Death Star, fully armed and operational.

Hey guys,

After more than a year of planning, and nearly six months of collecting parts, testing and building, the Death Star is operational! This post is not meant to be an educational how-to, but rather just my two minutes to be proud and show off. Once I polish this rig up, I will probably post a follow up on how and why I built it the way I did. Numerous obstacles were encountered and several concessions had to be made, but at 3am this morning I boiled water. I have never been so giddy to boil water.

"Death Star" was just a working title that stuck from the beginning. I knew I wanted the big chunky light up buttons. I wanted it to look 1970's industrial meets homebrewing steam punk. I wanted it to look like a control panel off of the Death Star.

Blah Blah blah.... Here are some crappy photos taken during the last 24 hours.







Now if you'll excuse me, I have some autotuning to go do

Shameless Facebook plug ---> http://www.facebook.com/pages/Tims-Closet-Brewery/109802049089362

Nice!

<insert jealousy>

any idea how much you spent on that rig, approximately? both hours and dollars... if you're willing to share.

Needs more square buttons and levers to be fully operational.

Unless you brew in a Vader or Emperor Palpatine outfit, it's not fully operational.

sweetcell said:

any idea how much you spent on that rig, approximately? both hours and dollars... if you're willing to share.

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That is hard to tally up for so many reasons. I won both the pumps, so those cost me nothing but they have a value, you know? Being intermittently employed allowed me to scrounge lots of stuff up on eBay at lower than market prices too. Then the time in is difficult to measure, as I probably spent a full 2-3 days thinking, mocking up, and testing different components.

Let us ball park my cost at just over a grand. Time in on the actual build? Let's estimate that at a solid 24 hours for the control panel and wiring and another 24 for the assembly with its plumbing and hard wiring... but that's just actual build time. That doesn't count my original plumbing that all got torn off, my numerous mock-ups, or hours spent staring and thinking.

brewingmeister said:

Needs more square buttons and levers to be fully operational.

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I have been searching for months now, but whenever I search eBay for a "Lever that goes BEEEEOOooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuu." I get no results.

If it is at all redeeming though, I overheated one of the potentiometers a bit while soldering and sometimes I have to give it a little love tap to make it work... Millennium Falcon style!

"Now witness the brewing power of this fully armed and operational brewing-station!"

Looks great man. I have a 2 vessel system, although mine's not all fancy with a RIMS . Would love for you to post the process of a brew day.

Commence primary ignition. You may fire when ready.

So does it make beer or just destroy planets?

wubears71 said:

So does it make beer or just destroy planets?

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Isn't that one of the purposes of beer - destroying planets, one liver at a time?

Did you make sure to leave one little whole in the back for a drop of beer to go down and blow half the assembly to space dust, when Hop Skywalker fly sparges by?

iijakii said:

Looks great man. I have a 2 vessel system, although mine's not all fancy with a RIMS . Would love for you to post the process of a brew day.

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I have it all mapped out and have walked through it using just water multiple times now. Assuming that the mail man does not skip my apartment again, I should have my hop order from Farmhouse and I will be running a 5 gallon test batch through it this afternoon. At which point we will figure out what variables I have overlooked. Until then, here is the battleplan:

1) Fill BK with entire volume of water required. (Batch size + boil off + grain absorption + "plumbing" loss)

2) Using the big element in the BK, bring the water up to strike temp.

3) Cross hoses and pump strike water into MT.

4) Set BK to bring remaining water up to mash out temps.

5) Dough in.

6) Uncross hoses, recirculate MT through RIMS to maintain temp and convert some starches, yo.

7) After conversion, recross the flux capacitor.... I mean hoses... And set the MT controller to mash out temps. Activate pumps and find a balanced flow rate. Pump BK contents into MT and MT contents into BK until I hit equilibrium, SG style.

8) Pump full content of MT into BK, pray that my math was correct and confirm that sight glass shows desired pre-boil volume.

9) Boil some wort with hops.

10) Install immersion chiller (for now) and whirl pool the BK until yeast pitching temps are achieved.

11) Sanitize the "dirty" side of the dump valve and drain contents of BK into a plastic bucket; pitch single cell fungi.

12) Leave filthy brew day mess sitting overnight to be cleaned the next day.

~ FIN ~

philber said:

Did you make sure to leave one little whole in the back for a drop of beer to go down and blow half the assembly to space dust, when Hop Skywalker fly sparges by?

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Philber, I can see that you are Bothan, so I feel like I can trust you. Here is the weak point:

The RTD sensor at the back of the RIMS tube was manufactured in China. In China they have no idea what 1/2" NPT is and they just put some sloppy ass threads on the sensor. The Storm Trooper who installed the sensor did so on a Friday, and despite his best Friday efforts to seal the threads with five fallons of pookie, the sensor still leaks. This is the only weakness of the Death Star. Well, that, and the temptation of the dark side.

very cool!

I picture of you, or someone, brewing on this system while in a Darth Vader costume would be epic!

All your controller is missing is some sort of decal like this: http://www.etsy.com/listing/88410613/vinyl-decal-star-wars-inspired-imperial

Good thinkin. Maybe with the TCB (Brewery name) over the top of the symbol in a different color!

philber said:

Did you make sure to leave one little whole in the back for a drop of beer to go down and blow half the assembly to space dust, when Hop Skywalker fly sparges by?

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Hilarious.

May the schwartz be with you!