Ventilation Help

Ok, so ia m closing in on finishing this frigin brewery that has taken months to build.

I am having trouble with the ventilation for my basement electric brewery. right now i have a really nice kenmore three speed range hood with lights, the whole nine yards. The range is about 36-42 inches from the top of the boil kettle, and the BK is centered under the range.

The problem is that, on high speed:
1) the vent does not suck up all the steam
2) after about twenty minutes of boiling, water that has condensed on the fan grill drips down into the BK.

Im thinking that i need more sucking power.

What do you guys think? I can't really lower the range hood.

What about a squirrel cage blower?

I need something that isn't too expensive

Do you have some place for air to come in? If you're too airtight, then your fan won't work as efficiently.

ChshreCat said:

Do you have some place for air to come in? If you're too airtight, then your fan won't work as efficiently.

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+1 We have a Viking Range in our kitchen with a large range hood above and a powerful blower. It don't work worth Jack Diddley if we don't open a window slightly. With the window open it could suck a small dog through the darn thing.

its an old house... can't be that air tight...

sjlammer said:

its an old house... can't be that air tight...

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It doesn't have to be air tight. Besides, not alot of air is getting through the concrete walls below grade in the basement. The blower will only expel as much air as it has available. How much trouble would it be to open a basement window to try it?

Add a duct fan near the exhaust point.

I bought a duct fan, but when i got it home and looked at it, i noticed that the motor is essentially exposed to the flow stream. The instructions for the fan show it being installed in a furnace vent (hot dry air). I can't imagine the fan will last long being exposed to steam.

It doesn't have to be air tight. Besides, not alot of air is getting through the concrete walls below grade in the basement. The blower will only expel as much air as it has available. How much trouble would it be to open a basement window to try it?

I tried opening the window... no dice.

There must be some sort of industrial blower i could pick up.

The fan in your hood is the same setup. As long as you continue running the hood/vent fan for 10 minutes after the boil is done, you'll be fine.

Try to tape some plastic around the sides of the hood and bring it down to the level of the top of the brew kettle. This will reduce the volume required to move the steam out.

The other thing is you said the steam was condensing on the hood and falling back into the kettle. If that is the case you probably cant solve that problem very easily. The steel is cold and as the steam is sucked across it some water will condense. Wipe it off or let it fall back in

good luck

I have had the same problem with the propeller type fans, the cfm numbers look good until you notice that is at free air no back pressure conditions. I would guess that you have 10 feet or more ducting to vent the hood and the flow is marginal at best. You should consider a squirrel cage blower of 250 - 400 cfm capacity at .2" wc back pressure. Here is a shot of the hood setup that I cobbled together http://picasaweb.google.com/kevin.ladue/SystemTestingPhotoS#5292822111769571506

I had 5 feet of 4" pipe and i just upgraded the ducting to go from 4" outlet, 6" pipe, 4" vent

I had a 4" inline fan to start with with 3' of 4" duct with 2 elbows and that was inadequate, upsized to a 6" fan and that was still inadequate. I finally bought a 270 cfm squirrel cage blower on Ebay which has enough capacity to keep ahead of the steam released during the boil. The main problem with the inline fans is the density increase with water vapor causes more pressure drop than the fan can handle, if you listen to the fan you can hear the speed change as vapor gets drawn into the fan.