The Brewshed Begins

ToManyHobbies said:

I'm sorry I can't help myself " I'm a self admitted picture whore"
Give me more pic's please! I was never good with story problems.

Click to expand...

Admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery ... second step is to have a home brew

I don't make the rules I just follow them!

Anothr small tip. we have the exact same shed it looks like . The front doors will leak like crazy. because they close up against rather than in the front, water runs down and drips into the front of the shed bad.. I think a piece of angled metal hanging over will stop it. silicone against the building. Like I said, mine was assembled by a couple of idiots so maybe yours will not have this issue.
EDITED TO ADD- after looking at yours again, it is assembled way better and differently than mine.you may not have this issue.

Thanks for the tip anyway. I was planning on weatherstripping the doors, and will look at installing some flashing as well. How's the progress on yours going?

matt99004 said:

Thanks for the tip anyway. I was planning on weatherstripping the doors, and will look at installing some flashing as well. How's the progress on yours going?

Click to expand...

ugh... I have a tendency to jump into things THEN back up and look it over. I am already brewing in mine but it is not even near really ready. right now it looks like an island in the middle of a pond from all of the water we have had lol. I am lucky, we set mine up on blocks so the water ON THE GROUND is not an issue .......yet.

Progress is slow but steady. Finally got the power hooked up in the house. I will finish the lights and fan tomorrow, and the final touches on the plumbing will be next.

Awesome! Can't wait to see your progress. Also considering something similar... myself.

Lights, exhaust fan and receptacles are all in. One more thing to check off the list!. Plumbing tomorrow...stay tuned.

I can't wait til I can have a brewshed/haus thing...

you should make your brew shed really nice. like put a bunch of brewing things in it and stuff. does anyone know how to make a fermented beer/wine or spirit?

WillyB said:

you should make your brew shed really nice. like put a bunch of brewing things in it and stuff. does anyone know how to make a fermented beer/wine or spirit?

Click to expand...

huh?

WillyB said:

you should make your brew shed really nice. like put a bunch of brewing things in it and stuff. does anyone know how to make a fermented beer/wine or spirit?

Click to expand...

those who can't brew, build...

(I KID! I'M KIDDDING!) I thought your comment was hilarious...

WillyB said:

you should make your brew shed really nice. like put a bunch of brewing things in it and stuff. does anyone know how to make a fermented beer/wine or spirit?

Click to expand...

Hahaha

I wish I had enough of a yard to justify a brew shed - these threads always make me so jealous!

Keep up the good work - looking promising so far!

no, the brewshed is pretty awesome. It would be so sweet to have one. I hope the whole plan goes off without a hitch!

matt99004 said:

Burned out my favorite drill, and broke the second masonry bit last night. That concrete is tough stuff. Shed will be delivered on Thursday!

Click to expand...

Ya need a hammer drill. Rent one. It'll save your back.

WillyB said:

you should make your brew shed really nice. like put a bunch of brewing things in it and stuff. does anyone know how to make a fermented beer/wine or spirit?

Click to expand...

This is my favorite HBT post in about 5 months of daily reading. You are the very best!!!

Finished the plumbing yesterday, finally. Starting the insulation today. First brew session will be on the 17th, when the kids are home from college!

Wanted to attach a couple of shots from yesterday, but the app keeps crashing on my phone. I'll get to those later.

Hey it worked anyway! You can seen the sink and buried hydrant I brought up thru the floor. The beer is my Chinook Blonde, which turned out almost like a Scotch Ale - but tasty nonetheless.

This is not a dead thread...more coming soon!

This is great stuff, man. Will be looking forward to see how this progresses more. Hope to have my own shack like this some day!

Well, brew day has come and gone. I had a chance only yo take two picture: my assistant brewers (my sons) and what it looked like after cleanup.

Here's the tragic part. Since the insulation is not complete, we built a temporary warming box to keep the wort at temperature. It consists of three pieces of and old cabinet, an in-line thermostat, and a 300 watt light bulb. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Problem is, the temp climbed to 88 degrees. Cooled it down and adjusted things... and we'll see how bad it gets, I guess.

Subscribed and living vicariously through you and other fortunate brewshack owners. I would put those sons to work.

Mine is only 10 x 12, but it has to do for the moment. Planning to extend it 8ft to 10x20 this spring.

That's a cool shot of the brewery assistants, Matt. Other than the excessive heat incident, I hope your brew day was a good and memorable one.

I think you might be able to get away with a 60W bulb... ?

nukinfuts29 said:

Mine is only 10 x 12, but it has to do for the moment. Planning to extend it 8ft to 10x20 this spring.

Click to expand...

Glad to hear that you have the room to expand! I gotta tell ya, this thing is an ongoing dream come true. Still insulating a bit when I get home from work, and I am now putting some time into thinking about the fermentation room. It will be 6 x 8, with an in-window air conditioner to keep it at temp.

Does anyone out there have any tips on super-insulating a room? The walls are all 2x4, so the insulation going in there is R-13. My original plan was to overlay this with 1" foam and then Sheetrock. Comments? Thoughts?

Chuginator said:

That's a cool shot of the brewery assistants, Matt. Other than the excessive heat incident, I hope your brew day was a good and memorable one.

I think you might be able to get away with a 60W bulb... ?

Click to expand...

The boys (ahem! - Men) earned their beers. They hauled sheetrock up from the basement of the house, got a refrigerator down the stairs and out of the house (had an extra), and then helped with brewing. I don't know how they feel, but "I" have never done so much in one day and had my elbows and shoulders feel so good. Let's hear it for offspring!

matt99004 said:

Glad to hear that you have the room to expand! I gotta tell ya, this thing is an ongoing dream come true. Still insulating a bit when I get home from work, and I am now putting some time into thinking about the fermentation room. It will be 6 x 8, with an in-window air conditioner to keep it at temp.

Does anyone out there have any tips on super-insulating a room? The walls are all 2x4, so the insulation going in there is R-13. My original plan was to overlay this with 1" foam and then Sheetrock. Comments? Thoughts?

Click to expand...

Seems like it would work.

Chuginator said:

That's a cool shot of the brewery assistants, Matt. Other than the excessive heat incident, I hope your brew day was a good and memorable one.

I think you might be able to get away with a 60W bulb... ?

Click to expand...

BTW, I ended up using a 200W bulb with my setup. It was 6 degrees out this morning, and the shed is not yet fully insulated...or heated. It was 38 inside tonight as I put up more insulation. The beer, thankfully, is running right at 69.

'Course the only reason I stopped is that SWMBO said we have to go to the Casino. Oh well, ya gotta do what ya gotta do...

matt99004 said:

Glad to hear that you have the room to expand! I gotta tell ya, this thing is an ongoing dream come true. Still insulating a bit when I get home from work, and I am now putting some time into thinking about the fermentation room. It will be 6 x 8, with an in-window air conditioner to keep it at temp.

Does anyone out there have any tips on super-insulating a room? The walls are all 2x4, so the insulation going in there is R-13. My original plan was to overlay this with 1" foam and then Sheetrock. Comments? Thoughts?

Click to expand...

...just don't forget to insulate your ceiling. ...and your floor. Sealing your seams helps a lot - a little draft space can bleed a LOT of heat/chill.

DarkBrood said:

...just don't forget to insulate your ceiling. ...and your floor. Sealing your seams helps a lot - a little draft space can bleed a LOT of heat/chill.

Click to expand...

yes...expandable foam is your friend. I think the air tight is as or more important than the insulation. Your door will be the worst offender.

Ceiling is no problem and I was planning on sealing. Insulating the floor might be quite a trick. The shed just sits on skids, so getting underneath to insulate is impossible. This part of the shed only has about 6' of clearance, so putting in a false floor that's also insulated is out of the question.

With all that said, are there any suggestions? Could a contractor get underneath to spray on expanding foam maybe?

matt99004 said:

Ceiling is no problem and I was planning on sealing. Insulating the floor might be quite a trick. The shed just sits on skids, so getting underneath to insulate is impossible. This part of the shed only has about 6' of clearance, so putting in a false floor that's also insulated is out of the question.

With all that said, are there any suggestions? Could a contractor get underneath to spray on expanding foam maybe?

Click to expand...

I would still put in a false floor. All it is for is fermenting. You gotta bend over to pick up buckets or carboys anyway.

matt99004 said:

Ceiling is no problem and I was planning on sealing. Insulating the floor might be quite a trick. The shed just sits on skids, so getting underneath to insulate is impossible. This part of the shed only has about 6' of clearance, so putting in a false floor that's also insulated is out of the question.

With all that said, are there any suggestions? Could a contractor get underneath to spray on expanding foam maybe?

Click to expand...

You could run some 1x2's on 16" centers in this area on the floor and use 3/4" foam board in between with plywood or osb on top. You would only lose about an inch and a half of height this way.

What are your plans for wall coverings once you finish insulating? I ended up drywalling my build and it took almost an extra year. ( I really hate finishing drywall that much.) If I had it to do over I think I would have used osb and painted the walls.

You could pull up the subfloor and insulate it before putting it back down. Sounds redundant but if you can't get to it and don't want to raise it.
For wall covering you could use white paneling. Easy to install easy to clean.

matt99004 said:

Ceiling is no problem and I was planning on sealing. Insulating the floor might be quite a trick. The shed just sits on skids, so getting underneath to insulate is impossible. This part of the shed only has about 6' of clearance, so putting in a false floor that's also insulated is out of the question.

With all that said, are there any suggestions? Could a contractor get underneath to spray on expanding foam maybe?

Click to expand...

Hmm. Well, the first question would be: how much clearance is there between/around the skids? And what is the ground like underneath? If your skids are on a bed of gravel/sand/concrete/etc. or if your ground stays reasonably dry year-round, I would recommend blowing some loose insulation into the space and slapping a little water-resistant trim around the bottom exterior.

The second question would be: what is the current floor made of? OSB and (cheaper) particle-board can be a simple way to add a little insulative value - however, in a brewshed, I'd strongly recommend heavy sealing or even a laminate floor - both OSB and particleboard are cheap, but absorb moisture like sponges.

A great first step in determining your needs would be to get 3 thermometers. Place one in the middle of the shed space to record interior ambient air temps. Place one either completely outside the shed or in the space underneath between the skids to record the exterior ambient temps. Finally, lay one directly on the floor (preferably as close to physical contact as you can) to record the temperature differential. Make notes on a few cold days and a few hot days - especially when you're NOT brewing (and adding moisture and heat to things). The differences between the three values will help you determine your needs. Comparing these notes to temp logs on brew days can then help you finalize a plan. It is very likely that you will find that you desire different levels of insulation for your brewing area, your fermenting area, and your storage areas (regardless of your configuration of kegerators, keezers, etc.). A brew day throws a LOT of excess heat and moisture and could quite possibly have an effect on your fermentation temperature controls if your shed is sealed up tight with only one room - in a smaller shed (rather than a big warehouse), these increases can even throw off the fancy insulated glycol-controlled conicals.

False floors don't have to be huge. Even just laying down some cheap strapping and a thin layer of laminate will gain you 1/2-3/4" of sealed air chambers to insulate with.

At the very least, if you don't insulate your floor, then make sure all of your goodies are up OFF the floor. There is very little that will mess up a carefully temperature-controlled fermentation as thoroughly as a fermenter with a drastically different temperature at the bottom from sitting on a cold (or hot) floor. Your yeast will get all stressed out as it cycles fro bottom to top, guaranteeing that you will not ferment clean, will have odd incompletely-formed esters and phenols (i.e. precursors for undesirables), and may even stop the fermentation by killing or overstressing too much of the yeast to continue. Likewise, your bottles/kegs will not age/condition consistently if the bottles on the floor are in contact with different temperatures that bottles higher-up.

Something to consider - for one project (I'm an architectural and engineering designer), I needed to design a "burst vent" for a specialty application where the interior air space of an insulated temperature-controlled room needed to be periodically vented for fumes with minimal effect on temperature. We ended up with a rather fancy piece of custom equipment, but the same effect can be built easily with a little extra manual operation. The basics of the 'burst vent" were that it contained a high-powered fan that had the switch rewired so that it automatically shut off 5 seconds after being turned on. On our fancy one, the switch was also tied to a mechanically-controlled vent cover that only opened when the fan is running and automatically closed to an air-tight seal when the fan shut off. A greenhouse-style "air mover" would work perfectly for this - they are relatively inexpensive, shielded for moisture, mount easily, and can pump a huge amount of air for their size - probably enough to push open a lightweight vent door on the exterior. Mounted near the brew space or equipped with a duct tube (which would allow you to direct which air is being expelled), this system could easily bleed out the moisture and heat from brewing without allowing excessive inflow from the ambient outside air. If your space is insulated properly, replacement air should be pulled through your insulation, helping to equalize the temperatures.

Wow - great ideas! I had considered the false floor idea that zazbnf mentioned above, and may have to reconsider it. I do have access to some free (meaning used) 3/4" Sheetrock that has a durable vinyl coating on it rather than paper. I was going to caulk the joints. Laminate on the floor (once finished) is cheap and easy.

Darkbrood, the burst vent is a bit much, but I can look into blowing in some insulation underneath. The skids are on a bed of gravel, and there's a good 4" of clearance. My concern there is mice. I live in the country, and my cat can hardly keep up as it is. Wouldn't the blown insulation be a haven for mice?