My Weldless Electric HERMS build

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jcdillin

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So over the last couple months i've been slowly collecting parts and planning and building my HERMS system. I've been trying to do everything stainless and silicone wherever possible. Of course that increases the time because i've been trying to do it on a budget.

I'm hoping that this systems first brew will be controlled by the BrewTroller controller that we are working on. Eventually I hope to have parts of it a bit more automated.


First off I wanted to have the nicest holes I could possibly make without a plasma cutter in the top of my kegs. So I built a simple jig to help me do that. I had some spare 80/20 extrusion laying around from my CNC machine build so I just used some of that.

Pretty ghetto but makes darn nice circles :)

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That little stubby piece just fits right into the hole in the top of the keg and with the help of a little olive oil spins right around.

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The other tough part of this project is the fact that I had to do everything weldless, for some reason it's pretty much impossible to find anyone down here that is willing to do the welding correctly.
 
First off we have the HLT

I decided to go bottom drain on everything but the boil kettle. I think it makes it look nice and keeps me from having to make pick up tubes for everything.

Looking down into the HLT, here the coil is missing but you can see the 1650W water heater element.

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Here is the coil, it's installed now I will have to take a couple more pictures. It's 30ft of 1/2" OD copper water tubing.

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Here is the element connection, I still have to build a cover for it.


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And here are the QD connections for the HEX coil.

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So that is pretty much it for the HLT, I still have to drill the hole to mount the temp probe, but i'm waiting to finish up my probe builds for the BrewTroller for that.
 
Looks nice... I assume the rig is going to be all 120VAC? I have never seen a 1650W folded element.

Are you using gas for the BK?
 
Then we have the MLT, i'm waiting for the false bottom to come in. But the drain, temp probe and sight glass will all be under the false bottom so the chances of grain clogging things up are slim.


Here is the bottom drain with the temp probe compression fitting

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Here is my new copper DS18B20 temp probe installed into the fitting.

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Inside looks like all the others :)

Here they are together.

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I still have to paint the stands to keep the from getting ruined from all the water.
 
Looks nice... I assume the rig is going to be all 120VAC? I have never seen a 1650W folded element.

Are you using gas for the BK?

Yeah everything is 120V since i'm only heating the HLT with electric I wasn't too worried about it being crazy fast.

The boil kettle is heated by propane, it's the only one with a side drain and a pickup tube.
 
Ahh cool, looks like a nice build, thanks for the pics.
 
Thanks!

yup, mcmaster part 99604A129

I was having a lot of trouble getting the O-Rings to seal properly, these silicone sealing washers make a seal even with just a bit more that finger tight. Works really good on uneven surfaces too.
 
This is really cool, I've been planning a similar setup but was planning on using welded connections. I haven't tried to find someone local yet who could do the welding, but I might just go all weldless. My concern with going weldless is having to break it all down often for cleaning. Any thoughts? I'd also love to see a breakdown of some of the connectors you've chosen. I'm thinking about doing a HX in my boil kettle for chilling like the one in your HLT.
 
After putting it together, I don't really see anywhere that I would need to dissasemble on a regular basis to clean. Maybe the weldless connection on the bottom of the MLT. But even still it's a few turns with the wrench and the connection comes apart. I plan to pump starsan and PBW through the system after every session anyways.

Well for most things I used standard weldless fittings with the only upgrade being flat silicone washers as opposed to round o-rings, I could never get the o-rings to seal properly. With the flat washers most the time finger tight is almost enough.

With the HEX coil I just used standard stainless compression fittings. Which most of the other connections are pretty much exactly like this. Except in the place of the compression fitting I just used either a half coupler and a close stainless nipple or a stainless lock nut.

Goes from inside the kettle to outside.


Compression Fitting
Stainless Shim/Washer Silicone Washer Kettle Wall Another Silicone Washer Stainless Shim/Washer Stainless Pipe Coupler And then finally a stainless QD from MoreBeer

Now granted McMaster isn't the cheapest option so I sourced alot of my stuff from either buyfittingsonline or bargainfittings.

If you have any questions feel free to ask
 
maybe tubing bends easier than the pipe sections? The 1/2" stuff I've bought for things ain't neva gonna bend with one person by hand!
 
What pump are you using?

Standard March pump, I forgot to take pictures of it. Northern brewer has the version with a pigtail for $20 less than the one with. So i'm just going to mount a small watertight box on my stand with a relay and run the wire to there.
 
maybe tubing bends easier than the pipe sections? The 1/2" stuff I've bought for things ain't neva gonna bend with one person by hand!

Ahh yes sorry it has to be coiled tubing. Without a bender straight pipe would never even begin to bend like this. I found some stuff on ebay that was made for drinking water. I bought a 60ft roll and only used 30 of it. Think I may sell the other 30 in the classifieds.
 
wow... nathan you are going to have a heck of a time coiling hardened copper. I would return what you have and purchase some soft copper tubing. The pipe is a different diameter also.

Great build jcdillin!!! Looks awesome! :mug:
 
okay, I kind of suspected that when I tried to bend it, that there might be "tubing" and "pipe" or something like that.

I used elbows for my hlt spigot and boil kettle spigot interiors to do what I wanted, so no biggie, but will keep in mind if I want to do a new coil for my HLT.
 
That may work, and I am not super experienced with copper... but generally to get a useful anneal you have to hold at temperature for around 30-60 minutes and cool slowly to avoid forming hardened compounds. I could be wrong though.
 
I've done it with copper head gaskets before, just used a propane torch, I've not done it with copper pipe though. It works the opposite of steel.
 
I think this demonstrates pretty well the annealing of copper.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jSz11lz8MA]YouTube - Copper Annealing[/ame]

I've found that you don't have to quench the copper, you can just let it cool slowly or quench it, either works.

overall... I'd buy tubing instead of rigid copper, but this might be useful for a dip tube.
 
As promised here are a few more pictures.

Here is the herms coil.

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And the march pump, the wire nuts were only a temp setup for this weekend to test the brewtroller.

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And finally here they are all set up.

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for now untill I can find a stainless one probably a dinner plate :) or some aluminum foil
 
can you get a shot of the inside connection setup on the herms coil?

btw, no QD's? Is all your tubing permanent?
 
can you get a shot of the inside connection setup on the herms coil?

btw, no QD's? Is all your tubing permanent?

Sure I will take one a little later today.

Yeah everything is QD, B3 just pulled a fast one on me and i've been waiting almost 3 months for my female QD's, all the males are mounted.

It just so happens that the silicone tubing fits perfectly over the male QD's so I was just using it that way to test I will probably brew my first batch that way as well.
 
Where did you get your heating coils?

You mean the herms coil or the water heater element? The element I purchased from grainger and the copper coils were just 3/8" copper water tubing I purchased from fleabay.

I currently have 2 more that I will be putting up for sale in the classifieds that I already formed into coils that I ended up not using.
 
So last night I was busy insulating both the HLT and the MLT. I wanted to see if it helped speed up the heating process and make the job a little easier for the 1650w element.

Holy monkey what a difference, so much faster heating the water now. I would say it cut the time by over half. I am going to try to time it tonight so I get an idea how long it takes to heat.

I used 16" wide reflectix insulation from lowes. I put it on using aluminum tape which I don't know how long it will last but I think it makes it look good. I ended up going with 2 layers on the sides and the bottom. One roll did both kegs with plenty to spare.

Here is the bottom of the HLT

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Here is the HLT while I was testing it.

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Another Shot

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Here is the MLT

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Amazing stuff i'm really glad I did it.
 
I also finished up my BrewTroller controlled outlets. I still need to seal up the wire entrances with silicone. But i'm very pleased with the result. The outdoor boxes are plenty deep to hide the relay behind the outlet.

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