Bypassing Ritchies Boiler Thermostat

[jimp2003]

Hi Guys.

I recently got a secondhand ritchies boiler that I intend to use as a HLT in my forthcoming 3 vessel set up. Its the one with a single element controlled by a Bruheat thermostat.

Yesterday I was calibrating a new dipstick to make sure I get my volumes right and I banged on the heat to see how long it would take to get up to strike temp. I noticed that even with the thermostat turned all the way up the heat keeps clicking on and off. I know this won't prevent me from using it as a HLT but I did think that now and again I would have liked to be able to use it as a boiler for splitting the wort of a brew and using one hop schedule in one half in the ritchie and different hops in the other half in my gas fired pot.

I only brew to 25 litres at most so the boiler would not need to boil a large quantity of liquid so I think the single element could cope. Does anyone have any experience of bypassing the thermostat on this type of boiler? Also is there a good reason why I might not want to bypass it? :wha:

Thanks in advance for any help.

Jim

 

[Darcey]

I am not famiialr with the Ritchies Boiler, but I had a secondhand Electrim boiler and they termostat was shot. I ended up wiring it out and just having the element plugged in for boiling and using a temperature controller for its now use as a HLT.

D

 

[jimp2003]

Cheers D. I think the electrim and this ritchies are the same type. I don't fancy rewiring as electrics are not really my strongpoint. I am wondering if there is something simple inside that can be removed/tinkered with to get a solid boil...?

 

[rich27500]

I have now taken the thermostat off and use a kettle lead. No issues a few brews in. Prior to that I left the box on and used wiring block to bypass the thermostat. That was fine for about 15 brews but then failed and I was lucky I have good trip switches on the fuse box because the wiring blocks had melted!!!

 

[Darcey]

I'll post some pics of what I did with the electrim tormorrow. You can just buy a new lead or bypass the thermostat.

D