NattyBrew's Electric Brewery Build

Not a problem. To be honest my solution is pretty darn easy. An upgrade to a floor drain would be beer geek heaven for me, but the walk in shower allows me to make just as much of a mess when I am cleaning my kettles as a floor drain does.

One of these days I'll have a full fledged brewhaus with floor drain....One can dream!

Matt

This is amazing... how have I not been following this thread the whole time? Wiring is crazy clean, stand is beautiful, kettles are drool-worthy.

I plan to (hopefully) build one of these in the future. I feel like once it's finally done and I get a look at the final product, I will be compelled to drop to my knees and weep tears of joy.... that is, considering it turns out even half as nice as yours.

You will weep with joy for sure. I only built the controller and everytime I see it I smile

Well that wiring is soooo clean. It could be an image for a textbook.

Reno_eNVy_446 said:

This is amazing... how have I not been following this thread the whole time? Wiring is crazy clean, stand is beautiful, kettles are drool-worthy.

I plan to (hopefully) build one of these in the future. I feel like once it's finally done and I get a look at the final product, I will be compelled to drop to my knees and weep tears of joy.... that is, considering it turns out even half as nice as yours.

Click to expand...

Reno,

Thanks for the props man! I honestly couldn't have done any part of this build without the help of Kal or the people here at HBT. I spent a huge amount of time to make sure I got the build right and I am positive that in the end it was worth it. If you do end up embarking on a similar build, be sure to document it (with pictures!) and if you have any questions along the way please don't be afraid to ask.

I know that I promised a picture documentation of a brew day on the system a while back and have not delivered so tomorrow I plan to make that right. I have a Belgian Wit on the brew schedule beginning bright and in the morning and I will be taking pictures all along the way to share my processes with everyone here on the site. Stay tuned for the my full brew day post!

Matt

Well as promised to everyone I documented my brew day today which was a Belgian Wit recipe which was published in the most recent issue of Brew Your Own magazine. I have brewed several American Wheat beers in my day but I have never tried my hand at an authentic Belgian Wit. Now that I have my electric system up and running the way I like, I thought it was about time I tried my hand at the style.

Here is a quick shot of my crush which includes about a half pound of rice hulls you can see pretty clearly in the photo. I have always used them for any version of my american wheat beers to be safe rather than sorry. I heard way too many horror stories about stuck sparges thanks to the very gummy nature of wheat that I have always included them in my grist when a major portion is comprised of wheat.



The BYO recipe includes a few simple ingredients including Saaz hops, bitter orange peel, and coriander.



First step in my brew day is to fill up my HLT via the hose faucet I installed on the wall. I use a spring loaded clamp to hold the hose in the kettle making the fill process hands free while I prep everything else.



I haven't really dedicated myself to getting too much into water chemistry yet, though I do hope to move someday into building my own water for every beer from RO water and brewing salts. My water source here has both traditional chlorine and chloramines (spelling?) so one Campden tablet per 20 gallons of water is enough to remove these from my brewing water. I use a mortar and pistil to crush the tablet.





After I have my HLT filled with 20 gallons of water, I turn on the HLT element and the water pump to recirculate the water as it heats up to my protein rest temp at 131 degrees. The top picture shows the actual temp of my tap water in red and the set temp below in green. My tap water is nearly 80 degrees right now which absolutely sucks when it comes time to chill my wort.





After my water reaches 131 degrees I move the water pump outlet to the mash tun to fill with my strike water. For this recipe I mashed at 1.5 quarts per pound, plus I add about 3 quarts for the liquid in the hoses, pumps, and heat exchange coil. For this recipe it ended up being 4.75 gallons, once you hit the mark you turn off the water pump and return the hose to recirculate the water in the HLT.

Now that you have the appropriate amount of water in the MLT, you hook up your hoses to recirculate water from the MLT, through the heat exchange coil, and back into the MLT. The cold metal of the MLT will steal a little bit of heat from your water, but it only takes about 5 minutes for the water to heat back to 131 degrees.





Now that our strike water is back to temp we are ready to mash in. I turn off the wort pump and hang the silicone hose up out of the way so I can add my grain. As I mentioned before I still haven't gotten into sophisticated mash chemistry, so I use 5.2 buffer in all my mashes. I've measured the pH using simple test strips and it seems to get me pretty close to a 5.2 or 5.3 on most my mashes so I've stuck with it for now. Have to take one brewing step advancement at a time, and I need to perfect a few other areas of my brewing skills before I step up to water and mash chemistry.



Here is the grain just added to my water before I've completely doughed in.



After I've stirred and ensured I don't have any dough balls I start the wort recirculation pump back up and start to get the temp of the mash back up to where I want it at 131 degrees. Again the grain steals some temp here so it takes about 10 minutes to get back up to temp. I could heat my strike water a little hotter but I don't mind the little bit of time required for the mash to come back up to temp.



Once the mash is back up to temp, start my 20 minute timer for my protein rest at 131. I like to do protein rests at 131 on all my beers for a few reasons: 1) I have seen pretty strong results in terms of improved head when I use a protein rest, 2) With high wheat grain bills a protein rest can be very beneficial at breaking down the gummy starches of the wheat products, and 3) Because with my new electric system I can!! :rockin:



After my 20 minute protein rest I raise the HLT temp to my mash temp of 152 degrees and the MLT follows. Once I've reached my mash temp I set my timer for 60 minutes and wait.



At the end of the hour long mash you can see the awesome benefit of having a constantly recirculating mash. You are able to set the grain bed really nicely and essentially vorlauf for an entire hour to make your wort run crystal clear. You can see the huge difference in this picture after the end of my 60 minute sac rest.



After the end of my main mash I raise the HLT temp to 170 degrees and once the MLT reaches a mash out temp of 168 degrees I start to sparge and transfer my wort to the boil kettle. I keep my HLT element on the entire time during the sparge to ensure that I am rinsing the grain with 170 degree water the entire time.

Here is a quick shot of my hose setup during the sparge as I slowly transfer my wort to the kettle. I usually try and make my sparge last about an hour or so, but it doesn't have to be exact. The key is that you don't want to rinse the grain too quickly or you risk lowering your efficiency.







Another quick shot of the nicely set grain bed as I am fly sparging into the kettle.



Once I have gotten my pre-boil volume in my kettle, which in this case was eight gallons, I just open the wort pump all way and drain the rest of the runnings into a bucket. I really enjoy the ease of fly sparging in general. Not having to fuss with calculations of how much water you need to use is nice, with this system you just sparge until you've hit your pre-boil volume and that's it!





Now that I have my eight gallons of wort in the kettle, I turn the Boil Kettle PID on to manual mode and crank the power up to 100%.



While I am waiting for my wort to come to a boil, I take down my MLT and prepare to empty the spent grain into a bucket.



About the time I am done emptying the MLT, my wort is reaching the hot break and almost boiling. I am not super anal about removing the "foop" on top of the wort before the boil, I just let it fall back into the boil.

Someone had previously asked me before about how I go about cleaning my gear. I do not have a sink or floor drain in my brew room, but I do have a walk in shower in the basement that is no more than 20 feet away from my brew room that I clean my pots and equipment in. Just so everyone can get a quick visual, this is my MLT in the shower ready to be cleaned.



Once I've add my first hop addition at 60 minutes and started my timer, the sample of my sparge runnings has cooled enough to get a proper reading and calculate my efficiency of my brew session. My eight gallons of wort had a gravity of 1.040 at 61 degrees, which equals a total of 320 Gravity Units. My grain bill calculated at 100% was a total of 366.5 Gravity Units. So once you divide 320 into 366.5, I came out with an efficiency of 87.3% for this brew day. I aim for my standard of 90% on this system so I fell I little short, but not by much.



As the end of the boil approaches I start a siphon from a 5 gallon bucket of Star San and pump it through my wort pump, CFC, and all the hoses. Some people choose to sanitize the CFC by recirculating hot wort for the last 5-10 minutes of the boil, but I had an issue with compacting the hops on my Hop Stopper when I tried recirculating at full throttle with my pump so I've switched to this method. Once I start to chill my wort I basically dump the Star San in the lines into a little bucket until I see the beer begin come out of the end of the hose. Then I will switch the hose over to my carboy and begin filling it up. This method has worked well for me as the Star Stan left in the lines also helps to create a nice siphon to start and pull the beer out of the kettle and down towards the pump.



Thanks to my warm as hell ground water I can only get my wort down to just over 80 degrees in my CFC. I can't wait for fall and winter to roll around so I can get my wort down to pitching temps in a single pass through my chiller. After I fill my carboy I toss it in my fermentation chamber with a sealed carboy cap on top of it to let it cool down to my fermentation temp, 70 degrees for this beer, before pitching my yeast. As long as you be sanitary with all your equipment I don't worry about any infections as it normally takes just about an hour or two to go from just over 80 degrees down to pitching temp at 70.



Here is a cool shot of the awesome cold break you get in your carboy thanks to the rapid chilling of the CFC. Seeing stuff like this just makes me smile! I know some brewers who get really worried about all the cold break getting into their carboy, but I am of the camp that cold break is an important component of yeast nutrition and food so in my book its the more the merrier! I rack off all of it in the end anyway and leave it behind so no worries for me.



Here is my aeration device, its main purpose is to degas wine but once you attach it to a drill and see the results of the aeration it seems very effective. I think my next upgrade will be to move up to an oxygen tank and diffusion stone, but for now this is a cheap and simple solution for aeration that is way more effective than shaking the carboy like I used to.





And here is a quick shot of the carboy after a minute of whipping the wort up into a frenzy with my aeration tool and drill.



After the kettle is emptied completely into the carboy I snapped a quick shot of the trub and hot break that is left behind thanks to the Hop Stopper. I know some people have had a little trouble getting their kettles to work with this device properly, but I think once you figure out the proper procedure for using it it's an excellent device.



The beer came out to an original gravity of 1.053, just shy of my predicted 1.054. I gave it a quick taste before tossing it into my fermentation chamber to cool down to pitching temp and I think it will be a great first attempt at this style. I will post some follow up picks of the beer once its kegged and ready to be served so you all can see the full results from start to finish.

I hope this brew day walk through was a help to everyone who wanted to see one on the system, I tried to capture all the important parts with pictures but if I missed anything please let me know. I'd be more than happy to answer any questions about my system and or process when I use it so please ask away.

Thanks everyone and happy brewing!

Matt

So much awesome!! :rockin: Set-up looks to be running smoothly.

Sucks about the hot tap water though. I'm lucky that here we get our water from Lake Tahoe and since it's so effing deep it never gets above 50*F. 5 gallons from boiling to 70*F in 12 minutes. Only an extra 5-7 minutes to get it down to ~50*F for lagers

awesome documentation.

when I win the lottery I shall have a Kal Electric brewery as well.

-=Jason=-

Reno_eNVy_446 said:

So much awesome!! :rockin: Set-up looks to be running smoothly.

Sucks about the hot tap water though. I'm lucky that here we get our water from Lake Tahoe and since it's so effing deep it never gets above 50*F. 5 gallons from boiling to 70*F in 12 minutes. Only an extra 5-7 minutes to get it down to ~50*F for lagers

Click to expand...

Can I please ship your Tahoe water to Cincinnati please?

In all honesty it isn't that big of a deal for most of my summer brewing; I just toss my carboy into my fermentation fridge and let it cool down for a couple of hours before I am ready to pitch. I just tend to save my lager brewing for the winter time when its much easier to get my beer down to pitching temp quicker.

Matt

Flomaster said:

awesome documentation.

when I win the lottery I shall have a Kal Electric brewery as well.

-=Jason=-

Click to expand...

Thanks Jason!

You don't have to win the lottery to complete a build like Kal's or mine. Just tackle it in pieces like I did....and eat plenty of ramen noodles along the way!

Matt

Natty, I think I just killed about 2 hours at work reading through this thread.

Blown away by all the useful information. I'm considering a similar but scaled down brew room.

Are you happy with your ventilation? I'm thinking of doing a similar setup. I was considering going the aluminum sheet route, but your setup of wood and panneling seems like it would be much easier to work with

I just stumbled upon this thread, awesome build by the way.
Any idea on the total build cost?

crypt0 said:

Natty, I think I just killed about 2 hours at work reading through this thread.

Blown away by all the useful information. I'm considering a similar but scaled down brew room.

Are you happy with your ventilation? I'm thinking of doing a similar setup. I was considering going the aluminum sheet route, but your setup of wood and panneling seems like it would be much easier to work with

Click to expand...

Overall I am very happy with my ventilation setup. I've brewed on my system every other week since its been completed and the only thing I have noticed is that if I am trying to boil harder than normal (above 85% on manual mode) I do tend to lose just a little bit of steam around the bottom of the hood. Nothing major at all, I'd say in that case I exhaust 95% of the steam, but if I had a chance to do it again I might up my hood depth just a bit. Maybe use a couple of 2x8's instead if 2x6's to give it just a little more depth to collect and hold the steam a bit better under those vigorous boil situations. My basement ceiling height isn't a full 8 feet so that's why I ended up going with a little more shallow hood.

Matt

mredge73 said:

I just stumbled upon this thread, awesome build by the way.
Any idea on the total build cost?

Click to expand...

Obviously a question that I get a lot from people here on the boards. I started to lose track towards the end of the build when I started buying the last pieces to get the final product together, but I would put my cost at about $4500 bucks or so. I was able to save some costs by building my own vent hood as well as saving on some wiring costs thanks to having extra from other projects, but all in all Kal's estimates on his site on right on the money.

I was more than happy to spend the money on this kind of setup that will last me conceivably for the rest of my brewing career, and provide me the consistency in my brew process that will allow me to make award winning beers. I love my electric system, and simply wouldn't change a thing.

Matt

How do you like the Auber timer?

Mike3701 said:

How do you like the Auber timer?

Click to expand...

The Auber timer has worked out great for me, no problems at all. The only difference is how you need to wire the thing to maintain the same functionality as the Omega timer that Kal chose to use in his build. There is actually a thread floating around here on HBT which includes a really nice modified wiring mockup that I used.

I am on the mobile app right now, so maybe someone can jump in the thread in the mean time and get a link to the writeup I am talking about in here. If you have any other questions just ask.

Matt

I believe this is the link you are referring to:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f170/asl-51-timer-wiring-207860/

Thanks, can you have 2 separate timers going on it? I see you using the lower line for a 60min countdown, but can you use the upper timer for hop additions?

No just one count down

Can you use the upper line for anything useful?

The upper line count down for me, bottom just hangs out

^ What he said.

The bottom line of the timer is the "Set Value" while the top line is the actual timer which counts down or up depending on how you set it up. I just set the timer for my boil length and add the hop additions at the proper time left in the boil.

Matt

Hey Matt,

Do you have any issues with condensate collecting inside the hood and then dripping back down into your kettles or on the brew stand?

I do have a little bit of condensation which forms on the inside part of the hood on my longer boils but it isn't anything that is a constant drip back into the kettle. I usually just take a towel and wipe down the hood if I notice a buildup.

If I had to change one thing I may add a lip on the bottom part of the hood, maybe out of something like 1x4 lumber which would just catch the few drops which do form from time to time and drip down. Honestly if I added the lip it would be more because of my OCD and less because I really need it. If you are planning on designing/building a similar hood, maybe just add the lip while you are building it if you are worried about the condesation.

Great, thank you. Sorry if you posted this earlier, but do you know what the cost of your hood was, not including the fan and duct?

Edit: nevermind, I see you wrote about $250, including the motor.

Without the fan and duct, the hood was super cheap. All it is made out of is five 2x6's, a sheet of 1/2 inch plywood, and a sheet of FRP panel. Add in the odds and ends like the stain and poly, panel glue, and trim pieces it most likely wasn't more than $100-150 at the very most.

Natty, when in the boil, do you leave the element on 100% during the whole boil?

I can answer that one. I have the same controller and a similar system. On a 5 gallon batch I usually only need to have the element set to 55% for a good strong boil. I've never done a 10 gallon batch so I don't know what you would need for that but I'm sure it wouldn't be 100%
The only time you set it to 100% is when you're getting the boil started.

xsists said:

Natty, when in the boil, do you leave the element on 100% during the whole boil?

Click to expand...

No I do not. Keeping the power at 85% works great for a nice rolling boil. You could use 100% if you wanted a more aggressive boil, but that would most likely have a higher than needed boil off rate. For my five gallon batches I aim for 8 gallons in the Boil Kettle, and at 85% power boil off 1.5 gallons in an hour. Whatever percentage power you choose just stay consistent, that way you have the exact same boil off rate every time.

Matt

What is on the outside where your grounding post was moved? next to the blue power on light.

I start this project next week. However initially I planned on doing in my laundry room thats like6 x 5 and decided it would be a very cramped setup. Now looking at doing this in the guest room. The one thing I decided was that if I was going to build a controller since I don't have this stuff laying around might as well build the cadillac since a knock off might cost me a little less but I know in the end i would rebuild it.

Gorgeous!

Did you gather the parts yourself, or get them from Kal?

If the former, how much did the puppy end up running you??

I have been wanting to make one of those "grail" control boxes for when I do my build, but am afraid to start collecting parts knowing it may cost a fortune!

movet22, honestly I started collecting them thinking I would save a ton of cash. Right now I am at about 875 without the bolts.......but I still have to get the parts from step 2......I have a feelin by the time I get everything I might have saved myself $100 - $200.

One thing I would change is I bought the box from the same store I bought the switches etc from...but some I bought on ebay, some from the store and I would have combined all of them if I had known it and saved on shipping. Plus for part 2 I think I have some of the wiring etc already laying around so I should save money.

movet22 said:

Gorgeous!

Did you gather the parts yourself, or get them from Kal?

If the former, how much did the puppy end up running you??

I have been wanting to make one of those "grail" control boxes for when I do my build, but am afraid to start collecting parts knowing it may cost a fortune!

Click to expand...

If I re-did it I would just order them from the site.........I think I came out slightly lower because I already owned some of the stuff.....and I probably could have done a little bit better if I bargain hunted some more....the biggest issue will be tracking this as my 1000's of ebay and amazon packages come in.

Congrats on the gorgeous build. I'm glad someone had some great documentation of actually building a Kal-inspired rig here. I'm looking to do the same thing.

A couple of questions, and maybe you answered them and I missed it in the 28 pages I just finished reading.

You were debating between two different kinds of pots (Boilermakers and something else), did you ever think about going the eKeggle route? If so, why did you drop the idea so quickly (it didn't even make it into the writeup)? Was the water level over the element(s) the only draw to the Boilermakers, or just the biggest?

Thanks, and again props to a sexy eHERMS build.

n00tz said:

Congrats on the gorgeous build. I'm glad someone had some great documentation of actually building a Kal-inspired rig here. I'm looking to do the same thing.

A couple of questions, and maybe you answered them and I missed it in the 28 pages I just finished reading.

You were debating between two different kinds of pots (Boilermakers and something else), did you ever think about going the eKeggle route? If so, why did you drop the idea so quickly (it didn't even make it into the writeup)? Was the water level over the element(s) the only draw to the Boilermakers, or just the biggest?

Thanks, and again props to a sexy eHERMS build.

Click to expand...

I went the e-keggle route with my kal-inspired system. It certainly can be done with out any limitations. I personally wanted all welded connections so I went with keggles mostly for that reason.

movet22 said:

Gorgeous!

Did you gather the parts yourself, or get them from Kal?

If the former, how much did the puppy end up running you??

I have been wanting to make one of those "grail" control boxes for when I do my build, but am afraid to start collecting parts knowing it may cost a fortune!

Click to expand...

I actually gathered all the parts myself before Kal got his company underway and started offering his complete kits. Honestly I would have pulled the trigger in a second on his DIY kit because it would have saved me a ton of time bouncing from site to site and double checking to ensure that I absolutely had the right parts for my build.

In total, I think my whole system cost me between $4000 and $4500 because I had some pieces before I started and cut out some thing that Kal has in his brewery including the stainless sink, built my own vent hood versus ordering a custom stainless unit, etc.

In my opinion, I am completely glad I made the large jump from an outdoor system to this system because it just plain works. Everything in this system is super repeatable, and the ability to take nearly all the variables out of the equation when you are trying to tweak your beers is beyond invaluable. It has allowed me to brew a recipe multiple times in a row, tweaking one item at a time, until I get it right.

-Matt