120v HLT

I've done a few searches but can't seem to come up with a definitive answer.

I have a 17 gallon aluminum pot that I will use for an HLT. I will be making 10 gallon batches.

Is it feasible to use 2000w, 120v heater for this application?

I'm guessing a little over an hour to get 10 gallons to 170. After removing the strike water I can top off the HLT for the sparge water volume. This can get up to temp during the mash.

Does this sound reasonable?

I don't think it'll be enough. I use that size element in conjunction with my electric stove to get to a boil for 6.5 gal, usually in about 30 mins starting from mash temp.

Grems, do you know what the element on your stove is rated at?

I'm also thinking it won't be enough, especially with out insulation. Back of the envelope calculation with no losses puts it at 75mins, thats 2000W in, bringing 10gal of water from 68F-170F.

If your system is not insulated you will be fighting the conductive nature of your big aluminum pot. Aluminum likes to conduct heat. Figuring out how much heat you'd be losing through the pot would be a little more involved and would depend on your environment(ambient temp, any airflow around the container).

Any way you could get more power into it? Either a 240V feed or using 2 120V legs to power two different elements?

This is plausible...

Lets look at this.

#1. Not having insulation will hurt you, bottom line.
#2. 2000W to heat to 170F will take about 75 minutes yes.... BUT
#3. Depending on how much strike you use (7.5 gallons?) you will have 2.5 at 170F left in the HLT.
#4. How much will you need to sparge? Oh, say from your 7.5 strike you get5.5 back out and want to boil 12 gallons?? You need 6.5 to sparge with.
#5 You need to add 4.0 gallons to the HLT at say 65F?
#6. If you add 4 gallons at 65F to 2.5 gallons at 170F you will have 6.5 gallons at 105F.
#7. To get from 105 to 170 is a diff. of 65F which with 6.5 gal. volume will take about 30 minutes.

It is doable... but NOT being insulated will hurt you badly, these values are based on decent heat retention. Test it on a dry (wet) run... if it doesnt work, then use another element. OR insulate your HLT and you will be ok.

Insulation is under consideration. I think this stuff will give me close to the same R-factor as a cooler. http://www.mcmaster.com/#9385k23/=3y5f2p

As far as more power, running 240 into the garage isn't in the budget right now. Two elements would work but I think I'd need to 2 controllers as well, right?

Thanks for the calcs, Pol.

arturo7 said:

Insulation is under consideration. I think this stuff will give me close to the same R-factor as a cooler. http://www.mcmaster.com/#9385k23/=3y5f2p

As far as more power, running 240 into the garage isn't in the budget right now. Two elements would work but I think I'd need to 2 controllers as well, right?

Thanks for the calcs, Pol.

Click to expand...

I am not convinced you need 2 elements, as I stated above, this is doable! If it is a 17 gal. HLT, why ONLY heat 10 gal to begin with? The MORE you heat initially, the less time it will take to heat when you top off the HLT. However, as you can see above, even starting at 10 gallons will work fine. 60 minute mash? You only need 30 to get the topped up HLT to sparge temp.

If you had two elements you could use a single PID and an SSRD to switch the two hot legs to the two elements I presume.

Doing a lto of calculating in my free time lately!

Alright, I'm going for it! With the insulation I think it will work just fine.

The only remaining concern is the ability of the 2000w element to maintain a full-pot boil to build up the oxide layer.



Is there a good thread on controller options?

Sorry, I have no idea what output my stove is. It's your run of the mill crappy apartment electric stove...

Obviously, if you CAN do two elements, why not? You'll have time in the long run, and it's not like it'll cost you more to do it (theoretically doubling the heating power = 1/2 the time to heat). Not sure if it REALLY works that way without doing some math... and I don't want to

arturo7 said:

Alright, I'm going for it! With the insulation I think it will work just fine.

The only remaining concern is the ability of the 2000w element to maintain a full-pot boil to build up the oxide layer.



Is there a good thread on controller options?

Click to expand...

You will not boil with 2000W... I can tell you that.

If you are looking for a PID, I would buy the Auber Inst. SYL2352. That is pretty common in HBing and many of us can help you program it.

Yes, with insulation it should be doable, but so is filtering all of your brew water with a Brita pitcher - for over a year i filtered all of my brewing water with a faucet mount filter, it sucked but it did the trick. Upgrading to a whole house water filter in my brewery was like trading in a Deawoo for a Porsche. That being said, it'll get the job done but its going to take some extra time. You will have some extra time on the front-end of your brew day, if you are alright with that then go for it-i'm by no means trying to discourage you. It'll probably take about 1h15m to get your initial volume of water to temp with insulation. From there it shouldn't be a problem heating the remainder of your sparge water in that 1h time frame.

2000W is really the biggest element you should be running on a 20A circuit. If that does not get you the performance you want you can certainly run 2 elements with 1 temperature controller but you'd need to make sure the two elements are on separate circuits(2 different breakers). My first thought would be having either 3 SSRs or contacters (depending on your deadband setting), one(actuated by your temp controller) to trigger the other two, which would supply power from two different 20A breakers, but there is probably a more straight forward method in doing this(i'm not an EE).

I can say from experience, with decent insulation heat loss will not be too much of a problem. I just finished up my HERMs hybrid system, with a 5500W element for mash and sparge water heating, and got within 30 seconds of my no-loss calculations in heating up mash water in a Coleman xtreme. About 95% eff, and thats with all of the liquid being recirculated at a rate of about 5gpm in about 8-9ft of santoprene tubing and a 1_1/2" dia stainless steel heat exchanger-if you intend on mounting your heating element in your aluminum pot your eff should be even higher.

Waiting for the water to heat up isn't that big of a deal. It allows time for breakfast, coffee and HBT right?

On the other hand, if I don't need another controller, it's only another $10-15 for another element. Hmmm...

You can do it no problem as long as you use two circuits. I use two circuits and two 1500W elements, just to be safe with my house wiring. I do 10 gallon batches with an uninsulated HLT and an insulated cooler mash tun. I set up HERMS system which is working for me...as long as I set it up the night before. That is the main caveat, it takes roughly 2.5 hours for me to bring about 12 g in the HLT and 7.5 g in the mash tun up to temperature in a recirculating system. I've built my process around it and I'm very happy with it. Here is a pic, below is a break down of the initial part of a brew day...


I set up my system the night before a brew day. I fill the HLT with around 10 to 12 gallons depending on what I'm brewing. I fill the Mashtun cooler with between 5 and 7.5 gallons of water and drop in some 5.2. I prime my pump and get the system functioning and set the PID temp. The morning of a brew day I wake up early enough to flip the switch and fall back asleep. I like to do this around 4 am and have no problem falling back asleep. When I wake up, dough in and start the coffee. I typically set the system to +5 to 6 degrees depending on how big the grain bill is. As soon as I dough in, I drop the temp on the PID to the mash temp and my system holds it, no offset factor. I plan to wire in a timer to switch the PID on in the future, I just need to isolate that circuit to that I'm putting all 1500 watts through the timer, not many of them are made for it.

In short, if your house wiring is limited, you CAN do it, it just takes a little bit more planning. In the future when I'm in a different house I'll rewire for 220, but you CAN do 10 gallon batches with 120, just be smart and SAFE and use time to your advantage.

Thanks for the help fellas!

jcb317 said:

2000W is really the biggest element you should be running on a 20A circuit. If that does not get you the performance you want you can certainly run 2 elements with 1 temperature controller but you'd need to make sure the two elements are on separate circuits(2 different breakers). My first thought would be having either 3 SSRs or contacters (depending on your deadband setting), one(actuated by your temp controller) to trigger the other two, which would supply power from two different 20A breakers, but there is probably a more straight forward method in doing this(i'm not an EE).

Click to expand...

I am thinking to use 2 elements on two circuits in my appartment to heat my brew pot. I like your idea to wire them both with the controller. Tought about one controlled and the other just on a switch to boost into a boil.
Running both on the controller is a different tought now.
However, I was wondering why you would use 3 SSRs instead of triggering just 2 (one for each element)?