CopperHillBrewery

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Greetings fellow homebrewers! I've been lurking for a while now, but have decided to make my first post about the heatstick I recently built and used yesterday for brewing.

I followed the fine instructions from Tom's Cedar Creek Network page and made a 2000 W right-angle heatstick. Plugged into a 20 A GFCI outlet in my garage, it brought water up to mash temp w/o any problems. When I used it for boiling 6.5 gallons of wort in an insulated 8 gallon aluminum kettle, I could barely get past a simmer. So I had to simmer/boil my Witbier for 90 min just to get a few gravity points. 3rd AG brew, btw

I don't have an extra 20 A circuit in my kitchen, but was wondering what my options were. I could use the heatstick with my stove for boiling, but will the 2000 W / 120 V Camco heating element work on a 15 A circuit? or will I need to run a 12/3 gauge extension cord from my garage to my kitchen? or something else?

Sorry for the long post. And thanks to everyone on this forum for helping me get this far!

Budzu

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Hi, glad to hear you're coming along into electric

Unfortunately you won't be able to run the 2000 on a 15 amp circuit. If you can run an extension cord to the garage from a 15 amp circuit, you could build another 1500 watt stick and boil with 3500 watt. Otherwise either you have to put in a 20 amp circuit in your kitchen (with 12/3 wire), or run the 12/3 extension cord as you mentioned.

Good luck!

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android

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+1 to making a 1500W one. that should give you more than enough power. i have both a 20A and a 15A circuit in my garage, so I can plug both in next to each other, but if you have a 15A circuit close by your garage, you could just run the cord to it... should be able to boil with no problem.

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CopperHillBrewery

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Thanks for the quick replies! I was hoping not to have to build another heatstick. I might go the extension cord route as a temporary measure.

jkarp

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Are you certain your kitchen outlets are 15A? Code has required two 20A small appliance circuits in the kitchen for quite some time now. If you've got a garbage disposal, it's also quite possibly on a dedicated 20A.

CopperHillBrewery

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All the visible ones in my kitchen are 15 A, but I'll double check when I get home. The only "hidden" outlets I believe I have are behind my fridge, behind my stove, and maybe behind my dishwasher somewhere. You're probably right about the garbage disposal having a dedicated circuit. I'll have to check that, as well. Thanks for the insight!

jkarp

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Visible meaning you're going by the plug appearance? US electric code is goofy in that it allows 15A plugs on 20A circuits. What do the breakers say in the box?

Cliff897

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Yah you can put it on your stove top. That's a very elegant solution.

Cpt_Kirks

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Luckily, I have access to two 20A circuits in the garage, and with an extension cord, in the back yard. So, I can use two 2000 watt sticks. I get great boils, even with 10 gallon batches (about 12 gallons in the keggle).

I don't think they are that hard to build, I have built four of them so far:




I've been busy, but hope to try out the double stick in my HLT lid next weekend.

Since I don't need to run the HLT and boil at the same time, 2 20A circuits will do until I get around to going 240V (if ever).

kerklein2

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This. My kitchen had 15A plugs but the breaker was 20A. I just picked up a 20A GFCI from the Depot and swapped em out. 2000W + Stovetop=125 to boiling in 20 minutes with 6 gallons. I wish the stove could maintain the boil once it got there, but it couldn't. 2000W stick could by itself though. Now I just need a controller for it so I can dial down the power and still maintain a boil.