eHERMS temp probe placement???

Hey everyone,

As some of you may know, I'm in the process of building a 3keggle single tier eHERMS, however i've got some questions on the temp probe placement.

I'm planning on having two PIDs, now should the probes be at the:
-Valve outlets
-fixed to keggle wall
-at the inlet of each pump
-other?

Thanks!!!

For the recirculation temp control of the mash, there are pretty much two camps on probe placement. Some folks place the probe in the water bath that the HERMS coil is sitting in (typically this is the HLT). Other folks put the probe at the return to the MLT (measuring wort temp as it exits the heat exchanger and goes back into the MLT).

So, that's one probe accounted for and a choice you have to make.
Check out this thread, where I attempted to get the same info a while back:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f36/where-your-herms-temp-probe-174518/


What is the other probe for?

Great thread!

I'll probably have three probes:
1- HLT: monitor and control strike temp & HERMS
2- MLT: monitor mash
3- BK: monitor wort cooling (maybe try to control element output to maintain a rolling boil while preventing boil over...)

The only question is where to mount them, I don't want wires dangling from every bit of the rig, yet I want to make it as functional as possible.

I was about to go with a BCS...but would rather not have to employ a laptop for every session. I might just go with 3 PIDs.

Thoughts?

Gabrew said:

Great thread!

I'll probably have three probes:
1- HLT: monitor and control strike temp & HERMS
2- MLT: monitor mash
3- BK: monitor wort cooling (maybe try to control element output to maintain a rolling boil while preventing boil over...)

The only question is where to mount them, I don't want wires dangling from every bit of the rig, yet I want to make it as functional as possible.

I was about to go with a BCS...but would rather not have to employ a laptop for every session. I might just go with 3 PIDs.

Thoughts?

Click to expand...

Three PIDs is kind of overkill. You don't need a full-blown PID to monitor the temp of your MLT. You just need a thermometer.

You can get digital thermometers that can be mounted in a panel and use a temp probe. I mean.. a PID will definitely show you the temp of a probe in the MLT, but if that PID isn't trying to control some other device based on that temp, then the PID is just acting as a thermometer.

Purely up to you. I can understand wating to keep things with a uniform look and feel if that's your thing.

As for a temp probe in the BK. If you want to monitor the temp for chilling, then you will want to install one in the BK someplace. A PID that is controlling a BK doesn't actually use the input from the temp probe because the temp of a boil is constant no matter how hard it is boiling. A PID with manual mode (the popular one from Auber than lots of guys use) is what you would want for boil control. Manual control of the BK while also displaying the temp of the BK to you.

Thanks for the advice!

Yeah I guess it would be an overkill...would you mind telling me the difference between the auber PID controllers vs the LOVE controllers?

I know nothing about the Love controllers.