Single Tier, 3 Pump, BCS-462, Automated Rig

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
subbing for future build

Thanks. Just waiting on kettles to get finished now. I have the frame, burners, pumps, SS lines, fittings, etc. I've already finished the BCS control panel as well. Since I'm doing SS hardlines, I can't really start the plumbing until the kettles are done and actually sitting on the stand.

I'll be making a new build thread, but will post a link to it from here.
 
Getting very close. I had decided I'd do my full build thread all at once with all the pics instead of doing it as each piece was completed.

Kettles are in and I've picked up one of them for doing the mock up on the plumbing. Waiting for the welder at BH to get back next week and he'll finish off the rest of the custom welds I'm having done. During the mock up phase I ended up changing some of the plumbing layouts and types of fittings, so now I'm waiting for a few more pieces to arrive. I will also be using two BCS controllers on the stand - a BCS-462 & a BCS-460. That will also give me a good test bed for the BCS Desktop App that I've written that will control up to 8 BCS's.

On the positive side though, the guys who bought my rig can't take delivery until sometime after the first of the year, so I'm still brewing on that!
 
Here's a couple of sneak peek's of the new rig. Full build thread coming soon...


IMG_4742s.JPG

IMG_4741.JPG
 
This whole thread - especially those last 2 pictures should be R rated. lol Man what I would give to have that.

I'll never see this level of brewing, but I sure look forward to following this build.

KT
 
Sweet, I'm ready for a wild ride! Make sure to keep us updated and post them pics when your done! Good luck with the rest of the build!

John
 
My what a big HERMs coil you've got there!

I don't mind a tease at all, but I think you need to start teasing some specs

48 bcs controlled 10a relays, 14 NTC temperature probes, 87 miles of 12ga copper... :)

Also, are you going to BG14s over your old nozzle wok burners?
 
My what a big HERMs coil you've got there!
Actually, it's going to be a pre-chill coil for my tap water going into my plate chiller. My ground water is so warm, I only get down to 80-82 in the summer and about 78 in the winter. I bought that off someone here on HBT with the idea of putting it in a bucket of ice water and running my tap water through it before it gets to the plate chiller. With that, I should be able to chill in one pass straight to the fermenter.

I don't mind a tease at all, but I think you need to start teasing some specs

48 bcs controlled 10a relays, 14 NTC temperature probes, 87 miles of 12ga copper... :)
OK, here's a few specs.... I'm using both BCS 462 & 460 controllers due to the number of outputs I needed. I will have 4 fresh water valves on the rig - 3 for kettle fill/flush purposes and 1 tied into the plate chiller. The reason for controlling the water on the plate chiller is that I want to set chill setpoints where I can drop to 180 for a whirlpool addition and let it steep for a bit, then automatically continue on to full chill. There will be 4 gas valves for the 3 burners. The MLT will have two gas valves that are preset for a high/low output. This will allow automatic changeover from high heat on strike water to low heat when maintaining mash temps.

Also, are you going to BG14s over your old nozzle wok burners?
Yes, I'm using BG14's. I've built a supercharger air assist system for the BK burner. These burners are sub-optimal when running on natural gas, so the supercharger allows all the NG to combust and increases the output phenomenally. All the details of this will be included in the build. I did do a previous thread on it with some sample numbers.

It's getting close! I did a lot of plumbing today.
 
Actually, it's going to be a pre-chill coil for my tap water going into my plate chiller. My ground water is so warm, I only get down to 80-82 in the summer and about 78 in the winter. I bought that off someone here on HBT with the idea of putting it in a bucket of ice water and running my tap water through it before it gets to the plate chiller. With that, I should be able to chill in one pass straight to the fermenter.

Hey Jon... I don't mean to rain on your parade, but this will not work (or at least as much as you would like). I tried a pre-chiller and it did essentially nothing. Cooling the mass volume of water that flows through the chiller is a tall ask, and at best you will drop it a few degrees, depending on flow rate and volume. If you want real chilling power, add a secondary chiller that is fed by a bucket of ice water. With my secondary chiller and a properly adjusted flow rate, I can get my wort from boiling down to ~50 degrees in one pass, and my ground water in South FL is in the 80's.

-BD
 
I used a bucket of very salty ice water with a SS ic as a prechiller and would have the water freeze in the ic if I didn't maintain water flow. Ground water was about 65.
 
Hey Jon... I don't mean to rain on your parade, but this will not work (or at least as much as you would like).

I'll still give it a go just to see how it does. I have a temp probe on the rig that measures incoming water temp so I'll see just how well it drops the temp versus ground water and the resulting benefit the chiller actually sees.

If it's not up to task, I'll just go back to what I've always done with chilling the last amount needed in the fermenters (since they are jacketed). If I go that route, I may end up using the coil to test doing a HERMS setup on the rig - just for the hell of it.
 
My prechiller never cooled well enough. I ended up loading my mlt with ice water and pumping that directly into my plate chiller. Works like a charm.

That's a good idea that I've seen done with HERMS setups also. Unfortunately that doesn't work for me as I do two 15 gallon batches each brew day. That means that I'm already mashing and heating HLT water for batch #2 when I'm chilling batch #1.
 
Check out the old mythbusters on chilling a six pack. I think they got their salty ice bath 20-25 degrees. I think you should be able to drop you ground water to half the difference.
 
Well I spent $$$$ and finally built this rig over the last two years. I really appreciate everyone's help especially you Jon. Now I moved to a new home in Hesperia California and have to get rid of it due to lack of space.
 
Back
Top