! Cheers kev. Can't wait to pick mine up on sunday now!

[leedsbrew]

Kev, I'm just looking at replacement elements, what size have you used? Also what size hole does the element flange require?

Cheers

LB

[Kev888]

Hiya,

sorry - been away for the weekend. I used an 11" immersion element (and bypassed its thermostat). The ones I got from tool station didn't actually fit the flange (the element itself was bent over at the end in too big a radius to go through), even though I got them all from there same place, and screwfix was out of stock at the time too so I ended up getting it from B&Q - that one just went through. For some reason they were selling the incolloy versions slightly cheaper so I got that kind.

I 'think' the hole my mechanical flange needed was 65mm, but with it all being tightened up now I can't actually check that.

Cheers
kev

[Kev888]

Just a brief addition to this:

I was previously quite impressed to get a big metal tank, pre-insulated for less than the armaflex (or even decent sleeping mats) alone would have set me back. But I've just been measuring the coil that was removed, and its wider and longer than I imagined - turns out to be made from 7 meters of 28mm copper tube!!!

I had been thinking about using it to condense the steam driven off from the boil but it seems worth more than that, somehow. If I'd wanted to make one, the tube alone would cost me about £50 to buy, and obviously someone has gone to all the trouble of bending it into a nice regular spiral too...

So I'm now thinking of some sort of enormo-CFC or something like that; whilst the volume-to-surface area ratio isn't as good as microbore, it should provide a very easy/unrestricted load for a pump - as in fact it would do in central heating systems. So I'm probably going to look at recirculating the wort through it - provided it reaches less than 80 degrees by the time it reaches my totton pump it doesn't then need to reach FV temperatures in a single pass..

Hmm...

Kev

[Kev888]

Hopefully a final update on this;
I made a wooden ring partly to reinfirce the rim but mainly to neaten up the top, wrapped it in foil tape, glued it to the cylinder with glue, filled the gap between it and the cylinder's insulation with expanding foam and sealed it to the cylinder with a bead of silicone sealant.

Then wrapped some radiator reflector bubble wrap type stuff around the HLT - this time I got a roll from B&Q; I'd tried some from wickes recently but it tarnished very easily in water and steam (so I'm going to use that for my radiators now, of all things ), the B&Q stuff seems to be much better in that respect, I suspect it has a coating of some sort on it. Expensive, but its a long roll and I'm going to need some of the remainder for an upcoming MT.

I also changed the compression fitting on the sight tube to a copper push fit one; someone mentioned they'd had cracking with compression over long term, I never have but thought it wouldn't hurt to play safe:




Cheers
kev

[Naich]

Very nice job. Looks beautiful.

[Gricey]

Yep, you should be very pleased with yourself - it looks mint.

[Kev888]

Thanks - certainly a lot less green now

Cheers
kev

[leedsbrew]

cracking that Kev888. glad you mentioned the problem with the cheaper stuff cos I planned on getting some for my version and planne don getting it from screwfix!

[Kev888]

cracking that Kev888. glad you mentioned the problem with the cheaper stuff cos I planned on getting some for my version and planne don getting it from screwfix!

Thanks!
I've not tried the screwfix stuff, it could be okay; seems difficult to tell in advance, there wasn't much difference in price. The stuff that didn't work well had quite a thin skin, presumably of naked aluminium foil; the stuff that seems better has more of a plastic feel - I guess either a coating over the foil or a plastic alternative to foil. Seems to work well at the mo, anyway - I guess time will tell as to how it ages and so on.

Cheers
kev

[Kev888]

Right this really MUST be the last update.

Firstly made a lid with two disks of marine ply (one a bit bigger than the other) stuck together, covered in shiny tape on one side and more foil-bubble stuff on the other. No idea if the tape will last in the water vapour but as its only a HLT not a boiler thought I'd try it:


Then I made a test flap to protect the immersion heater from drips. It says not to cover it, so this is more of an overhang than a true cover. Seems to work, so I'll make an aluminium one before 'going live' - not convinced the foil-bubble stuff would be up to the heat long term.


Right, thats definately time to stop fiddling with the HLT!

Cheers
kev

[haggis51]

Found this thread, if that's what it's called, but unable to see any images. Help please.

Well, following this thread I won a hot water cylinder on ebay, which I'm going to convert to a HLT. This is a going to be a photo record of progress.

This is the tank with the top cut off and after removing a couple of inches of the foam lagging:

I reckon the 117l cylinder will have at least 90l left after removing the top, even without a syphon effect outlet.

The metal is very thin - you can easily flex the rim with one finger and I'm sure it would be very easy to dent. If this were a boiler, being upended and cleaned out regularly and so on, I'd definately want to re-inforce the rim somehow, but as a HLT (which I'll probably leave more or less alone aside from filling and emptying) it may be okay as is - not decided yet.

I had originally intended to use the cylinder upside down and cut the bottom off instead, to make use of the existing immersion setup. However, the immersion was locked solid and seemed to have suffered some sort of burn out. More importantly though it was almost vertical - smaller batches and the latter part of sparges would leave it sticking out of the water as this photo shows:

So I'm now going to use it the right way up and put an immersion in horizontally, towards the bottom somewhere.

This is the inside, with the coil which i'll remove next:

I'm thinking of using the upper coil hole to poke a temperature sensor in. I may use the lower one as the drain or sight tube connection, but its a little high. There's also the original connection for the cold water feed lower down.

There's a bit of green and some scale but its not too bad at all. The metal is quite smooth inside so hopefully will clean up fairly well. I'll probably use a scratch-free kitchen scrubber, and possibly some cleaning fluid if I can find anything reasonably powerful yet also okay for copper.

Thats all for now

Cheers
Kev