eric_pwb

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Hi all,

I am currently brewing from kits and have been wanting to jump into all-grain for a while now and have decided on a HERMS system which I plan to automate.

I work for a hot-tub company and have the opportunity to get a brand new heater for free (no I am not stealing it). It is a 6kW 240V Stainless steel pass-through tube type heater, does anyone else out there use something similar that can comment on how well this would work?

Thanks,

Eric

The Pol

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That would be a RIMS.

Sounds cool, high wattage, depending on the watt density, it MAY, may, scorch wort passing through.

Unless of course you run it at 120VAC and get 1500W from it, that would be sweet too.

eric_pwb

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I realize that it is kind of a roundabout way of doing it, but I was gonna use it to heat the water in the heat exchanger, having separate circulation systems for the water and the wort, so it would be a HERMS system. I would likely have to do it that way as the heater has 2" PVC unions on it, as it is designed for use in hot tubs.

The Pol

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Oh, I see... well, in that case. Should work perfectly. Turbulence in the HEX is needed anyway, so pumping or stirring of that water is required.

eric_pwb

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Good to know.

Does anyone have an Idea of what kind of heat times I should expect with a heater that size? I plan on doing 5 gallon batches now, but building the system to handle 10 gallons for the possibility of going bigger later.

The Pol

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How much water are you heating?

Step mashing with a HERMS is... well... interesting

But how much water are you heating in the HEX? And to what temp, from what temp?

EvilGnome6

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What kind of heat exchanger? A plate chiller would probably get clogged.

The Pol

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He said Pass Though Tube

EvilGnome6

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The pass through tube heater is to heat the water in the heat exchanger. If he's building the heat exchanger as a coil inside his HLT (similar to yours), that would work fine. If he's thinking about using a plate chiller, it could get clogged.

eric_pwb

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My plan was to use to 50L kegs, having two circulation systems.

One will circulate the wort through a copper coil heat exchanger in the one keg, and the other will be to circulate the water through the heater and serves the dual purpose of agitating the water, which will likely be used for sparging in the end.

The water circulation system will likely be using 1 1/2" or 1" PVC as the heater has 2" unions on it, this way I can be sure I will have enough flow that I won't overheat the heater.

Make more sense?

As for water volumes, I am a little unsure, I am probably going about this backwards as I have researched way more into the rig than the actual process, so water volumes and temperature are a little beyond the realm of my knowledge at this point:P