One Burner to Rule them all.

ok I currently have the 23 tip flame throwing NG Jet burner. I don't get scorching or soot on the bottom of my keggle, but its pretty much on or off nothing in between. I have been toying with the idea of buying 3 more burners for my brew stand.

here's the catch... I currently brew with Natural gas at home and don't desire to use propane tanks for my goto rig, but I would like to be able to take my rig off site for some LHBS parking lot brewing. there is also a chance I'll be moving to Texas and I am not sure if i'll have NG or low pressure propane, would an NG setup work for low pressure propane.

so I'd like to be able to use: NG, LP, and low pressure propane if at all possible.

would having a larger orifice for NG work if I just added a regulator with Propane tank?

also looking at the agrisupply BG-14 http://www.agrisupply.com/bg-high-pressure-cast-iron-burner-/p/64494/cn/5400000/
and this valve to use for NG http://www.williamsbrewing.com/HURRICANE_CONVERSION_VALVE_P2214C87.cfm

any other burners I should be aware of?


-=Jason=-

*bump*

in the market for a new burner and stand seeing how my JET burner melted my turkey fryer stand and now I can't brew until I make a new stand and I figure I might as well get a new burner.

right now I brew with NG at my house.

I will most likely be moving to Texas in a few months. not sure if the new house will be NG or Propane.

I do not wish use propane bottles for my main source of fuel, but would like to make a portable setup so that I CAN hook up propane bottle and brew off site.

is there a burner out there that can accommodate both High Pressure and Low Pressure.

is it just switching out an orifice, or more complicated?

-=Jason=-

*cough*

I'd like to hear from anyone using a BG-Styler burner on Natural Gas. what is your setup for Natural gas and can it be used for Propane as well?

-=Jason=-

I'm no expert, but I think in general changing from one type of gas to another is an issue of changing out orifices. Most of the info I find with a quick google is related to changing propane grills over to natural gas, and one of the common issues there is with the control knobs (as there is a small hole that is metered by the knob, so if you don't make that hole bigger, you can't turn the gas 'up' as far).

So, that may be an issue for you as well (though if you are using an adjustable regulator, like I've got on my turkey burner, and you replace with an adjustable regulator, you'd have your control there.

It sounds like, to be honest, switching back and forth might be a PIA. It might be more reasonable to make your burner/hose assembly easy to remove, and have a dedicated propane burner. Or, make a brew stand that works with a turkey burner and use that for travelling brewing, while your home unit uses your current burner and runs on NG.

from what I gather I can buy the High Pressure BG14 and put a orifice from williamsbrewing

so it looks like all I have to do is:

a.buy the burner from agrisupply.com
b.buy this valve orifice http://www.williamsbrewing.com/HURRICANE-NATURAL-GAS-CONVERSION-VALVE-P2214.aspx

should i wish to use this with propane I'd just remove the special valve and put the stock oriface back on and hook up to propane tank.

-=Jason=-

The basic requirement is to make it so that you can change out the orifice on the burner relatively quickly. That means no hard piping between where the gas hits the stand to the burner itself. I'd probably grind the threads off the burner side of the orifice so that it could just slide into the burner and rely on some method of holding them in place elsewhere. Where it connects to the manifold, I'd use air-hose quick disconnects. That way the propane and nat gas orifices are pop in/pop out. Simple in theory, maybe less so in practice. If you have a main pipe on a manifold held to the stand with U-bolts, you could make it pivot at that point. In other words, rotating the whole manifold away from the burners would disengage the orifices from the burners. Change them out, rotate it back and secure the U-bolts tight.

I'd skip the conversion valves and just get extra sets of stock orifices and drill them out little by little. You'll want individual valves anyway if you hook up to propane.

I like the idea of that, you don't think the smooth orifice going into the burners threaded body would pose a problem with gas trying to escape out the threads?

but I wouldn't be changing things around every brew session so even if I had to remove a burner and change the orifice out that wouldn't be that big of a deal to me.

-=Jason=-

Flomaster said:

from what I gather I can buy the High Pressure BG14 and put a orifice from williamsbrewing

so it looks like all I have to do is:

a.buy the burner from agrisupply.com
b.buy this valve orifice http://www.williamsbrewing.com/HURRICANE-NATURAL-GAS-CONVERSION-VALVE-P2214.aspx

should i wish to use this with propane I'd just remove the special valve and put the stock oriface back on and hook up to propane tank.

-=Jason=-

Click to expand...

Other than not knowing if that burner is the same one that the valve is meant to work with (I assume you've made that determination), it looks like what you'd need is the NG and the LPG valve assemblies, which apparently have their 'orifice' on the end that screws into the burner (nice). Then whatever hoses and regulators are needed to connect the valve to its respective gas source (I don't know what you've got to hook up your current NG bas burner, but the propane setup should consist of a hose and regulator, and that will screw onto your standard BBQ tank).

It actually sounds pretty easy, the only issue I can see is with the valve screwing into the burner, this is probably not meant to be screwed in and out all the time, and the instructions may call for teflon tape on the threads. But that shouldn't be a big deal if you aren't switching back and forth like, every week...and maybe not even if you are.

I just bought one of the blichmann burners and converted it to natural gas with an orifice change from Williams. I also went to lowes and bought a 10' natural gas grill hose and hooked it to the outside gas pipe on my patio. As a plumber, I will tell you that you do want to switch orifices if you switch fuel sources. Though they might work, you take a huge risk in causing a fire or personal injury.

Wlffmnn, care to expand on how changing the orifice for the proper fuel source could cause fire or personal injury?


if your orifice is small and meant for Propane then these match up, if you try and use NG which is low pressure with a small orifice you will not get proper BTU output and very poor fire.

now switching to a NG orifice like you have done and using NG source you get a matched fuel source?


what I want to do is use the same burner for NG at home, and switch it out when I take my setup off site and use propane. is this not safe is so why?

-=Jason=-

The orifice fitting threads into the casting just to hold it there. It also holds the air damper disc in place. The threads don't seal anything. Gas is shot out of the tiny hole with high velocity into the main casting. It definitely won't want to come out of the gap between the casting and orifice fitting.

Jason, my first burner was a propane one that came on my turkey fryer. The orifice for it was threaded with, I believe, 1/8NPT. I drilled and tapped the burner to 1/4NPT to fit that williams conversion valve. I also have a 1/8-1/4 reducer that I can still screw into the burner to set it back to my propane setup. As long as you can thread the corresponding orifice assembly back into the burner, you can run whatever fuel you want with it.

Currently I have the 6" burner from Agri supply, and run it on NG. As long as I have the means to thread the original propane adapter back into it, I could run it on propane.

beeboy thanks for replying, I just recall you said you had a sooty burn with the original burner. I am betting its because it was of crappy turkey fryer "kit" with the price of the agri burner the smaller one I just might buy one and give it a go.

http://www.agrisupply.com/burner-cast-low-presure-multi-hole-/p/40282/cn/5400000/
this is a 10 dollar burner but looks to be putting out plenty of heat on high and can be dialed down low enough judging from the photos you posted in the other thread.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/6-low-pressure-burners-227767/



-=Jason=-

the one that was all sooty was one of these, it did not convert well to NG. The 6" one works beautifully!




I brewed this past weekend with the 6" Agri supply burner and it worked well. A friend of my brew partner fabbed up a stand for it. I am tempted to try the 10" burner, for the price that Agri supply sells these its cheap enough to experiment.

beeboy said:

the one that was all sooty was one of these, it did not convert well to NG. The 6" one works beautifully!

I brewed this past weekend with the 6" Agri supply burner and it worked well. A friend of my brew partner fabbed up a stand for it. I am tempted to try the 10" burner, for the price that Agri supply sells these its cheap enough to experiment.

Click to expand...

it seems that the 6" burner is putting out plenty of heat.how does it attach exactly? does the 6" burner have a threaded hole in the bottom of it or...?

-=Jason=-

Flomaster said:

it seems that the 6" burner is putting out plenty of heat.how does it attach exactly? does the 6" burner have a threaded hole in the bottom of it or...?

-=Jason=-

Click to expand...

A threaded bolt is what came with mine!

Cool that means I can install it easily into my current stand.

-= Jason =-

yeah, it has a bolt in the center, and 3 legs about an inch tall.

wlffmnnn - can you post pictures and the process of your Blichmann conversion?

*bump*

well I am in Texas now and managed to tap into the natural Gas Water heater connection just fine like I did in AZ. so I think I'll try my luck with the smaller 6" burner and just drill the orifice out to the right size.

-=Jason=-

I have 3 10 tip jet burners on NG and I'm thinking of changing my MLT burner to one of the 6" ones discussed. Please report back here on converting the 6" burner to NG and how it performs.