Brew Stand Fails!

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This. Otherwise tl;dr.

Really?
4 pages... Most replies are under 50 words each. Good grief. Are you here to learn something or just complain.

Back on topic.
I understand about the time is money thing. I wanted to try to build the FB just to see if I could make something worth while. It was more an experiment than anything else. Fortunately, my time paid off. I'm getting mid to upper 80's on efficiency and the FB flows VERY well.
 
Instead of building a stand I bought 3 tier welded metal shelves from Lowez. $170 and perfect flexibility for height. I use it as single tier with 2 pumps and an electric setup but i think it could be used for 3 tier. Not mobile though.
 
Just a couple Qs. How high off the ground is the top of the MLT? Why did you make the shelf it rests on so tall?

The top of the MLT is 82.5" and the shelf is that tall so that it didn't hang over the keggles with no clearance to stir or work comfortably and in case I want to switch to direct fire in the future. It's 61.75" from the ground. It was supposed to be 60" but the casters ended up being a bit taller.

I needed it the stand to be fairly narrow for storage reasons and I figured it's a lot easier and cleaner to pump water for the mash up than it is to pump hot wort. I like that I can keep the pump clean and even if something gets in it, everything will be boiled afterwards.
 
thought Id throw mine in the mix. I used old metal shelving rails so I could adjust the height if needed. Still need to buy a pump for the bottom kettle that is electric.

Where was the fail here?


So, I have been using a cheap plastic trash can flipped upside down. It's the perfect heigh to gravity drain into my kettle when its on the burner. The trash can is plastic with a set of wheels (you know what I'm talking about) so I added the wood bench to stabilize things a bit. I was brewing a large RIS so like 24lbs of grain in it. That batch was fine, decided to do second runnings for a smaller beer. Randomly, not touched at all, the trash can buckles, throws off the weight distribution and then entire 150* mash/second runnings come crashing down onto the garage... WHAT A MESS. Make sure anything hot and of weight is on a stable surface

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Worst part... I still use this trash can every brewday hahah :ban: .... really need to build something more stable :)
 
Where was the fail here?

So, I have been using a cheap plastic trash can flipped upside down. It's the perfect heigh to gravity drain into my kettle when its on the burner. The trash can is plastic with a set of wheels (you know what I'm talking about) so I added the wood bench to stabilize things a bit. I was brewing a large RIS so like 24lbs of grain in it. That batch was fine, decided to do second runnings for a smaller beer. Randomly, not touched at all, the trash can buckles, throws off the weight distribution and then entire 150* mash/second runnings come crashing down onto the garage... WHAT A MESS. Make sure anything hot and of weight is on a stable surface

Worst part... I still use this trash can every brewday hahah :ban: .... really need to build something more stable :)

Awesome FAIL story!!
 
I had visions of a potential fail today while brewing an extract batch. I was shaking down my stand and saw steam rolling out of the tubes with the open ends. This made me think about the vapor trapped in the welded tubes. I stopped the batch, let it cool a bit and got out the drill.

When I popped the steel, steam popped out at me and during the brew I occasionally saw steam come out of the holes. MAKE SURE YOUR STAND ISN'T COMPLETELY SEALED!

The rest of the afternoon I had visions of exploding tubing and trips to the hospital.
 
Center pickup dip tube. I had really pretty soldered copper center pickups on my keggles. They worked flawlessly and I thought they were the bees knees, until I tried side pickups. I ended up cutting and resoldering my dip tubes to pick up off the side.

I wish I would have gone straight to a single tiered stand. It's just neater and cleaner, that goes a long way with SWMBO. I know it's not the cheaper option, but sometimes the cheaper option ends up not being the cheaper option in the long run.
 
I've not made a stand. However, I'm a mechanical engineer working in heavy industry specifically dealing with structures and mainly with the bolted designs, I see a lot of opportunity for improving the load flow making a few small design changes. A simple example, when making a 90 degree connection, it is better to seat the horizontal tube onto of the vertical, as opposed to connecting the horizontal to the side of the vertical. Other examples include large spans between supports, where adding a vertical under the center of a horizontal running tube, where bending stresses are the highest, would improve the design. Luckily we're often no where near the yield stress of steel, but still can't help but be a little anal where it could be better.
 
This past spring, I made a center post, wooden, two tier stand with one of the support feet on a hinge so that it would take up less space when storing. Rectangle coleman cooler mash tun on top, hlt/bk (single vessel) on the bottom.

I had already made two batches on this stand with success. I was making my third, a dry stout, and in the middle of pouring in the batch sparge, the weight pulled out all of the screws holding the hinges on, and the whole stand tipped over sending the cooler with the second runnings all over my garage. I still see it in slow motion in my memory, including my slow motion "Noooooo!"

What a mess. I'm still finding bits of grain here and there.

Luckily, the first runnings were in a separate vessel for transfer, so while I was cleaning up the mess, I topped it off, added some DME and finished the batch. It actually turned out pretty good. Wouldn't win any awards, but was definitely drinkable.

Lesson learned and stand rebuilt with a full size base (soon to be replaced by a single tier for electric conversion)
 
spkguitar said:
This past spring, I made a center post, wooden, two tier stand with one of the support feet on a hinge so that it would take up less space when storing. Rectangle coleman cooler mash tun on top, hlt/bk (single vessel) on the bottom. I had already made two batches on this stand with success. I was making my third, a dry stout, and in the middle of pouring in the batch sparge, the weight pulled out all of the screws holding the hinges on, and the whole stand tipped over sending the cooler with the second runnings all over my garage. I still see it in slow motion in my memory, including my slow motion "Noooooo!" What a mess. I'm still finding bits of grain here and there. Luckily, the first runnings were in a separate vessel for transfer, so while I was cleaning up the mess, I topped it off, added some DME and finished the batch. It actually turned out pretty good. Wouldn't win any awards, but was definitely drinkable. Lesson learned and stand rebuilt with a full size base (soon to be replaced by a single tier for electric conversion)

Awesome Fail! Now that's what I'm talking about!
 
This past spring, I made a center post, wooden, two tier stand
...
Lesson learned and stand rebuilt with a full size base (soon to be replaced by a single tier for electric conversion)

why are you going from 2 tier to single? i have a single gas setup i converted to electric with bottom drains and am now contemplating going 2 or 3 tier to save floor space.
 
I had decided flare fittings would be easier to do than sweating copper... I was wrong. I was creating the manifold for the propane out of copper and hadn't sweated copper yet and I seems harder than it actually is. I bought all the fittings, came up with a design that worked and grabbed a crappy harbor freight flare tool kit. I got everything setup, tightened all the fittings and felt pretty good... Until I leak tested it... Leaks everywhere. Three hours of undoing each joint and redoing the flares I still was no closer to fixing the leaks. I youtubed proper flare technique and I was doing it wrong, no wonder my fittings leaked. About two more hours of fixing everything again, I had a manifold I felt safe around. Next time, I'll just sweat the fittings, it's much easier. Lesson learned from this, just use the black iron pipe, screw copper.
 
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