Vertical Brew Stand Question

I'm in the process of welding up a 3 tier, vertical brew stand. I was originally planning on making the base 40" x 28". The drawing below is to scale and the circles are keggles.



I laid out my steel tubing and I didn't like how big the footprint of this design is. I'm thinking of changing the dimensions to 40" x 15" like the drawing below.



Will this be stable enough? I plan on welding casters to the bottom.

Here's the complete model:

With the limited info you have provided, I would guess no. Mine is narrow like your second drawing but is also bolted to the wall. The higher you put weight the more stable the base needs to be. Maybe make a narrow stand with retractable supports?

Edit: I see the third drawing now and I think it would be stable left and right. Front to back may be another matter depending on weight distribution. I still say outriggers

lschiavo said:

Maybe make a narrow stand with retractable supports?

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I agree - you'll need some sort of side bracing, which could be retractable if the storage footprint is your main size constraint.

ArnooBrew said:

I agree - you'll need some sort of side bracing, which could be retractable if the storage footprint is your main size constraint.

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What do you think would be the minimum width that I could go with without using side supports?

d_striker said:

What do you think would be the minimum width that I could go with without using side supports?

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Not completely sure. Is bracing not an easy option for you, space wise? It's a tradeoff: footprint versus stability/safety.

d_striker said:

What do you think would be the minimum width that I could go with without using side supports?

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You sound like an engineer Apply some real numbers and your statics and dynamics knowledge and you're done. Or just experiment until it works to your satisfaction...like Edison

ArnooBrew said:

Not completely sure. Is bracing not an easy option for you, space wise? It's a tradeoff: footprint versus stability/safety.

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I'm not sure how I would incorporate bracing with the use of casters.

lschiavo said:

You sound like an engineer Apply some real numbers and your statics and dynamics knowledge and you're done.

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I am, aye An electrical engineer rather than a mechanical one, though, so I can't readily crunch stability numbers. But my judgment is to definitely brace.

d_striker said:

I'm not sure how I would incorporate bracing with the use of casters.

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You could have triangular braces which you could affix to the sides when you're brewing. These could also have castors and could be removed when you're done brewing, if you need to reduce the footprint for storage.

ArnooBrew said:

I am, aye An electrical engineer rather than a mechanical one, though, so I can't readily crunch stability numbers. But my judgment is to definitely brace.

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Also electrical myself but I fondly and faintly remember the mechanical stuff.

d_striker said:

I'm not sure how I would incorporate bracing with the use of casters.

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I would bolt an arm at the end (maybe center) of each horizontal base (4 total) that could swing out as a stabilizer and be retracted for storage. I would also test this theory with cold water in the HLT

Sorry if I am not helping. If we could sit down with a beer, paper, pencil, hacksaw, welder....we'd be in trouble

Stating the obvious, too, the instability would be greatest at the start if the brew day, when the HLT (at the top) is full and the kettle (bottom) is empty.

I think the skinnier version will work...It's not going to be the MOST stable but it's not going to tip from something bumping it.

Some additional things to consider are that on a typical batch, I will heat up 4 gallons of mash water and mash on the middle tier before any sparge water is introduced to the top keggle. I figure this to be approximately 20 lbs on the middle tier.

After the mash is underway, I will then fill the HLT with approximately 6 gallons of sparge water. This is approximately 50-60 lbs with keggle.

I plan on batch sparging which means that some of the weight will transfer to my boil keggle on the bottom tier.

answer is too simple...
splay the legs at a slightly downward angle
VERY stable

OneHoppyGuy said:

answer is too simple...
splay the legs at a slightly downward angle
VERY stable

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I like where this is going....I'm still wondering how short I can make that section that the legs would attach to.

Here are some other examples



I did a lot of looking at other designs looking at their strengths and weaknesses. The one challenge with this design it that the legs are cut at a compound angle.

Thanks for the brilliant idea....

Here's what I came up with for a model....I used a 45 degree miter cut on the leg angles simply because I don't know how to create less of an angle in google sketchup....

there ya go

What do you think about this? 30 degree cut on the legs.