Brewery build.

The Homebrew Forum

Help Support The Homebrew Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Mash tun is now done too.

First up, a simple 25L cooler from Go Outdoors (£15 with their discount card).
Please excuse the mess on my workbench....
20160320_205715.jpg


After measuring up, use a 38mm hole cutter to drill through the outer skin of the cooler.
20160320_210128.jpg
You need to just go through the outer skin and not all the way through.


I then pilot a small hole through the insulation and the inner skin to gt the smaller inner hole lined up right.
20160320_210156.jpg


A 19mm spade drill from the inside just needs a slight fettling with a scalpel to give a good tight for the thread of a 15mm tank connector.
20160320_210324.jpg


You need to clear out the insulation out to the size of the outer hole so that the tank connector only fits around the inner skin. If you just drill a 19mm hole through both skins, the flexible nature of the box means you'll never get a seal.

A bit of spanner twirling and we have a valve.
20160320_212500.jpg


A load of 15mm connectors and tube from Wickes gives a right natty manifold.
20160322_210607.jpg

20160322_210629.jpg

It should work pretty well as it conforms to John Palmer's guidelines regarding tube placement.

All set for my Pilsner now. Can't wait.

I think my next project will be a counterflow cooler.....
 
Greenhorn. Have you done the bohemian Pilsner yet? Plan to do mine on Tuesday.

No. We ended up spending easter with the in laws. I'll be getting it brewed this weekend hopefully.

It's not scheduled for release until a party on the last Saturday in June. So it'll have over 2 months to condition. Can't wait.
 
No. We ended up spending easter with the in laws. I'll be getting it brewed this weekend hopefully.

It's not scheduled for release until a party on the last Saturday in June. So it'll have over 2 months to condition. Can't wait.


Hope mine will last until the summer. Are you doing a stepped mash?
 
Hope mine will last until the summer. Are you doing a stepped mash?

Not for this one, no. Not a lot of point, given the grain bill.

I think I'll be trying out a step mash on my first wheat beer, which will be next up.
 
Hmmmm.

How old is that book?

I'm planning on buying the AG kit from Get er brewed, so I might call them and ask. I'm assuming that kit is made with the Weyermann BP malt. I was going to use my own recipe, but the kit was almost exactly the same ingredients and cheaper.
 
Hmmmm.

How old is that book?

I'm planning on buying the AG kit from Get er brewed, so I might call them and ask. I'm assuming that kit is made with the Weyermann BP malt. I was going to use my own recipe, but the kit was almost exactly the same ingredients and cheaper.

Not sure on the age of the book. I will be doing a decoction. Read a few recipes some call for a step mash whilst others don't.
 
Yeah. I read your post and then checked that. I think I'll ask GEB. They're selling the malt so should know.

I think some of the difference in advice might be that you can buy floor dried malt (think that's right, I've had a lot of Glenfiddich), which isn't as modified as most modern malts.
 
I've now finished the protective covers for the kettle elements on the boiler. Well, one of them anyway..

So, here it is being built on the 3D printer at work.
20160406_124509.jpg

And here it is finished and glued together.
20160406_195204.jpg

You can see the groove on the edge for a rubber O ring to fit in and hopefully seal against the boiler.
20160406_195222.jpg

For reference, here is the element as it is.
20160406_195558.jpg

You can see that with the plug attached it does look a little dodgy, and I'd certainly not want to have a boil over!
20160406_195614.jpg


And here's the new cover fitted.
20160406_200740.jpg

It all went together brilliantly, much a much better fit than I hoped. Apart from the curved edge where it meets the boiler. I'd shaped it beautifully and offered up to a random bit of boiler side it fitted like a glove. Unfortunately it seems that the element fitting itself is flat and this has distorted the plastic side of the boiler. I'll adjust the 3D model to fit and might just end up siliconing this one as there is a small but annoying gap, which I don't think will be filled by the O ring.

20160406_200801.jpg
But with the plug in place, it looks much better. Overall, a success.
 
Awesome. many thanks. Even with nothing in it, my fridge is yoyo-ing all over the place, so I'll definitely be lobotomising it.

If you are measuring the air temp and want it to stabilise it all you need is a small 12v PC fan. I have an almost identical set up to you and i also had a problem the first time I tried cold crashing to very low temperatures.

I realised that I had accidently disconnected my PC fan when messing around in the fridge before crashing (my wiring was very half arsed). I reconnected it and suddenly the temp dropped to 1oC from 6oC. Without a fan the warmer air rises and cooler air is at the base of the fridge. With the probe near the top, it will never get down below 5 or 6 degrees even with the compressor running full guns. The fans cost a couple of quid and you can wire them up to an old phone charger. Alternatively get an adjustable voltage supply so you can set the fan speed. I only use mine on 9V. I think this is essential if you are measuring air temperature.

I've got mine positioned on the ceiling at the opposite side to the probe. Me feeling being that the raising heat from the heater gets distributed quickly around the fridge.
 
I'm just starting to get the materials together for my mash tun and boiler...get a PayPal account set up, I'll take a pair of those plug covers for sure! :)
 
I'm just starting to get the materials together for my mash tun and boiler...get a PayPal account set up, I'll take a pair of those plug covers for sure! :)

It has crossed my mind. The issue is producing them cheaply enough to make it worth my while. I can't imagine that anyone will pay more than 10-15 quid for a pair of these covers. For the O rings, you're looking at about £2-3 for two as they're pretty big. Then you really need to replace the tri-head security screws with standard pozi ones, as the deep screw wells make the screws tricky to do up without a normal screwdriver. So that's another 40p. So unless I can make the covers for a few quid each, it's not worth it.

Of course, I could just do it out of the kindness of my heart. :)
 
It has crossed my mind. The issue is producing them cheaply enough to make it worth my while. I can't imagine that anyone will pay more than 10-15 quid for a pair of these covers. For the O rings, you're looking at about ��£2-3 for two as they're pretty big. Then you really need to replace the tri-head security screws with standard pozi ones, as the deep screw wells make the screws tricky to do up without a normal screwdriver. So that's another 40p. So unless I can make the covers for a few quid each, it's not worth it.

Of course, I could just do it out of the kindness of my heart. :)

People HB as a hobby, rather than just to make cheap beer, and often aren't that bothered about costs (after all, how much beer would you have to drink to make a braumeister pay for itself). As long as the bit of kit does the job well, I think people would be willing to pay the cost of whatever it costs you to make one of your covers if it's something you cant buy elsewhere :thumb:
 
People HB as a hobby, rather than just to make cheap beer, and often aren't that bothered about costs (after all, how much beer would you have to drink to make a braumeister pay for itself). As long as the bit of kit does the job well, I think people would be willing to pay the cost of whatever it costs you to make one of your covers if it's something you cant buy elsewhere :thumb:

Well that's a very good point. I'm tinkering with the design for the second one and I think I can up the performance of the printer, given the geometry of the model. So I'll see how it goes and put a cost together.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top