Third vessel in Rig

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benbradford

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Do HLT's work like this?

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I want to run this idea by you all and see what kind of feedback I can get...

I currently have a 2 keggle system rig with one pump and the boil kettle is electric with 2 120v elements. There is a false bottom in mash tun, and herms coil in boil kettl

I have a hoff steves keg that I am pondering how to add to my system.

What I am thinking is that I could add 2 120v elements to the third vessel that are similar to my boil kettl, and add a pump to my sytem so that I could:

1: Fly Sparge(minor gain, but a gain nonetheless)

2: Use third vessel to circulate wort through mash so that I could increase effective mash tun size by 100% because mash tun could hold 40lbs of grain and some wort, and the remainder could be in third vessel. When finished, third vessel would become second boil kettle and circulate with first keg to create a circulating double boil kettle.

3: lay hoff stevens keg on side in cradle and ferment larger batches in keg with airlock on side coming out of the bunghole.
 
I've been thinking about a future plan for a system and noticed some people use two vessels, but was wondering how you sparge? I can see in the three vessel system you can use the HLT to heat up the sparge water and drain into the BK, but where do you drain the wort to if your sparge water is in the BK? From what I've seen most people use the third vessel to heat sparge water/act as HERMS, but if I can cut down a third I'd definitely be all for it!
 
The third has only been to recieve the wort during the sparge, and also perhaps with the three vessel system, there are benefits for cleanup also. Another help would be that you could have your different additions dialed in and ready to go with a second addition at 190 something and a final at 168, without having to add water to cool it back down.

What I am trying to suggest, is that if the wort is moving through the mash tun back to the third vessel, the effective size of the mash tun would becom 31 gallons. After the mash, the same vessel would then recirculate with the boil kettle, and have it's own heat source, and would then act as a boil kettle also, effectively changing the boil kettle into a 31 gallon vessel also.
 
Ok, I might have an idea what you're shooting for now, but a couple of questions.

For the third vessel during mashing, are you thinking about having a separate mash going in two vessels and recirculate the wort through both mashes and through the herms, or are you just using the second mash tun to hold liquid that would recirculate through the first mash tun and the herms?

Then it sounds like when you are boiling, you'd clean out the new vessel and have both sets of heating elements running? I'm not sure if you'd actually need to recirculate through during the boil, unless you wanted to do it a few times before the boil started to make sure your wort was well mixed before boiling. Otherwise I'd make sure your pump can handle moving that much boiling liquid.
 
only the mash tun would hold grain...but the third tank would be part of the mash and have a constant circulation at a high flow that would allow the mash to be thouroughly mixed...the only real concern about it is whether the grain bed would become compacted, but with rice hulls, it is very similar to what I am already doing with my herms setup where the mash is circulating through the coil of the boil kettle and back at at somewhere about 100 gallons per houror so...

there would not be any cleaning of the third vessel, it could recieve the wort immediately, and begin the boil.

I would circulate between the two to make sure the hop utilization was even between the entire quantity of beer :)

If you don't have a setup built yet, I feel that the two vessel and single pump is the best first step and is entirely sufficient, and I don't beleive that I would even consider a third unless it significantly increased my production possiblities, and I also plan on doubling the third vessel as a fermenter with a set of two cornelius lids built into it, so that during use, it will be vertical and have an opening on the top, and then during fermentation, it would lay on it's side and have a lid with an airlock installed for fermenting.
 
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