E-Rims "All Copper" Build

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OK. Here's mine. E-Brewer warnings - this is ugly, the soldering isn't great, the grounding wire fell off at the end of the last brewday, and I haven't yet potted the element connections. Don't yell at me, I know about all these things :p.

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Hokay, so mine is a 10" piece of 1.5" copper pipe, (sourced from extras at work). I bought a 1-1/2" to 1/2" adapter, a 1-1/2" x 1-1/2" x 1/2" copper Tee, a 1-1/2" sweat-to-NPT adapter, and a 1-1/2" NPT x 1" NPT bushing all on ebay. For the half inch stuff, I got three 1/2" sweat-to-FNPT adapters, a 1/2" to 3/8" bushing, and a 3/8" MNPT x (i think) 1/4" flare fitting. Also, a couple of 1/2" copper Tees, and a bit of 1/2" copper pipe.

Element is this one. 4500W at 240W is 1125W at 120V, and with the size of this big honking thing, it's definitely LWD.

Brass QDs came from McMaster.

RTD was a 5 dollar deal from china on Ebay, (search "PT-100", sort by cheapest, you'll find it, although I suggest you search this forum for "ebay RTD" and get the one walker uses...it's 1/4" NPT already).

SO, the build. the 1-1/2" x 1/2" adapter I got was actually 1-1/2" OD, not the expected 1-1/2" ID, (for sweating onto 1-1/2" pipe), so I had to buy a 1-1/2" coupler, (which is 1-1/2" ID, 1-5/8" OD). Oh well, small problem. So the adapter on one end steps me down to 1/2" copper, which then Tees off for the outflow, and for the ~4" RTD probe. The cheap chinese RTD probe had metric straight threads on it, no hope of finding a plumbing bushing for them. I found a flare fitting with an ID only slightly smaller than the RTD probe, and drilled it out with whatever drill bit matched the RTD probe. Then, I soldered the probe into the flare fitting, and screwed the NPT side of the flare fitting into the 3/8" to 1/2" bushing. Here's close ups of that:

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In the second pic, the silver bit is the RTD probe, the bronze looking bit is the flare fitting.

On the other end, here is the element going into the 1-1/2" x 1" NPT bushing, and that bushing screwed into the 1-1/2" sweat to FNPT adapter:

QpNLll.jpg


....Now here was my issue. My 1-1/2" x 1/2" x 1-1/2" copper T was great, but it offset my inlet about 3 or 4 inches from the base of the element. Look here...the upright bit on the left is the original inlet from that bigass Tee, and look how far away it is from the element base:
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So, I took a 1/2" Tee, and cut it down the "backside" with a dremel. I butterflied it open with pliers, and hammered it out (a lot), against the 1-1/2" thread adapter to make it take on the curvature of the 1-1/2" pipe. I then drilled a 1/2" hole as close to the element base as I could, and flat soldered the Tee on there:

p9b4Zl.jpg


(note how sad my dog is with my soldering skills). Look back at the pic two above, and see how much closer I moved the inlet to the element base! It was a ***** to solder though, and it leaked a while until I pumped a ton more solder into it.

To solder 1-1/2" pipe, you need a MAP torch...propane makes it tough....I bought the cheapest $15 one lowes had.

I've used it for a couple brews now...works flawlessly.
 
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