Well we brewed the first batch on Sabco last night. A breakdown and my thoughts (positive and negative). I should also interject I still haven't finished the user manual, or their CD that came with this. So user error may well be prevelant. I didn't have time to read.
Protein rest was easy. My hot water on tap is 122*, so adding that to the HLT with my chemical additions, then swapping water over to the Mash was a breeze. (Side note - I started with 10 G in the HLT, and used chemicals for that amount. Then I really only transferred about 6G to the MT for the Mash. I figure, hey, the rate for the mash is accurate, and I have some extra chemicals in the HLT, that will get watered down when I add more water for the sparge. I have no idea if this is the right approach..... but my Mash PH should have been good)
I did a 4 step mash. Protein rest, Sacch at 145* for 40 minutes, Sacch at 154* for 40, then a Mash Out for 10. Getting from the Protein Rest to the next step took over 30 minutes. I kept the flame low, and stirred occassionally, while the water was constantly recirculating. Maybe I should have kicked the flame a little higher? Was worried of scorching the wort. Trust me, I scorched nothing. Added maybe 90 minutes to my brew day though which you will see if you keep readin.
The problem with the Brew Magic is like others have said. The burner on the MT effects the water pipe going to the digital thermometer. So the control panel will say you have overshot the temperate "Turn Off Burner!". But once the burner is off, the temp drops 8-10 degrees. Then you need to turn the burner back on, as the electric heating element isn't strong and won't warm it up that far. Its a back and forth struggle.
After that step, it took about another 30 minutes to go from 145 to 154*. And really, the first 10 minutes that I counted for that mash step, it fluctuated from 150 to 158. Once the system dials in, its great. But, its tough to get it dialed in.
Took about 30 more minutes to go from 154* to 168* for my mashout. At this point, I'm also heating the water in the HLT to get that to 168 for my fly sparge. That effects the temperature reading of the Tun thanks to heating the pipes around it.
Normally - I would have increased my step temp with water from the HLT. I think the lesson learned here is, start with little less water in my protein rest. Add a quart of 180* water or so from the HLT to help the burner and electric kick up the heat, and do that again for a next step. Just a Quart, not to add too much water, but to get the temp moving. (Hopefully heating it up doesn't effect the stability of the temperature in the Mash though...worried about that)
Sparging - OOPS. Was too worried about keeping the pump "full". Ran off the first 3 gallons (ok, maybe 5) from the Mash in like 5 minutes. Grain bed was exposed. So I slowed that, and kicked up the water from HLT. 5 minutes later - OOPS. Had put in like 5 gallons of HL into the Mash. Way too much water. Finally got it more dialed in after that. But I ran out of water in the HLT when collecting the last 1 or 2 gallons, and finished sparging in about 25 minutes. I did check the gravity at 11 G (collected 13) and I was at 1016. So still good. But I'm sure that last gallon was much closer to straight water. This was all me not being ready to handle the system though.
As this was the first 10 gallon batch we've ever done, learned a lesson on how long it takes to use an IC to cool on an 85 degree day. Took a bit more then twice as long as normal. Usually done in 20 was done in 50 minutes. Gonna have to get a pump to pump some super chilled water through....
When all was said and done, I was targeting 75% efficiency, despite normally getting 69% on the old setup. Hit 78.5%, and my sparging was terrible. No stuck mash. No explosions.
I did smell burning a couple of times. I'll check the heating element later to see how much wort may have burned there.
Some quick improvements by Sabco would go a long way:
*Put more guards around the burner, don't let that heat other pipes and effect the temperature readings!
*Use a little stronger heating element.
*The burner on the boil kettle sucks. It is different then the HLT and MT. It was quick to 200*, then took a good 20 minutes, maybe longer, from that point.
*The physical Thermometer on the MLT is right next to the digital probe for the electronic controller. Should always read the same, even =/- 0.5 degrees due to timing. But they were consistently 3-4 degrees off. I'm calling to b*tch about that this week.
After having this, and using it, I wish I was technical enough and had the time to build this. The problem for me would be the software/controller. If you can build this yourself, its just a pump with one heating element. But I'm pretty happy with this. We'll see how it works once I read the instructions and better learn the system.