My wodden rig, just finished.

Just finished today:




15 gallon kettle
10 Gallon MLT
8 Gallon HLT

Still may need an small shelf on the high side. Have to mount the march pump and electric crap.

very nice, i am in the process of doing something similar myself.

Cheers!

Nice! I think you'll find wood is really great for adding and changing things.

I'm doing something similar, in that what I'm planning also includes a burner on a stand on a wooden stand.
What is the height of your burner from the wood? and have you seen any effect from the heat?

dleonard said:

I'm doing something similar, in that what I'm planning also includes a burner on a stand on a wooden stand.
What is the height of your burner from the wood? and have you seen any effect from the heat?

Click to expand...

Sorry for the late reply, I haven't had a chance to fire it up until today.

It's 6" from the bottom of the burner housing to the wood stand. The bottom became very warm to the touch but you could keep your fingers on it for more than a few seconds, nothing close to burning. Surrounding wood and cooler stayed cool.

It's been so hot I've avoided going outside if at all possible. Today was nice so I fired it up for a dry run.

I've since insulated the 8 gallon HLT. Using a 1500W heatstick I brought 6 1/2 gallons of tap water to 170F in about an hour.

Transferred from HLT to 10 gallon cooler with a march pump, no problems. The cooler wasn't pre-heated and it lost 8 degrees.

1st problem: I attempted to recirculate from the brewpot to the top of the tun using the march pump. It would not push the hot water about a 5ft distance. The tun eventually emptied into the brewpot but the march would not push it back up, made it about half way. Any suggestions here?

2nd "problem": I tested out my 30 plate duda chiller. I hooked it up what I believe to be counterflow, cold water in / cooled wort out on one end and exit/hot water out/ hot wort in on the other, just as is pictured on a shirron chiller.

It did not come close to chilling the "wort". I didn't take any temps but it was burn your fingers hot. The exit water was also hot. the chilling water was running full blast and I dialed back the wort to a trickle and was still too hot.

I reversed the wort fittings so cold water in and hot wort in were on the same side. the water exiting was much hotter and the wort was pleasantly cool even at a decent flow.

Any reason why it works better connected "wrong"?

Your first problem sounds like the march pump either isn't primed or isn't staying primed. Bobby_M has a video here in post 17 that helped me with priming my march pump.

Regarding the second question, I don't use a plate chiller but this page seems to show how the connections should be made...

Nice setup. But do be careful of the wood under the burner. I've not experienced it on mine yet, but someone I know had a little smoke and charing from his. I have noticed that the area where my top burner mounts is a little darker then the rest of the wood. Eventually, it'll start to burn, so I keep the hose charged and ready.