Simple Brewing est. 2009 : The build

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Jeremy and I just finished the first wet run testing....

All systems are a go!

I'll post some pictures and details later on when I am not tired and have some time.

Briefly;
-it took 45 minutes to get 50 degree water up to 158 for strike water
-maintained mash temp flawlessly
-circulation was great
-stirrer worked well but we are going to make the paddles bigger for more agitation
-brought mash temp water (158) to boil in about 20 minutes (more on this in the forthcoming details)
-maintained a boil with a full 5.25 boil volume with no lid
-cooling was awesome, we used 1 20 lb bag of ice and cooled the full 5g from boil to 70 in 15 minutes, under 140 in 3 minutes!

Overall, the system is as awesome as I had hoped

:rockin:
 
So here are some pics....

Here is the Simple Brewery in storage mode
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Unpacked
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boil
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ice in the mash tun. That is one bag of 20lb ice
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Heating times from cold water to strike temp
time temperature
9:25 PM 50.6
9:30 PM 59.6
9:35 PM 68.9
9:40 PM 77.9
9:45 PM 88.2
9:50 PM 97.8
9:55 PM 106.5
10:00 PM 114.3
10:05 PM 122.6
10:10 PM 130.0
10:15 PM 137.9
10:20 PM 145.4
10:25 PM 152.7
10:30 PM 158.0

Up to boil

11:15 AM 159.5
11:20 AM 167.3
11:25 AM 175.0
11:30 AM 182.5
11:35 AM 189.7
11:40 AM 194.0

Cooling

12:06 PM 212.0
12:09 PM 140.0
12:11 PM 100.0
12:14 PM 80.0
12:20 PM 70.0
 
No love?

14 minute cooling with a fully closed system and only 20# of ice??? Come on! :D

I do have a question about boiling with electric. The water was clearly boiling and rolling when the sensor was reading 182. Obviously, because the element is in the liquid the boiling will be localized, but how do you electric brewers deal with this?

We were thinking on our next brew (the first real brew day) we would keep the lid on until the full volume reached 212º then take the lid off and start our boil timer.

Do you start timing once a roll starts in the kettle, or once the full volume is up to boiling temps?

Super happy with the system. The rubber insulation does a good job IMO. The outside at boil was rather warm but not hot. You could pick up the keg by holding the outside. It was maybe 100 degrees on the outside of the rubber. Is that good?
 
Some better formatting and pretty pictures....

Data_chart.bmp


strike_chart.bmp


boil_chart.bmp


cooling_chart.bmp


Basic numbers:

Rise º/min to strike water temps -> 1.7º/minute
Rise º/min to mash temps to boil -> 1.5º/minute

jkarp- what do you think of that? Similar to the countertop 20?
 
Personally, I'd start the timer when you get the full volume up to a boil. Technically you can "boil" however long you want as long as your hop additions are put in at the right times counting back from your "flameout".
 
I agree with you. Wait until the full volume is at a boil, I normally wait until I get the hot break then start my boil timer, I just wanted to see what everyone else was doing.
 
No love?

I do have a question about boiling with electric. The water was clearly boiling and rolling when the sensor was reading 182. Obviously, because the element is in the liquid the boiling will be localized, but how do you electric brewers deal with this?

We were thinking on our next brew (the first real brew day) we would keep the lid on until the full volume reached 212º then take the lid off and start our boil timer.

I used my rig for the first time yesterday. I ran into the same thing. I started seeing boiling in the mid 180's and my rolling boil was about 195-200 for the whole boil. I just thought maybe since I am using digital now, that I am getting an more accurate reading then the old dial. Second thought was that and I am at 6500 feet in elevation.

Either way I started my timer at the hot break. I really liked boiling with electric. It work great.
 
Brewing for the first time right now. We are doing an American wheat 50% 2-row / 50% wheat / Chinook and Cascade / Nottingham on a cake

Mash has been awesome. The HERMS is sweet!!! :rockin:
 
This is frickin' sweet! I'd be interested to see how it chills with just tapwater.....
 
I don't know about tap water. But the ice is kickin ass right now.

This was a great brew day. First time around and we hit all our numbers. 74.5% efficiency into the boiler, looking to be about 73% into the fermenter.

We did this as a concentrated boil to achieve 5 total gallons including a gallon of top-up water. Pre-boil gravity was 1.068.

Mash temp maintained perfect, boil was quick, cooling is unreal easy and fast.

All around, this system kicks ass.
 
Down to 60 degrees in thirteen minutes. And pitching temp. This would work for chilling lagers in Wisconsin... nice. I am a happy man.

I will post some pictures and whatnot tomorrow.
 
Setting up and measuring strike water volume.
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Setting up the brewday logbook
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Jeremy doughing-in his very first beer!
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Mash circulating. The locline is the best thing since sliced bread.
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Cross circulation mode during the sparge.
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Dry grain bed.
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Jeremy working the controls.
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BOIL!
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Hot break!
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Still have some ice left when the wort is at 60º...
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Done. Transfer to fermenter.
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A happy man with his first beer!
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And a nice shot of two beers I kegged last night. Left is a twist take on Orfy's Mild, right is a wild ale.
CIMG4033.JPG
 
So the brewday went awesome.

Only oddity is the efficiency. We will have to test again, but it seems that the lauter efficiency was fine (89.7%), the conversion efficiency was low (93.4%), and our eff. into the fermenter was 58.6%.

Not great numbers but I think some of our volumes were off. We will work toward better control. For a first shot I think we did very well!!!

:mug:
 
Nice. Any reason why you didn't actually put it on the countertop? Seems like you had to do a lot of bending.

Those carboys looked pretty dang full, what was your final volume into the fermenter? I think you said you topped up....do you think that affected your efficiency calcs?
 
Yes, Fermcap all the way. No boil-overs in the kitchen. Clean up was sooooo easy. We were completely clean including the floor in like 10 minutes.

FOr me, the mashtun is the most time consuming for cleanup. Did you just dump it and spray it out, or did you use the shopvac?
 
Nice. Any reason why you didn't actually put it on the countertop? Seems like you had to do a lot of bending.

Those carboys looked pretty dang full, what was your final volume into the fermenter? I think you said you topped up....do you think that affected your efficiency calcs?

We put it on the floor because it keeps it at a lower profile. We thought it was easier to bend down than to stand on a stool. Also, the floor is very easy to clean up and no spills on our logbooks, comps, etc.

We ended up with about 3.75g into the fermenter. That is a 5g carboy. We did not end up topping up because we hit or gravity mark, just not the volume. I think we need to change some things for the next brew, but I am not upset about the efficiency, we will get it to 75%.

FOr me, the mashtun is the most time consuming for cleanup. Did you just dump it and spray it out, or did you use the shopvac?

It was so light we just picked it up and dumped it on my compost heap. Sprayed with a hose in the washdown sink, and clean as a whistle. Very easy. I used to use a shop vac for my 10g keggle batches.

Looking at this picture, someone was VERY excited about the boil :p

hehe... yeah. Actually, he had just shoveled some of the 12+ inches of snow we just got.
 
We just dropped 2 oz. of cascades in the American wheat for dry hopping!

The beer is going to be very good. No scorching or any other process defects. No DMS or off flavors from a non-vigorous boil. I think we have a winner.
 
I am just starting to look at this brutus 20 rigs. How exactly does sparging work? Is a plate chiller not recommended?
 
There are a couple ways you can do the sparge. The brutus twenty method is basically no sparge (option one below).

1. No sparge, dilute the sugars with your full strike volume and all sparge water at once until all liquid has the same gravity, then drain into BK. In a two-vessel system like mine, just recirculate all the liquor for about 15 minutes to dissolve all the sugars, then pump into the BK.

2. Batch sparging and fly sparging can also be done if you use a third vessel as a collection vessel. For example, a fermenting bucket works very well. The downside here, is that you cannot heat the wort during the sparge so it adds some time to the brewday.
 
hi,
on my search for a bigger boil kettle (to do AG on ~7gal preboils; 5gal final batch)) I scored a dirty and dirt cheap 15gal keg (cheaper than any 8gal alu pots). A friend of mine will weld all couplers in.

I was wondering about the kw i should use?
I was thinking about two (2) heat elements with about 1500W each.
This should be able to run them on two different 120V circuits and keep my apartment still as brewery-playground.

Are 3000W on two 120V circuits enough to get a boil for ~7gal? How long would it take to heat up from ~170F to boil temp?

thanks
 
Well, last night was awesome. Brewed up a 4 gallon batch of Saint Simon IPA from my Twelve Hopostles series, and it went great. We were drinking some of the American Wheat we brewed while getting better with the system.

I'll post up all my log book pages once fermentation and aging are done.

Briefly:

4.25 gallons of 1.066 wort collected
67.5% brewhouse efficiency (99.6% conversion / 69.3% lauter / 7.1% left in kettle)
7 hop additions and another kick ass cooling

I finished and fully cleaned up (including mopping the floor and scrubbing counters) in 5.5 hours.

I also pulled the controls out of my old side by side fridge and reinstalled in a more size appropriate fridge. I am fermenting in corny kegs, and my new fridge fits two perfectly.

Fermenting happily away at 66º.
 
I've read through your thread a few times and will be reading it as well as your other builds over and over as I begin mine, thanks for all the detailed information.

I have a similar rubber coated keg and was wondering about your valve assembly. I couldn't quite tell from the pics in Post 66 if you bored the rubber away for the valve like you did the element. Or, if you just drilled the right size hole for the nipple to the pass through to the bulkhead.

I have the full size keg like this and am looking for another to complete the set. Did you notice if the rubber gave you much insulation during the mash?

Thanks again for all this information, and I thought I was going to be happy with a turkey fryer and extract, man was I mistaken.
 
Hi Mose-

I am glad you like the system! We did indeed cut away the rubber before mounting the weldless fittings. We did the same for those as we did for the element. Pilot hole -> big hole saw to cut away the rubber -> step bit to cut 7/8" hole for the nipple.

The rubber definitely insulates. It is warm to the touch during the boil but never hot. To me that is pretty good.

Ask any questions you have int he future:mug:
 
Ask any questions you have int he future:mug:[/QUOTE said:
Offers like that will get you in trouble. I am learning about electricity in a big way. There will be a long list of credits when I do my build thread. Fortunatley my Electrical Engineer neighbor should keep me from killing myself, plus he likes good beer.

Great news about the insulation, both for mash and safety. I have little ones and want to brew with them around and don't want to risk a trip to the ER for a burned hand on a gas burner.

Edit: Hence the electric route.

Thanks again, Cheers
 
Brewed a kiwi wit this weekend and ended up with 62% brewhouse efficiency. We are still dialing in the system and I think I need to tighten up my crush, but I think 65-70% is where we will end up.

The system continues to be very nice to brew on.
 
Just ordered a lot of stainless parts, and two pumps for this build last night. I'm modifying by adding a second pump and going single tier, but your build list helped a ton with the parts so far. Thanks.

Next up...electrical components...
 
Just ordered a lot of stainless parts, and two pumps for this build last night. I'm modifying by adding a second pump and going single tier, but your build list helped a ton with the parts so far. Thanks.

Next up...electrical components...

Yo may want to take a look at 2P-Twent-E in my sig. It is a single tier version of this build including all the safety changes mentioned in this thread.

I can't wait to finish that thing!
 
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