e-Brewery Control Panel Project/Conversion from Propane to Electric

augiedoggy said:

I dont see that working very well... it defeats the whole point of precise temp control with a herms or rims..

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Thedutchtouch said:

there's got to be a way to cycle the pump and the heater so they arent on during the same duty cycle, but still maintain adequate recirculation... perhaps not the easiest solution, but gotta be possible.

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augiedoggy said:

I dont think you quite understand how a herms works... The wort that travels through the coil emerged in the HLT becomes the same temp as the HLT... if you turn your pump on and off with your HLT at 168 all its going to do is raise your mash to 168 degrees a little slower, with completely uneven mash temps from the first time the pump turns on.

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Thedutchtouch said:

i understand completely. my comment is based on the fact that you can run an element and a pump on alternating cycles (think multiple cycles per second or a second or two each.) this could then enable a "continual" flow of wort, as well as linear heating. you don't lose enough heat to the environment within a few seconds to have any impact. think of it as having a SPDT switch built in to the circuitry that switches back and forth rapidly between pump and element (obviously 120 pump/240 element wiring makes this more complicated)

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augiedoggy said:

Either you dont or I am missing what you are trying to accomplish. Im referring to post #77
The wort that exits the herms coil submerged in 168degree temp water will be 168 degrees or close to it even if you have the pump at full speed. How will pulsing the pump speed have any effect on enabling the herms to maintain a consistent 152 degree mash while having 168 hlt?

are you talking about just running multiple elements such as in a RIMS application off a smaller circuit and not about a herms at all? If thats the case then there are multiple ways of accomplishing that such as using a 4500w HLT element and a 240v 2000w rims element which can both be ran off a single 30a circuit fine.. as would any 5500w element and 240v pump.

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Thedutchtouch said:

i think we're getting off the rails here lol. this isn't anything i'm trying to do, was proposing an out of the box way to solve a "getting below X amperage" threshold issue.

to anyone reading along, augiedoggie knows a lot more about all this than i do, assume i'm wrong and ignore this subset of the discussion!

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augiedoggy said:

I dont think you quite understand how a herms works... The wort that travels through the coil emerged in the HLT becomes the same temp as the HLT... if you turn your pump on and off with your HLT at 168 all its going to do is raise your mash to 168 degrees a little slower, with completely uneven mash temps from the first time the pump turns on.

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RelicScoth said:

I've thought about doing this as well (Herms in HLT, while ramping HLT to strike) but I envisioned using a PID to control a pump. Place the probe at/in the pump outlet, pump into the TOP of the herms loop, and drain return to the tun. Once the outlet wort into the herms is back to the correct temp, the pid would turn off the pump, and the wort still in the herms would finish draining back to the mash tun.

(This, of course, assumes a gravity transfer system)

As the HLT rises to strike, the HERMS cycles would simply get shorter. And, in step mashes, you'd be in better position to step faster as your HLT has been heating up the entire time you've been sitting at a break.

Am I missing something key here? I could see how an insufficient flow rate could return a portion of your wort above your step, but returning it through a sparge arm should distribute that extra heat into your still-not-there-yet temp wort, and as a bonus help avoid thermal layering.

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augiedoggy said:

I currently set my sparge temp on my HLT as soon as I transfer strike water to my MT the sparge water is at 170 long before I I need it and the element maintains the temp fine the whole time I continue to mash with my rims on a mere 30a circuit so why go through all this trouble to make the herms work less effectively as a work around to another weakness already associated with it? there are far more effective solutions without the tradeoffs.

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RelicScoth said:

The system I've been piecing together is keggles for the HLT and BK, with an igloo cooler for the mash tun (these I already have, converting them to electric soon). Given the limitation of my "brew house" (some plywood on a sink with a shelf above it, and full breaker box) I only have one 240 line available from my dryer connection. Since I'll only be able to power one element at a time, this seemed the best way to go.

I can strike in at the proper temp, rely on the cooler alone for single step mashes, and use the herms setup only when I need to step the mash temp or mash longer than the hour or so I could maintain temp in the cooler without assistance.

A rims setup would keep me from heating sparge water, since I'd need an element in the mash tun and hlt running together. Skipping the herms loop and trying to have an almost-all gravity based transfer system means dumping boiling water to the tun, or decocting, both of which bring ladders and boiling liquids into the same sentence. Do able at a significant risk, but really just means I can't step mash easily.

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augiedoggy said:

Yeah pretty sure your clear flow meter just became a "must have". I'll have to revisit the rims vs herms debate. I planned on scaling to 5 gallon all grain batches using induction, but got a great deal on the keggles and mash tun. That scaled me out of induction but allows 10 gallon full boils., so I have "room for growth".

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