From Buckets to HLT

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

BreezyBrew

IPA is my spirit animal
Joined
Feb 12, 2012
Messages
3,701
Reaction score
572
Location
New Tampa
So I am looking to modify my current process, and do away with buckets and heavy lifting, so I can brew a couple of batches on a Saturday if I wanted to.

Currently I have a 10g igloo cooler Mash Tun, 10g BK, a chugger pump and... buckets. I also have two burners and I own a 20g SS that I bought to upgrade my system eventually to a herms. This kettle can be used as an HLT and I'd like to do so.

Any issues with heating up strike water in the HLT, pumping it into the Mash Tun, Mashing, (maybe pump vorlaufing?) then pumping it to the BK? I think my biggest concern would be a stuck mash if tried to drain too quickly, or too much of the grain got compacted. I'd want to do a test run to get my volumes and temp range nailed down. I currently do have a bleeder valve on my pump, to get rid of any trapped air that might happen in the transfer.
 
Put a valve in the output so you can start the flow slowly. Lots of people do exactly what you're proposing, and run the flow full time through the mash. Your test run should include looking into how far you can open the pump valve before you start having issues
 
Any issues with heating up strike water in the HLT, pumping it into the Mash Tun, Mashing, (maybe pump vorlaufing?) then pumping it to the BK? I think my biggest concern would be a stuck mash if tried to drain too quickly, or too much of the grain got compacted. I'd want to do a test run to get my volumes and temp range nailed down. I currently do have a bleeder valve on my pump, to get rid of any trapped air that might happen in the transfer.

That sounds fine. I assume you have a decent false bottom, so the stuck mash shouldn't occur.

You never want to impede flow to the pump, but you can put your ball valve right after the pump to throttle the speed.


If I understand you right, I think everyone does something similar.

If grainbed compaction is an issue, rice hulls help!
 
Thanks folks. I have a pretty traditional false bottom. It does have a 3/8 the outlet that sizes up to a 1/2 size. I've opened it too quickly before and it stuck. That's where my main concern comes from. I'll be sure to throw some extra rice hulls in there next time around.
 
If grainbed compaction is an issue, rice hulls help!

Another thought I had was milling a lot corser. Right now I am at .35 with the barley crusher. I looked around and a number of people suggest .45 for a RIMS/HERMS system. I don't have a problem with adjusting, but I think my efficiency would go down a bunch since I was planning just doing a single infusion rather than recirc through a coil for an hour.
 
Back
Top