Alternative to water heater elements?

Has anyone ever tried using a cartridge heater? The kind used in molding and other industrial processes? They seem to be available anywhere from 200 watts up to 2000+ And they are designed to be inserted into a hole in a molding block or something like that. I was thinking maybe they could be installed in a thermowell? Or directly through a compression fitting? They are cheap on eBay, and look to be pretty versatile.

We use them for our humidity biolers on our environmental chambers. They are essentailly the same thing as the water heater elements only they are wrapped in a stainless package. They are also quite pricey when bought new. I would be leary of buying used ones as they do go bad after long term heavy industrial use plus you never know what they were used for.

I agree, but there are several on ebay that say they are NIB, and less than $10 each I was thinking about putting them in a 5 gallon corny HLT through a compression weldless fitting...

I really like that they are sealed, and they have leads instead of the trouble we have to go through to mount a water heater element.

give 'em a try and let us know!

I'm using something like that in my RIMS (link below). I don't know where to get more of these though. I like that it's all ss touching the wort.

bendavanza said:

I'm using something like that in my RIMS (link below). I don't know where to get more of these though. I like that it's all ss touching the wort.

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How many watts is your element rated for, and how does it perform? That's pretty much exactly what I'm wanting to do. Though I find myself torn (again) between a big RIMS and no HLT, and an HLT with something like this in it...

Those shown are 200 watts. You'd need 8-10 to make it worthwhile. A 2000 watt element is less than 20 bucks.

IrregularPulse said:

Those shown are 200 watts. You'd need 8-10 to make it worthwhile. A 2000 watt element is less than 20 bucks.

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Yea, I know. I just grabbed those as an example. They are available upwards of 5kw each, and in various lengths.

Without parroting the concerns listed beforehand, yeah they would work. Like a regular water heater element, they need to be in direct contact with the water so a thermowell would be a no go.

CodeRage said:

Without parroting the concerns listed beforehand, yeah they would work. Like a regular water heater element, they need to be in direct contact with the water so a thermowell would be a no go.

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I'm no expert, which is why I asked the question, but...
I did a little research on these, and one of their primary applications seems to be in die cast and injection molding, where they are inserted in drilled holes to heat the molds. In fact, I found a chart that showed the maximum watt density for an element, based on how tight the tolerance was between the heater and the mold block. At .005" the density was very high, and decreased as the gap between the element and the mold increased. That is why I was wondering about insertion into a thermowell - It would make it a lot less important to know where they came from and what they did in a past life.

Regardless, I get the impression they will work. Which answers my question. Now I just gotta decide what I want to do

Air is a horrible heat conductor. Even the parts it contacts in the thermo well would be less efficient than direct immersion, thats all.

I have been looking, the most powerful I can find off hand is 2000W. But... the watt density was like 300W per square inch. That is 4x that of a LWD element.

I have seen these before, and would like to use them, but I look for a min. of 9000W per kettle and 11000W if it is over 10 gallon batches. Id need a lot of these things, that is a big downside.

We have watlows that are 5500 watts. New they are about $200+ each

Okay, so I found a 2000W that was LWD... but it is 24" long... try getting that into your kettle It was also more $$ than a 5500W element.

Id love to use something like this, but to get the watt density down, I cannot fit one in a kettle.

SweetSounds said:

How many watts is your element rated for, and how does it perform? That's pretty much exactly what I'm wanting to do. Though I find myself torn (again) between a big RIMS and no HLT, and an HLT with something like this in it...

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From what I read doing some research, the element in my RIMS is a Heatron/Watlow Firerod 1300 watt, 120vac, p/n N7L-5813 Type CR9.
Performance is fine. I can maintain or ramp temps, no scorching so far. Ramping temps largely is limited by the flow through the mash, which is to be expected to not compact the grain bed.

I like the fact that some of them are 6" long. If I build a HLT, I want to use a Corny keg, and most water heater elements would have to be mounted from the bottom because they simply won't fit horizontally. These could be passed through a compression fitting on the side of the keg. If I needed 2 or more, that could be OK with me, just so I don't have to deal with the rubber bottom of the kegs. That's pretty much the only reason I find them interesting. And, in that capacity, watt density would be irrelevant.

I agree that they are not well suited for a BK, but they could have their place...