My 36 ft Herms coil...

This is about to be soldered. It's about 40-1/2" 90 couplers and 30 feet of pipe.

I cut the pipe and cleaned it up. Cleaned the fittings also. I got the pipe for .41/ft and the fittings were 40 of them for $20 bucks. Already had tons of solder and propane so this should be a pretty cheap and fairly unique build.

I'll show pics when it's done.

What is the final shape going to be?

TacoBrew said:

What is the final shape going to be?

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Judging from the stack of equal length tubes and that pile of 90° fittings, I'd say a squared spiral...

Cheers!

Square spiral.

Awesome. But can I have some of your free time?

I guess there are no concerns about flow rate through 90 90-degree elbows?

that is a decent alternative to the coiling issue - I am desperate to see the finished pictures.

I have about 3 more rows left. Then clean up and make connections in kegs.

Awesome, but you have way too much time on your hands.

Sure, ill trade you for my unemployment... It really has been easy. Had my brother hook a drill to the copper and I held the cutter. I used a drill attachment to clean the insides of the couplers and pipes. Used another drill attachment to clean the pipe up. The soldering has been a lot of fun to do and honestly isn't taking much time. I would have been done hours ago but I went to see a movie. I just snapped a picture when I got back.

Now I'm cleaning it up. Then I'll pressure test it.

are you putting that in a keg? or a pot?

It's going in a keggle. I wanted it bunched tightly at the bottom so I could do 5 gallon mashes also. My valves top and bottom are 13 1/2" on center.

sorry for the newbie question but is this a permanent wort chiller?

opengun said:

sorry for the newbie question but is this a permanent wort chiller?

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No, It goes inside the HLT and recirculates the wort from the Mash Tun. It's called a HERMS coil. You could however use it as a Wort Chiller but I would probably use 3/8" for that, it would be a lot easier. I used 50 FT of 3/8" copper for my immersion chiller and it chilled 10 gallons of wort down in less than 15 minutes. Cool thing about using that 3/8" for an immersion chiller is that you can convert that into a counter-flow wort chiller very easily with a couple copper fittings and a rubber hose, that's what I just did.

So it keeps the wort in the mash tun a constant temp?

opengun said:

So it keeps the wort in the mash tun a constant temp?

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Yup exactly...also allows you to do step mashes, and quickly heat your mash to higher temps if you want. Plus your constantly vorlaufing so you get a cleaner wort.

Mellman said:

Yup exactly...also allows you to do step mashes, and quickly heat your mash to higher temps if you want. Plus your constantly vorlaufing so you get a cleaner wort.

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So much to learn, I don't know where to start. That is the reason I've only been doing extract brewing for now.

Meh...all grain sounds intimidating but its really not, don't worry about all the fancy word s...mashing is just like steeping your grains in extract brewing, you just have more grains, and do it for a little longer. And instead of steeping in a bag, you do it in a keg or cooler, and just run hot water through them. I was intimidated by it until I saw it in person and everything fell into place...get with someone in your area and watch, just be warned it will make you want to go all grain

that looks cool man. does it fit down the opening of a keggle? it looks too big from the pics

The opening in the top of my keggle is 12". I just checked and I think I'll have to shave about a 1/16" on top. I was going to use Unions to connect it to the insides of the keg but decided I would just "sweat" them in/out when and if I ever wanted to remove the coil. I pressure tested it bit ago and I have 1-2 leaky joints I have to fill.

And All-grain brewing becomes an obsession once you learn how to do it. I will agree 100%. It is however, easy to learn and so rewarding.

Markd27 said:

I guess there are no concerns about flow rate through 90 90-degree elbows?

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This. I imagine you'd need something better than a March 809 if you want anything more than a trickle being pumped through.

I'll be making my HERMS coil soon... as sharp as yours looks though (better than I imagined from the OP) I think I'll be going with a more conventional "coil" design, probably 50'.

Main thing I haven't decided yet is SS or copper. While I know copper actually has benefits pre-fermentation (binds sulfur compounds), everything else in my brewery is stainless, glass, or silicone (except, apparently, copper used to braze the stainless plates of my Therminator), and cleaning 50' of copper pipe that's had wort running through it for hours (and the higher maintenance requirements of copper in general) doesn't seem like my cup of tea. Maybe I'll just clean some pennies and throw them in the boil

Actually, now that the thought of cleaning it has crossed my mind, the shape and ESPECIALLY the multitude of fittings on your coil seems like it'd be a nightmare...

I'm not concerned about cleaning it. I won't have to do it that often. About flow rate, ill be using a little giant pump and since it is a herms coil I'm not too concerned with a high flow rate but the little giant with its higher flow rate should have no problem. The only thing i'm concerned about is a consistent mash temp which I feel will be easy to attain with 36 feet of 1/2" pipe.

opengun said:

sorry for the newbie question but is this a permanent wort chiller?

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Welcome to brewing my friend!! When I started, forums like this along with brewing friends were worth their weight in gold. Just remember, we were all noobs once.

Cleaned the coil with a soak in star-san for the better part of the afternoon. Capped one and and tested it dunked in the star-san soak. Had 3 leaks, fixed em up and this thing is looking beautiful. I will be sweating it into the keg tonight. I cut the opening in the top of the keg to an even 12" and then scrubbed and polished the rest of my connectors for my kegs. Check my brutus build for the other pictures.

Polished it up with a sand blaster! Ready to install!

Nice!

Very nice. I'm interested in seeing it assembled and in use!

Looks good. Do you any pictures of it in the Keggle?

Hopefully this afternoon.

great build man!

real diy, this is of unbeatable value and of great inspiration for the diy lovers in the homebrewing world!

good luck for your successfully beer!

gm

Not sure how different it is, but when I was plumbing my reef tanks in the past, every 90 degree bend was 1ft of head pressure. Have you done a dry run with your pump connected, I'd hate to see it all welded in and not get any flow.

There really is no coiling issue with 1/2" OD copper tubing. It coils to a 10" OD like butter with no tools.

Bobby_M said:

There really is no coiling issue with 1/2" OD copper tubing. It coils to a 10" OD like butter with no tools.

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I know it's not difficult to do but for my cost on this and the originality I would say this is a win win. Haven't got a pump yet but water from my faucet flows through it great. I guess as soon as my pump is hooked up ill post a small video on here to show my flow. Once again, this is a herms coil and I don't need a super fast flow rate. Thanks for the compliments. BTW, ordered some fittings and a new sight glass from you Bobby. Love your prices and shipping speeds, you've been a huge help on a lot of my diy projects.

petrostar said:

Cleaned the coil with a soak in star-san for the better part of the afternoon. Capped one and and tested it dunked in the star-san soak. Had 3 leaks, fixed em up and this thing is looking beautiful. I will be sweating it into the keg tonight. I cut the opening in the top of the keg to an even 12" and then scrubbed and polished the rest of my connectors for my kegs. Check my brutus build for the other pictures.

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Nice build be curious to see how it performs. Star-San may not be the best choice for cleaning the coil as it is a sanitizer not a cleaner. I would soak it in PBW for cleaning. Just a thought.

You shouldn't have a problem pumping through the square coil. You can always pump top to bottom and let gravity help out a bit.

JRems said:

You shouldn't have a problem pumping through the square coil. You can always pump top to bottom and let gravity help out a bit.

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That's exactly what I plan to do. Also, the coil is SPOTLESS! I will definitely do a pbw soak before brewing and cycle it through the coil for at least an hour.

Have it roughed in now. I had to cut and resolder my dip tube a bit so it wasn't pushing on the coil. I'm glad I have weldless bulkheads I was just able to drop the presoldered coil in and tighten the bulkhead to hold it in place. A benefit to this, I can remove coil easily for cleaning! Hope you all like, I'll be doing a solid pbw cleaning on it as soon as I get a pump.

One question. What type of pipe threading are you guys using for threads that touch water/wort? Thanks again for all the kudos.

Oh, I'll be adding my sight glass and rtd 4" temp probes this week to the HLT and the MLT.