DIY Sparge Arm

[blawford]

At the moment I am using a peice of foil with holes and jugging wort and sparge water ontop. I would like to upgrade and I have been struggling to come up with a good design for a sparge arm.

The main problem is that I want it to do it all. I just built a PID controller do I am thinking the next build might be a HERMs coil, so I would like a sparge arm that fits my cooler with the lid open and closed (so I can continuously recirculate while mashing), this is the main point Is struggling with.

Do i need to sprinkle the water or assuming I have an inch or two of water covering it will running it down the side of the tun be enough to avoid channelling​?

My mash tun is and Igloo Ice Cube and I haven't had it more than about half full so far, i guess something that was moveable closer to the grainbed would be helpful to avoid channelling also?

While I am here, at some point I will want a pump to recirculate, anyone got any recommendations?

 

[IainM]

Nice project. I can't help with the sparge arm but I've been recommended this pump, reputedly the same spec as the Bulldog Brewer one.

 

[blawford]

I am leaning towards installing an inlet through the side of the cooler near the top and then running the wort/sparge water down the side . That way it can be independent of the lid. Just wondering if this is likely to cause any channelling?

 

[blawford]

Finished this yesterday after being on holiday for 10 days. Just in case anyone comes across this wanting to do the same, here is what I did.

I went with one of these to go through the side of the cooler near the top. I drilled the hole using two different sized hole saws, as the outer part was larger than the inner part and I had a set of different sizes (bought cheap from Toolstation. I used a 1/2" tap washer to seal the inside (although there wont be water this high up the mash tun, just required for when I drain water out and splash it around cleaning). Below picture shows the inlet and version 1 of the arm:

Unfortunately I used a 2.5mm drill bit and this lead to water dribbling out rather than spraying, I should have used 1.5mm! The arm design was a bit tight fitting and seemed like it would be in the way when mashing in, stirring etc so I decided on a different design.

Seems to work pretty well, looking forward to trying it on the next brew.

 

[dps51]

good job nice and neat hope all goes well
I was think something along this line
using a lawn sprinkler for the spray part