Finished my motorized mill

After weeks of getting stuff together I finally got my Barley Crusher motorized. I got the motor from surpluscenter.com. https://www.surpluscenter.com/item.asp?catname=&qty=1&item=5-1098 its 177 rpm (although I havent measured it) and 40 in*lbs of torque. I used lovejoy coupler to connect to mill. The motor has 1/2" shaft and the mill is 3/8" shaft. I did test run with 2 lbs of grain and it did start up with the grain already in the hopper, but I will have to see after I get 12+ lbs of grain in it.

Very Nice!

sweet and a good price on the motor too. thanks for sharing.

Pretty cool. I keep thinking about motorizing mine but I just don't seem to get around to it.

This last brew session yesterday, I tried out my 18V cordless drill on my BC....no chance whatsoever. I may as well have hooked it up to a hamster wheel.

I figure at least I get some exercise at the start of every brew day. I still want to build something like this, though.

Nicely done. I would wire in a reverse switch if I were you. At some point it will jam and you will need to reverse it. I did the same job with my BC and a beefy bodine motor and absolutely love it. One of my most worthwhile DIY projects.

I wanted to have a switch for forward and reverse but I wasn't sure how to wire up a switch for forward and another switch for reverse.

rockytoptim said:

I wanted to have a switch for forward and reverse but I wasn't sure how to wire up a switch for forward and another switch for reverse.

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Looking at the wiring diagram, wouldn't you just wire one switch up to the blue, and the other to the black? I think a 3-position switch would be better, though, so you couldn't accidentally switch on both at the same time.

good Job, looks good.

just what I am looking for to run my barley crusher.

A 3-way switch looks like it would work fine and would be simple to wire.

Here is a link to the wiring diagram I used:

http://www.lamabrewery.com/the_mill.htm

I just wired in a 3 way switch to get my forward and reverse.

Thanks everyone for you comments.


To HarkinBanks

Thanks for the link to the diagram I am a little electrically challenged.

Your welcome. Another hbt member drew that one so I can't take any credit for it, but it works well. I wondered if it was worth it when I was building it but then my bc jammed with 7 lbs of wheat malt in it and I was sure glad I could just hit the reverse swith and clear the rollers. It's also a good safety measure I suppose in the event of an emergency.

rocky, did you use the capacitor like the one at Lama Brewery?

So now that this thread popped back up.... how did the motor work out? Are you happy with it? I want to motorize my mill but I don't want a 12" sheave spinning around... I like the direct drive idea.

To Maltose: The motor came with a capacitor. I mounted it under the table as well.

To Iaefebs: Motor works great. You have to start the mill before pouring the grain in or it wont start.

Does anyone know if one of these motors would be enough to drive a Monster MM3-2.0 mill?

Alemaker said:

Does anyone know if one of these motors would be enough to drive a Monster MM3-2.0 mill?

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I looked long and hard at this motor when I was building my stand for the MM3-1.5, and decided it wouldn't provide enough power - so I personally wouldn't use it for the 2" flavour.

As much as I didn't want to, I ended up going with sheaves and a 1,725 RPM capacitor start one I snagged from ebay for about the same price. You might find this thread a bit useful from when I was trying to figure out what to use....

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f11/ft-lb-torque-barley-crusher-114548/index2.html#post2126543

I apologize for resurrecting this old post, but I didn't motorize my mill 2 years ago. After combing the web for info, I have put together a concise list of all the Grainger parts you need to motorize (1725 or 1750 rpm motor) the 4" mill that MoreBeer offers. Quite frankly, I'm surprised they don't offer this as an upgrade kit. All this for under $50 (hey, if I could "borrow" a VFD and lovejoy coupling set-up from work, I'd be typing this email while a PLC was making beer in the basement):

2" sheave: 3X896,
12" sheave: 3X938,
44" belt: 4L440,
bushing reducer: 4X664

All that said, you might need a different 2" sheave based upon your motor shaft and a longer or shorter belt, but these part numbers will put you in the neighborhood to find those options without spending hours combing all the chat boards and catalogs. BTW, I didn't do an exact calculation since 290 rpm vs 295 rpm doesn't make much difference (I'm a retired EE who doesn't miss all the calculations, besides, we're ignoring wind resistance, surface tension and friction anyway), but this configuration will put you under 300 rpm unless you have a synchronous motor running at exactly 1800 rpm.

The main reason that the manufacturers don't offer a motorizing option is due to the liability issue. It would be difficult to mill your fingers off using a hand cranked mill. Get your fingers caught up in a motorized mill and it will do some serious harm.

Anyone know the fermentable content % of fingers?

where did you get or how did you build that hopper?

downpantera said:

where did you get or how did you build that hopper?

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The hopper came with the Barley Crusher. Its the 14lb hopper version. I think the 7lb hopper is missing the part where the black tape is.

hey rocky great build! where did you get your coupling.

I also vote that this be a sticky!

kegtoe said:

hey rocky great build! where did you get your coupling.

I also vote that this be a sticky!

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I got them at http://www.mcmaster.com

3/8" hub no keyway 6408K133
1/2" hub with keyway 6408K713
Buna Spider 6408K74

Let me know if you got any more questions.

any chance you could post a pic of the capacitor as its wired up??

kegtoe said:

any chance you could post a pic of the capacitor as its wired up??

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Kegtoe,

I won't be able to get a pic until thursday night. Here is the schematic that came with the motor. The capacitor is what is connected between the red and blue.

Let me know if the schematic is good enough or you still want a pic.

Hi

After seeing this Thread I used the information to motorize my grain mill in the same way. I just used a different switch and way to wire as you can see from my pics below.
I just used wire nuts for the Earth and Neutral wires.
Using a 3 way switch for the forward / reverse operation making it simple to wire as the hot goes to the center of the switch and then from either side of the switch to either side of the capacitor and then to the motor.
This also helped to keep it all neat and tidy in a box on top of the mill stand, which I can unscrew and move the motor to another operation if I need to.
I am thinking I may use the motor to also motorize an apple chopper for a cider press making it interchangeable between apparatus.

Hope this Helps

man... i took me forever to track this thread back down.

I had looked at it when it was current and have been thinking about following suite, but I never subscribed to the thread or bookmarked the link to the motor.

just spent 20 minutes trying to search and finally just started paging through the DIY forum and searching for threads with "motor" in the title.

Ugh.

Glad you resurected it. I plan on motorizing my MM-3 in the near future. I have an old table top drill press in the garage, I'll be seeing if the motor is compatable for this project.

Gotta do this!! While the corded drill works fine, I'd like to make a little grain milling station.

thanks to rocky, i've bought supplies to motorize mine. Actually mounting mine on an unfinished wall cabinet.

I'd like to see a "show me your motorized mill" thread.

Kegtoe, Lets see the pics.

Rocky,
how did you mount the mill to the blocks of wood. and then that to the table top surface. I've got a couple of ideas but yours looks pretty clean.

here is my thread, its a work in progress to this point.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/nates-motorized-grain-mill-228136/

rockytoptim said:

Kegtoe, Lets see the pics.

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Kegtoe, I used long bolts through the wood blocks to attach the mill. Then I used deck screws from underneath to secure the wood blocks to the top

hey, tim: in the JSP MaltMill clone thread for this project, I posted a message with pics for how to wire up the thing to give you a forward/reverse switch if you were still curious.

Thanks for the idea and links on the motor. I ordered mine a couple hours ago, along with coupling parts from McMaster. One more thing to tinker with, I guess.


I do have a question for you. I was thinking about how to mount the motor, and I like the idea of utilizing the bolts that are already on the head of the motor to mount it to a vertical plane of wood. Did you have to get longer bolts for to pull that off? The pic of the motor on surpluscenter.com doesn't look like the bolts are long enough to go much more than the motor head itself.

Walker, Yes I had to buy longer bolts. The old ones came out easy so you shouldn't have any problem getting them out. Thanks for link on the wiring.

rockytoptim said:

Walker, Yes I had to buy longer bolts. The old ones came out easy so you shouldn't have any problem getting them out. Thanks for link on the wiring.

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cool. thanks!

I kept thinking about doing this but my corded drill was doing OK ....until 15 minutes ago when it crapped out on the last lb or so.... Just ordered the motor and couplings. Now to figure out what to do with it all when it comes! Thanks for all the info here.

Anybody got a drawing with dimensions of the mounting? Maybe I can get a jump on that before the motor arrives

I have to order one of those motors, my drill seems to have lost the ability to spin slower than "balls out" so I have to pulse it on-off-on-off. im thinking of using gears to put it next to the mill instead of inline with it. just a simple 1:1 setup. Or maybe a cogged belt or chain drive.... hmmm I love to tinker.

rockytoptim said:

To Maltose: The motor came with a capacitor. I mounted it under the table as well.

To Iaefebs: Motor works great. You have to start the mill before pouring the grain in or it wont start.

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Once the motor is on can you fill the hopper with grain and it still works? I need a motor, would like direct drive just don't know if I should get a bigger motor. If you had to do it over would you get a bigger motor?