Brewday 17/06/07 - Double trouble!

[Ianb]

So, with lots of kegs to fill, I thought I'd have a brewathon!

Set the timer on the HLT to come on at 0630. Woke up at 0930. Ooops!

First up, Styrian stunner.

Mashed well, everything going well, sparging finished, boiler on.

20 minutes later, a quick temperature check - 85 degC. Strewth, this
is taking forever! wait another five, check again, 83 degC. Aw SH**!!!

Traced fault to a blown fuse in the plug. Fuse in supply to thyristor was ok so all lights were still on. That's what was fooling me!

Boil went well after that.

An hour into the boil, mashed second beer - Steve Flacks Mild, again. Managed to get well under desired mash temp as I'd taken the fuse out of the kettle to get the boiler going again, so I couldn't pre warm the boiler!!!

Boil finished. Turned off and left to stand for 30 minutes. This gave me chance to try out the new heat exchanger. I originally thought these were CFC's but on further inspection, they're plate heat exchangers, encapsulated in plastic.


The pump is a 110v mag drive pump I picked up off ebay. I'd originally thought of using two heat exchangers in series, but the pump can't muster enough head. The tubing from the boiler outlet valve to the pump and from the pump to the PHE is food grade plastic, which gets all soft when boiling liquid goes through it, causing it to suck flat as the hop strainer in the boiler blocks up.



I'm using the python pump from the product chiller to supply the primary side of the chiller. This chiller has a 75 ltr water / ice bath which I turned on yesterday. Experience gained today has shown this is capable of chilling two five gallon brews a day, from just off the boil to 25 degC in quarter of an hour. I'm happy with that!



Now I have cold wort in the boiler, and thus the cold break going on, I have another couple of problems. I thought this would be the answer so I could leave the cold break debris in the boiler. The problem is it blocks up the hop strainer. I ended up having to go in with my (sterilised) arm and move everything away from the strainer to get flow back.



I thought this would be a solution to aeration, and it may still be, but once again, the break material that made it through the strainer kept blocking the holes in the watering can rose!

Still, apart from a boil over with the mild (I didn't turn the boiler down quick enough), and the hop filter flow issues, not a bad days work.

The Styrian now has a lovely yeast head, and the mild is starting, but it is a few hours behind.

So what do you use as a hop filter???

Cheers

Ian

[Vossy1]

Gr8 photo's IB and a very interesting post regards the chiller. I too have been experiencing pump problems and flow issues with my pc.

You say they look like pc's on closer inspection. Have you opened one up?

If so how many plates? I've been looking into getting a new pc imported from the states, to use in series with my existing pc, but you may hold the soln

[wooyay]

So what do you use as a hop filter???

I went for the simplistic approach and use half rolled up frying pan splatter guard attached to a 1/2" BSP end feed tap connector with a jubilee clip screwed into the back of my kettle tap. After an initial 1/2L run off which is returned to the kettle the rest seems fairly clear until towards the end.

[Ianb]

Sorry for the delay in replying, I've been doing other things (like cleaning cornies!!)

Firstly,
Daab

I've got a friendly sheet metal shop who owe me a few favours, so I'm considering asking them to knock up a stainless hop strainer / false bottom for the boiler which will consist of a grid plate with 5mm x 5mm square holes over it's entire area, and a mesh of about 3mm diameter sitting on top of it. My thinking is that even if I am pumping out of the bottom of the boiler, this will give a large surface area for the hops to settle out on, and hopefully the hops will carry out the break material filtering, whilst still letting enough liquid through to satisfy the pump / draw off demand. Any comments?

Vossy,

I've not cracked one of the PC's open yet, and I'm loathe to. They're nice and pretty!!!

I might have a go at one later, but not for now.

I might have a solution for you. Before these turned up, I acquired a 30kW rated PHE out of a combination boiler. This has a manifold on one side that gives 3/4 BSP connection for the primary flow (cooling water) and 1/2 BSP connection for the secondaries (wort). It is ex service so will need a good cleaning. Nicely, the manifold has a thermistor temperature sensor built in. I found that the same manifold would fit on both the inlet and outlet sides, so ordered another from the local heating factors. It cost about £30, and I haven't used it yet, so don't know the performance.

Obviously it depends on wort temp, cooling water temp and the flow rate of each relative to the other. What would be interesting is to know your cooling water flow rate. For this you need a weir cup.

Whilst I want to hang on to the larger PHE, in case I ever upgrade my brewery ( I have considered / am considering doing a brewathon then selling up and starting again, but four times bigger, mrs B might start playing D.I.V.O.R.C.E. on the record player if I do! ), but you are quite welcome to borrow it to experiment.

I can photograph it and count the plates if you want.

[Vossy1]

floating suction tube a bit like a King keg float.

I have been thinking a lot about this problem and came to a similar conlusion to you DaaB. Why are we trying to pump the wort through the bottom ot the copper and trub, when we could just take it from the top of the copper, ie, no flow restriction on the pump from debris or the manifold

IME a lot of the break goes through the pump anyway so that sjhouldn't be an issue

IB, I don't think a full false bottom on your copper will work as in my boiler the hops never cover the entirity of the base. In this situation the cold break could get through the unhopped areas of the FB

Depends if your worried about transfering the break material to the fv though

[Ianb]

Well, I would prefer to leave the cold break behind. If I wan't trying to achieve this, I'd just regulate the boiler outlet flow through the PHE direct into the FV.

I had thought about this, and concluded, because my boiler is tall and thin, that the false bottom idea would work on all but the most stingily hopped milds.

When I'm doing Styrian Stunner and the like, ther are that many hops, it can't fail!!

I'm also liking the idea of syphoning, which has inherent benefits and problems. There could be a fixed solution which has the advantages of both. i.e. a false bottom to filter the hops and seeds and some of the cold break, but then extracting from below the false bottom with a slotted manifold about 5mm or so above the boiler floor. This would allow most of the cold break to settle on the boiler floor.

Hmmm. I just love coming up with hair brained over complicated solutions to simple problems. It's in my nature

[Vossy1]

I was a little bit unclear on the post above. I would only take the wort from the top of the copper when recirculating the wort through the chiller, to chill the batch

I would draw off to FV through the manifold, hopefully leaving most of the cold break behind

[Ianb]

Firstly,
If you can get hold of a plastic plate and drill it full of holes to see if it works, a bit like this you should get an idea of how it would perform
http://www.18000feet.com/Daabs_False_Bottom/DFB1.htm
as I could well be wrong.

I'd love to try it, but as I am using an old "swan" 6 gallon tea urn as a boiler, the heating element is in the centre, bottom mounted, so the plastic plate may well melt!

The drilled copper tube is the simplest, but I've never been known to choose "simple" over "ridiculously over complicated and expensive"! It's just the way I am!!!

Another friend has suggested buying a sieve, doing away with the boiler hop strainer and catching the hops on the exit.

[RabMaxwell]

When i started homebrewing over 15 years ago i used a 15 mil copper manifold with slots. But with my experimental mind i then went through constructing allsorts of devises false bottoms stainless braid ect.Then went back to the old copper with slots even with the suction from a RG550 pump it doesn't clog up. Even with sparging my hops most of the break remains in the kettle filtered by the hops. By the way Ianb it's a nice little setup you have do you control your fermentation with your python cooler yet.

[steve_flack]

I notice a few people have been brewing the mild recipe I posted a while back....what have you thought of the finished beer? (Ian - I know it's a bit soon for you to tell!)

[Ianb]

I notice a few people have been brewing the mild recipe I posted a while back....what have you thought of the finished beer? (Ian - I know it's a bit soon for you to tell!)

It's not that soon, Steve.

This is my second go at it. The first batch was universally acclaimed by all who sampled it, with comments like "I'd pay good money for this if I could buy it in the pub" and "excellent"

It was pulled through a beer engine, retained it's head superbly and all in all is a thoroughly nice quaffable pint. It was my second attempt at A.G. (and now my sixth).

Top Hole!

[Ianb]

When i started homebrewing over 15 years ago i used a 15 mil copper manifold with slots. But with my experimental mind i then went through constructing allsorts of devises false bottoms stainless braid ect.Then went back to the old copper with slots even with the suction from a RG550 pump it doesn't clog up. Even with sparging my hops most of the break remains in the kettle filtered by the hops. By the way Ianb it's a nice little setup you have do you control your fermentation with your python cooler yet.

Rab

I had to double take - RG550 pump. I know the RG500 is a lovely 500cc two stroke Suzuki....Ahhh, the smell of castrol R....memories... (If anyone has an unmolested RG500 they want to sell, let me know first! )

It's funny, I've been considering cooling fermentation with the python pump, but with a five gallon brew length, If I can keep the room temperature stable, I don't think therre will be that much problem. One thing I have done though is wrap a hose pipe around an FV and when fermentation has progressed far enough, turned on the Python pump. This gets the beer temp down to +2 degC in 24 hours (I should point out that it is wrapped in an old sleeping bag for insulation / condensation purposes) I believe this helps clear the beer.

One thing I have considered is controlling the shed temperature with the python cooler, although I'll have to relocate the unit itself to the garage whic is next door. The shed is well insulated and should only require modest cooling during the summer. The central heating is fine for the winter. I had considered looking for the external unit from a cellar cooler (you know the ones with the water cooled condenser) and installing that in the shed as a cooler, passing the cold water from the chiller through the coil and recirculating air over it. Obviosly I'd have to dispose of the condensate to drain, but this might allow me to hold the room temperature stable to within +/- 1 degree or so.

My problem is I always go over the top