Husky Brew Cart

Link to pictures: http://imgur.com/a/gl90H#XXkpl

Found a utility cart on sale and made some very minor modifications to it for my brew setup. Cut out a small part for my ball valve on my Mash Tun to fit. Also installed my march pump on the bottom. Unfortunately I cant have inlet down outlet up because of the low clearance. Right now its inlet right outlet left. Let me know if I need to modify to left-right instead. Too many threads have me scared of priming....

Plan to pump hot water from boilermaker (HLT) to mash tun and gravity feed from mash tun to boil kettle (that aluminum pot is temporary until I get a 15-20 gallon boil kettle for 10gal batches. Then use IC to cool and use pump to go from boil kettle to 15gal corny for fermentation.

Using the 15 gal corny which I found on craigslist to pressure ferment. Kinda worried to try all these new gadgets all at once. I have just been doing 5 gallon batches and manually lifting hot water into the mash tun on a work table. Looking forward to not having to lift 6 gallons of cooled wort into a bucket. I figured the pump was a necessity when I moved to 10gal batches which is right around the corner.

Interested in any feedback or recommendations out there.

Future modifications: would like to get a switch of some kind so I can more easily turn on the pump instead of plugging it in to my extension cord. Eventually will get rid of IC and go with plate wort chiller, not sure where I will mount that one....

at a minimum i think you should rotate the pump head 180 degrees so the inlet/outlet are on the top. It wont be as good as a vertical alignment but imo better than what you have now. I think it will be hard to prime as you have it, the air will get trapped in the top of the head and not be able to escape. So like this -o- instead of this _o_ if that makes sense. Looks good otherwise, i like the idea of the cart for the storage of the gas bottles, and nice burners also.

Looking good!

I ferment in cornys and picked up two 10 gallon cornys a while back. I used on on Saturday. Though I'm not pressure fermenting. I've just got a gas disconnect on the post and the other end of the hose in some star san.

Do you have a parts list for your spunding valve? That's one of the slickest ones I've seen yet.

JetSmooth said:

Do you have a parts list for your spunding valve? That's one of the slickest ones I've seen yet.

Click to expand...

Here is the thread I used to build mine. It looks almost the same:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/my-first-spunding-valve-231048/

It works great.

Awesome. Thanks!

Once I "pay off" this last round of equipment, this will be my next project.

ok will look into rotating 180 for inlet to be on the left instead of the right. Thanks for the input.

In regards to the spunding valve, yes I used the same thread. Most came from this @ midwest http://www.midwestsupplies.com/bleeder-valve-assembly.html

DrillSpot.com for the control device: http://www.drillspot.com/products/47211/Control_Devices_CR25-100_Variable_Pressure_Relief_Valve

On another note, im brewing after work today so hopefully all goes well with priming, I dont know why I fear it so much!

Rev2

Made some modifications and thought I would post an update.

Here are some pictures:Photo Album - Imgur

Changes made:
Changed orientation of pump (inlet left, outlet right)
Added Blichmann Therminator
Added power switch and optional inlet plug for easier pump operation
Made a hop spider with paint strainer bag (not in picture)
Added snaplock to the MashTun outlet so I can fill from the bottom if I so choose

Future changes:
Purchased inline oxygen system to be attached to therminator outlet
Was thinking of getting a center inlet pump so my outlet could be facing up but to be honest I havent had any pump issues yet so im going to stick with this version until proven otherwise.

Rev 3

Found a good deal on a stainless center inlet so I jumped all over it. Came with the larger impeller and so far seems to be working like a champ. Only tested at 130, will have to wait till brew day to test at boiling temps. With the left to right position I had, boiling wort temps seemed to lock up the pump every now and then. Had to burp it often to get it running again. Since my pump was so low the traditional up/down method didn't work for me so this center inlet, outlet up configuration hopefully will be the bees knees.