Allied 1000W Bucket Heater

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mZnthebend

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It almost seems to easy. 1000W 120V Immersion Bucket Heater. I have seem them all over the web, but Tractor Supply sells them as well.

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Tractor Supply Company - Allied Bucket Heater

I fully understand it is only 1000W and little low on wattage, but it seems to be a good alternative to drilling another hole in my Keggle HLT. Or at least a good intro to the Electric HLT. Possibly two on dedicated circuits. (From other websites, I have determined the "auto-shut off" is for if it is run out of water.)

Does anyone have any experience with one of these units?

Thanks
 
Yeah, it says it'll heat water past 150 but usually those things are just designed to prevent freezing, not boil.
 
I'm sure it will work, might take some time though. Probably work well in a cooler to heat batch / sparge water. You are not going to boil much at that wattage! I use
2000W heatsticks and even w/ 2 of them it takes time.
 
Ahoy hoy,
For those of you who saw my post on the williams thread, I got 2 williams heaters, the 15 and the 11 inch. The one ( the 15 inch ) committed hari kari, the other just didnt have the umph to boil water period. So, I sent those 2 back and got my 380 buck refund.
So, now i just went out and spent 100 bucks, for 2 of these bucket heaters. They were 49 bucks each, but thats up here in alaska, so, considering shipping, that was a good price. So, Ill be testing them tonight hopefully, and Ill let you folks know just how fast they can boil, and they claim they can be used in plastic due to the gaurd, so ill see if it can heat up the water in my coleman extreme (to mash temps) if they will submerse. If not, Ill do both mash and boil tests in a 50 qt SS pot. If nothing else, they should be able to assist the stove top with my big pots, and that would be a step in the right direction.
Again, a guinea pig for my pards on this forum. But, that the kind of character I am :drunk:
I bid you all a great day, and will report back when able.....
 
Ahoy hoy,
Well, I write this after returning from the feed store, where I just finished returning the 2 bucket heaters.
Not to critique anyones claims, but these things are complete failures when it comes to boiling water. I put the 2 of them in 5 gallons of water, and after 2 hours they had peaked at about 175F. There wasnt a ghost of a chance that these things could ever bring 5 gallons to boil. So, folks, if you want to heat up water to 150 or so for mashing, they can do that, in 45 minutes or so. But if you want to boil wort, forget it. Dont waste your money. I did that for you. But got it back. So, other then waiting for the refund to show up on my card in 3 days or so, no harm done.
Anyways, I told you folks I would let you know what happened, so as to save someone else the grief. I know I know, the things I do in the pursuit of an electric wort boiler....
I bid you all a great day!
 
Ahoy hoy,
Well, I write this after returning from the feed store, where I just finished returning the 2 bucket heaters.
Not to critique anyones claims, but these things are complete failures when it comes to boiling water. I put the 2 of them in 5 gallons of water, and after 2 hours they had peaked at about 175F. There wasnt a ghost of a chance that these things could ever bring 5 gallons to boil. So, folks, if you want to heat up water to 150 or so for mashing, they can do that, in 45 minutes or so. But if you want to boil wort, forget it. Dont waste your money. I did that for you. But got it back. So, other then waiting for the refund to show up on my card in 3 days or so, no harm done.
Anyways, I told you folks I would let you know what happened, so as to save someone else the grief. I know I know, the things I do in the pursuit of an electric wort boiler....
I bid you all a great day!

Medo,

I really appreciate your feedback. I wasn't planning on using them for boiling, but great feedback. Guess I can scratch that trip off of my list of errands to run this weekend. Sounds like you are on a mission, please post back on what success you have.

Thanks
 
Reviving zombie thread because it is the first result in google for homebrew bucket heater.

DO NOT USE IT

I got one to help my crappy electric stove get to a rolling boil. It will get to boiling a lot faster, but then it will get into an on/off cycle that gives you 5 seconds of rolling boil every 20 seconds or so.

Since other people in other forums and here claim to use them for boiling, I thought mine was defective and called the company. The engineer says that it is the way it is designed to work, it shuts off when it gets to boiling. I am at sea level, maybe someone living at altitude can get a continuous boil if their water boils under the shut-off temperature.

But most importantly, the engineer said that the product is not FDA approved, it uses lead solder, the element's material may leach nasty stuff and finally it will corrode if used to heat up acidic solutions.

It sounded too good to be true. Good thing I was able to return it.
 
I have one of the Allied bucket heaters. I use it to heat up my strike & sparge water in a 50 quart Ice cube cooler. It will bring 12 gallons of water to boiling temperaure in this cooler. It does take some time to reach boiling; several hours at least. I get around this by using a timer to turn on the heater 4 hours before I plan to dough-in. I blend cold tap water with some of the water from the HLT to bring it down to the desired strike temperature from boiling.

The Bucket Heater does not have sufficient power to use it for boiling wort, so I would not recommend it for that use.

Regarding it being rated food safe, it's much like some of the pumps and other equipment commonly used in home brewing. Allied never intended for the bucket heater to be used in food preparation and therefore, never pursued a food safe rating. Why would they? I see no sign of solder anywhere on any part of the bucket heater that would be in contact with the liquid being heated. The element shield is stainless steel. I see no evidence of corrosion on the heating element after repeated use. I think the element is copper, but I'm not at all certain of that. It might be different with acidic solutions. I doubt that the guy you talked to was an engineer at all. I'm skeptical that they would have an engineer taking customer service calls. Maybe he was just trying to impress you. That happens a lot. In any case, I have no plans to stop using mine.
 
The piece of solder is what joins the thermostat probe (stainless steel rod) to the element itself. It would be very easy to cover it up with some food safe silicone if anyone worries.

I could have kept it for my strike and sparge water, but I already have that part of the process dialed in. I need it for a better boil along with my electric stove, there are people speculating that it may or may not work. I did not for me.

Regarding the power, it does have enough power to boil wort. For the five or so seconds that it turns on I get a beautiful boil. Then it turns off. If the shut off were calibrated ten degrees higher it would be perfect and would still protect against fires.
 
I took another close look at the bucket heater and I now see the very small, maybe 1/2" sliver of solder you are talking about. I'm guessing it's silver solder. I don't think lead solder will adhere to stainless steel, but I know silver solder will. In any case, I'm not at all concerned about it. Still no indication of corrosion on the element, thermostat rod or on the solder itself.
 
i have to resurrect this thread one more time. do you suppose this bucket heater would be good for maintaining mash temps? im about to start using a keg to brew large batches and my cooler is not going to hold all the grain. i dont know how much heat will be lost from the SS, i dont really want to keep a flame on it because i dont know if it will scorch, i dont know a thing about recirculating or circulating into a heating element then back into the mash or any of the acronyms...RIMS HERMS HLT...ets. this stuff is confusing.


or would it just be cheaper to head to the home depot and pick up a bigger cooler?
 
i have to resurrect this thread one more time. do you suppose this bucket heater would be good for maintaining mash temps? im about to start using a keg to brew large batches and my cooler is not going to hold all the grain. i dont know how much heat will be lost from the SS, i dont really want to keep a flame on it because i dont know if it will scorch, i dont know a thing about recirculating or circulating into a heating element then back into the mash or any of the acronyms...RIMS HERMS HLT...ets. this stuff is confusing.


or would it just be cheaper to head to the home depot and pick up a bigger cooler?

Without some type of recirculation or stirring, the heater would scorch your wort just as direct fire might.
 
Just seen this at the top again...

I use the allied 742g 1000w for my tile saw in the winter. I assure you it WILL boil 5 gallons of water in around an hour, sitting in the snow. I see no reason why two of these couldn't be used for a wort boil.
Both of mine are covered it muck from the tile water so I don't dare use them in anything I will drink, but I have thought many times about ordering a couple more just for assistance with the propane in the winter. My garage is not heated and the cook times go up considerably.
 
i have to resurrect this thread one more time. do you suppose this bucket heater would be good for maintaining mash temps? im about to start using a keg to brew large batches and my cooler is not going to hold all the grain. i dont know how much heat will be lost from the SS, i dont really want to keep a flame on it because i dont know if it will scorch, i dont know a thing about recirculating or circulating into a heating element then back into the mash or any of the acronyms...RIMS HERMS HLT...ets. this stuff is confusing.


or would it just be cheaper to head to the home depot and pick up a bigger cooler?

IMO, your best option would be to simply get another cooler. As mentioned above, you will likely overheat the wort and possibly scorch it using a bucket heater and the same for direct firing over a burner unless you do some type of continuous circulation either manually or with a pump.
 
Have been following this thread and took the plunge:

Just got 2 Allied Precision bucket heaters (1000W ea), and verified rolling boil from 95 degree start in 60min with 5gal water. Still some plumbing and electrical work to do in my basement before I graduate to wort. I can't imagine I'd have any more problems with scorching than with my propane burner, but will let you know.
 
There is enough space between the guard and element. Scorching has kind of been disproven....even in RIMS tubes. There will be slight residue on the element after brewing, but absolutely zero burnt/scorched/caramelized flavors.
 
IIRC, the bucket heaters do not use a low density element as most e-RIMS setups do. This could, indeed, lead to scorching problems. Might work OK in the BK, but I suspect not so well for an MT. I would be especially concerned about scorching in an MT if not circulating the wort. The space between the element and the guard won't make any difference if the wort is not circulating or otherwise being stirred. If it's in a static condition it will scorch stuff in the MT. It should be obvious that conditions in a mash tun will be considerably different than the conditions in a boil kettle.
 
I hate to resurrect a thread this old but it might answer a tough question for me.

I want to do a kettle sour but have no way of maintaining temp.

Do you guys think one of these would maintain 115ish in a vessel holding the kettle?

Ie: a Rubbermaid container full of water with the kettle sitting in it. Heater controlled by temp controller submerged in the Rubbermaid heating the surrounding water.
 
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