Any Major problems with this wiring plan?

Does anyone see any glaring safety concerns with the following control panel wiring plan?

First let me explain what I am trying to do:
2-Tier 5 gallon all-grain single element electric system
BK = converted sankey keg
MLT/HLT = 10 gallon rubbermaid coolers
5500W element in the kettle
220v Gorman-Rupp magnetic pump
120v stir motor
The system will be fed from 30A GFI breaker in the main panel

Process
- Heat strike water in the kettle
- pump to MT while adding grains
- heat sparge water in the kettle (to mash temp)
- recirc through a removable 1/2" tube coil in the kettle
- raise temp to mashout
- pump sparge water to the HLT
- pump sparge water to sparge arm (in MT) while gravity drain to kettle
- boil



Some of the choices I made were because I already have the watlow PIDs and power controller (gift from a guy in the industrial controls business), 24v power supply, 24v contactor, pump and stir motor. I would like to stay with the 240v 2-conductor line (dryer outlet) if possible, to save cost. However, I wasn't sure if this would work with the GFI - do you have to have a neutral to use the GFI? I mean the pigtail connects to the neutral in the main panel, but do I need to actually have a neutral running to my brew panel too? I was thinking that in a 2-pole setup it monitors the difference between the hots and ground or from hot to hot. Please correct me if I am wrong about this.

I guess one problem I already see is that the stir motor will not be GFI protected (because of the transformer). I could possibly skip this part and run a cord directly to a GFI outlet on the wall. I would appreciate any other thoughts you guys have.

I can't really answer your questions, not an electrician. But I do have some questions. Where is the ground? How are you going to run 120v motor from a 220v without a neutral? Edit - never mind the last comment I see the transformer.

I agree with Samc on the stir motor. If it's a 120V motor, you should get rid of the transformer, and run it off one of the hot wires, and neutral. Adding a transformer doesn't give you any benefit, and just adds another piece of equipment that can fail, and an extra power loss (which means more mone on the electric bill) when it's working.

Other than that, I would put the yellow (heater) light right on the heater socket, so it shows when the heater is under power, not just the SSR.

I left out the ground for simplicity. It will be there. The question really is, whether or not the neutral line is necessary, since I don't have one. The line is 2-conductor plus a ground (dryer outlet). The transformer is only needed because there is no neutral. I could re-run the line, and I may end up doing that, but I want to know if it is necessary.

Also, I'm trying to source some cheap finger-safe options for the contact strips. Anyone have a line on something like that?

Are you sure your outlet is 2 hots+ground, and not 2 hots+neutral? Don't quote me on this, but I remember reading, somewhere on this forum, that 3 wire 240V outlets were 2 hots+neutral...

Anyway, is not hat the neutral is "necessary", but, the way I see it, if you can run it (in case you don't already have it), it makes sense to do so. It's always good practice to keep the equipment down to a minimum.

That is correct for dryer (30A) and range (50A) outlets prior to the last 2 major NEC updates. The neutral served the function of both the neutral and the ground conductor. The dryers and ranges both have 120V devices within them. Current code for new wiring to those appliances requires a 4 wire feed.

Thanks for the info. I just assumed it was a ground wire because it isn't insulated. Either way, I would not use it to pull off 120V with no separate ground. I am a fan of simple solutions. I think in this case I will run the correct wire to the dryer outlet and redraw the wiring diagram to use 4-wire.

Modified to use a 4-wire feed:

Looks good,
Can't believe I didn't realize you had wired your power supply on 240V in your first diagram... (where's a head slap smiley when you need it)

P-J said:

That is correct for dryer (30A) and range (50A) outlets prior to the last 2 major NEC updates. The neutral served the function of both the neutral and the ground conductor. The dryers and ranges both have 120V devices within them. Current code for new wiring to those appliances requires a 4 wire feed.

Click to expand...

Im not sure that I agree 100% with you. The only real way to tell is if you pull out the outlet and check if you have a bare ground or neutral. Ive seen with older 240V 3 wire set ups black, white, and bare ground. The old code called for the white wire (neutral on 120) to be painted or marked because its actually the 120B. So essientially you have black 120A, white 120B, and bare ground.

I finally completed work on my system. I made a few changes from the previous posts. I decided to run 4-wire from the panel to the GFI Spa Panel. I split off the dryer from there to it's outlet, then wired a GFI protected outlet in the GFI panel box.



A 20' 10/4 cable connects the GFI to the brewery panel. Here's an overview of the panel:





And Inside:



Wiring diagram:



The wiring might seem sort of convoluted, but that is because I was trying to accommodate several 24v components that I already had (contactors, LED indicators, power controller, Watlow PIDs, etc.).

I used a PWM (Walker's design - thanks man ) to control the boil because I was trying to get the system done cheaper. Then I came across the free temp controllers, so decided to incorporate them anyway. Eventually I might swap over control to the temp controller. Also, the second temp controller is not in use, but it is wired up. Eventually I will use that to control a recirculation loop for mash temp control.

I figured out the total cost to be around $600. I also figured out how much it would have been if I had to source all of the freebie parts. That would have run it up to about $900 total.

I also did a temperature ramp test today. I took 10 gallons of water from 56F to boil in 50 minutes. That’s an average of just over 3 degrees/min. I was pretty happy with that. The best part was the ambient temp in the room after the boil test. It went from 66F to 70F. When I used to use propane, the ambient temp was more like 85-90F. That was really uncomfortable.

I have been working on this panel (obsessively) for the last several months. I am really looking forward to brewing on it now. But that will have to wait until January.

Looks pretty sharp.