OK Im completely bat-crap confused. Help with an E-Herms setup

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wedge421

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Ive been on the verge of going with an all electric setup for a few months now. Ive been reading and reading and reading and reading. Ive read Kals PDF through 3 times now but I still have some questions about how I should approach my particular setup. Here is what I have in my arsenal currently:

3 - 10gal Blichmann's
1 - Top Tier Setup
1 - 220v 30amp line run to my garage

I would absolutely love to build Kals setup but that control panel just looks a bit mind blowing for me to even attempt to tackle. Im thinking of getting the largest Brewmation control panel since it comes with all the probes and heating elements:

http://www.brewmation.com/Panels.html - Its the $1499 one.

My questions is this. If I go to an E-Herms setup how does mashing work. Ok so I get the HLT up to the desired temp and fill the MLT. I have a temp probe in the MLT and the HLT now. I turn on the pump and let it circulate through the HERMS coil and back in to the MLT. My question is which probe controls the heat element in the HLT, the one in the MLT or the one in the HLT? If I want a mash temp of say 157, if the MLT probe sense it dropping to 155 will it trigger the heating element in the HLT or do I need to manually turn on the HLT and raise the temp? Has anyone had any experience with the Brewmation panel and if it will work that way?

Thanks so much for helping this very confused individual! Oh and for the record I blame Kal for this!!! J/K
 
I have a herms system. I just use a dial thermometer to track the mlt. All the temp control is done in the hlt. I set it to strike temps, mash in, refill with sparge water, set hlt to mash temps and recirculate. To mash out, I set the hlt to 168 and circulate until the mash gets there. Then sparge.
 
My question is which probe controls the heat element in the HLT, the one in the MLT or the one in the HLT? If I want a mash temp of say 157, if the MLT probe sense it dropping to 155 will it trigger the heating element in the HLT or do I need to manually turn on the HLT and raise the temp? Has anyone had any experience with the Brewmation panel and if it will work that way?

Thanks so much for helping this very confused individual! Oh and for the record I blame Kal for this!!! J/K

You want the probe in the hlt to control the element in the hlt. Then the probe in the mt should control a pump. When the mash temp drops below your preset, it will turn the pump on and circulate your wort through the herms coil in the hlt and maintain the temp.

That's how my setup works, i'm sure the brewmation will do the same thing.
 
Do you ever have to worry about the pump priming?

You will have to prime the pump before the pump is triggered by the system, or you will have problems. I recirculate my hlt water so the temps stay even throughout the vessel.

_
 
wildwest450 said:
You want the probe in the hlt to control the element in the hlt. Then the probe in the mt should control a pump. When the mash temp drops below your preset, it will turn the pump on and circulate your wort through the herms coil in the hlt and maintain the temp.

That's how my setup works, i'm sure the brewmation will do the same thing.

Why control the pump at all? If the hlt is set to mash temp you can circulate continuously. Then just bump the temp for mashout. Continuous circulation gives me nice clear wort.
 
Why control the pump at all? If the hlt is set to mash temp you can circulate continuously. Then just bump the temp for mashout. Continuous circulation gives me nice clear wort.

That's how my setup works. If you keep the hlt set 2-3 degrees warmer than the mt, it circulates for a good 40 minutes of the mash, which is more than enough. Setting it at the exact same temp never seems to work well for me.

_
 
My probe is mounted on the output of the coil to monitor wort as it comes back to the MLT. I don't care what temp the HLT is, as long as my mash is right.

So, the PID monitors the returning wort, and heats the HLT if necessary to get that wort where I want it.

My pump constantly runs.
 
there is a high inrush current when starting an electric motor, so you might very well be using more power than me.... depending on how often your pump kicks on. :p
 
My probe is mounted on the output of the coil to monitor wort as it comes back to the MLT. I don't care what temp the HLT is, as long as my mash is right.

So, the PID monitors the returning wort, and heats the HLT if necessary to get that wort where I want it.

My pump constantly runs.

do you have any problems with overshooting? if the MLT was too low, does the heat of the HLT get too hot, leading your MLT output to being too hot? how do you account for this?
 
do you have any problems with overshooting? if the MLT was too low, does the heat of the HLT get too hot, leading your MLT output to being too hot? how do you account for this?

I've not had any overshoot problems at all. It works perfectly.
 
any info on your temp sensor setup on the output of the coil? pics?

It's fairly common to put the sensor on the coil output (I took a poll about this before building my system and those that responded preferred that location over one directly in the HLT or MLT).

I just used a few pieces of copper soldered to the end of the coil to make a chamber where I could screw in the probe.

These are the parts, sort of laid out like they need to be soldered together. The reducer is option, depending on whether your coil is smaller than 1/2" or not.

copper_fitting_probe_chamber.jpg


Here's an actual pic of mine (which uses slightly different parts than shown in the pic above because the probe I use is enormous), so I came from 1/2" out to 3/4" for chamber.

copper_monster_connections.jpg


Anyway.... use whatever parts make sense for your probe and coil. This is the general idea though.
 
another pic for the one a guy I know needs to build.

3/8" OD coil expanding to 1/2" tee with a 1/4" threaded part for his probe.

wort comes out of coil, into chamber (touching probe) and then wort exits out the bottom of the T to your hose and back to the MLT.

Penissi_coil2.jpg
 
Walker said:
My probe is mounted on the output of the coil to monitor wort as it comes back to the MLT. I don't care what temp the HLT is, as long as my mash is right.

So, the PID monitors the returning wort, and heats the HLT if necessary to get that wort where I want it.

My pump constantly runs.

I'm not saying there is a right or wrong way...but I monitor mash temp when the wort exits the mlt. I have a 60 foot 3/8 hex coil which is efficient enough to raise the wort to mashout in one pass. So I know what the temp is coming out of the coil...exactly what my hlt is set.

One thing I have observed is that it takes a while for the output of the mlt to match the output of the hex coil. It heats from the top down. If I didn't monitor as I do, I would have to guess when the whole mash was at temp.

It takes about 15 minutes to raise a 10 gallon batch to mashout on my system.
 
Agreed. There is no right or wrong way and the MLT heats from top to bottom.

On my first 4 or 5 batches, I used three thermometers to see what my temps looked like.

1) Pid probe at output of coil
2) Digital probe thermometer in a thermowell that stuck into the middle of my grain bed
3) floating glass thermometer pushed all the way down into the grainbed to measure the temp at the bottom of the MLT

These were all within 1*F of each other.

Do whatever works.

I do like the probe on the coil for chilling, too. I chill by pumping wort through the coil (backwards) and have the coil in an ice water bath. I go through the coil and then right back into the kettle.

When chilling, the probe is then monitoring the wort temp as it comes out of the kettle, so I just circulate until the probe tells me I'm at pitching temp.

I tried to be as minimal as possible, so that one probe is all I need for the whole process.
 
Walker said:
Agreed. There is no right or wrong way and the MLT heats from top to bottom.

On my first 4 or 5 batches, I used three thermometers to see what my temps looked like.

1) Pid probe at output of coil
2) Digital probe thermometer in a thermowell that stuck into the middle of my grain bed
3) floating glass thermometer pushed all the way down into the grainbed to measure the temp at the bottom of the MLT

These were all within 1*F of each other.

Do whatever works.

I do like the probe on the coil for chilling, too. I chill by pumping wort through the coil (backwards) and have the coil in an ice water bath. I go through the coil and then right back into the kettle.

When chilling, the probe is then monitoring the wort temp as it comes out of the kettle, so I just circulate until the probe tells me I'm at pitching temp.

I tried to be as minimal as possible, so that one probe is all I need for the whole process.

I like minimal. Less things to go wrong but just enough to get the job done.

I never considered chilling. My system is not set up that way. I am sure you are doing what works best for your system.
 
I like minimal. Less things to go wrong but just enough to get the job done.

I never considered chilling. My system is not set up that way. I am sure you are doing what works best for your system.

My first HERMS system used the HEX in the HLT for chilling, remember? But I didn't like it because it took 42 pounds of ice to chill 5 gallons. I'm sure there is an efficient way to do it, but since our tap water is so cold I like the CFC 100 times better for me. Today I chilled 5 gallons in one full-speed pass and didn't recirculate.

By the way, the new and improved HERMS worked flawlessly today. No grainbed compaction, no hot water/wort shooting out of weird places, no missed temps, etc. I'm keeping the CFC for sure for my chilling.
 
Yooper said:
My first HERMS system used the HEX in the HLT for chilling, remember? But I didn't like it because it took 42 pounds of ice to chill 5 gallons. I'm sure there is an efficient way to do it, but since our tap water is so cold I like the CFC 100 times better for me. Today I chilled 5 gallons in one full-speed pass and didn't recirculate.

By the way, the new and improved HERMS worked flawlessly today. No grainbed compaction, no hot water/wort shooting out of weird places, no missed temps, etc. I'm keeping the CFC for sure for my chilling.

We are lucky to have such cold tap water.

Glad to hear the system is working. I don't ever want to think about your compaction issue again!
 
By the way, the new and improved HERMS worked flawlessly today. No grainbed compaction, no hot water/wort shooting out of weird places, no missed temps, etc. I'm keeping the CFC for sure for my chilling.

and how are YOU monitoring temps, yoop? MLT outlet, coil outlet or grainbed? :tank:
 
My first HERMS system used the HEX in the HLT for chilling, remember? But I didn't like it because it took 42 pounds of ice to chill 5 gallons. I'm sure there is an efficient way to do it, but since our tap water is so cold I like the CFC 100 times better for me. Today I chilled 5 gallons in one full-speed pass and didn't recirculate.

Wow. 42lbs of ice for chilling is crazy.
 
Wow. 42lbs of ice for chilling is crazy.

I know! The reason I wanted the system to begin with was to save my back! I wanted a pump, and no lifting/pouring. Of course, I wanted all-electric too for indoor brewing.

The person I bought the rig from was a proponent of no-chill, if you remember! Probably because it took 42 pounds of ice in the HLT to properly chill the wort. He told me he did it before he went no-chill.

Buying/carrying/storing/lifting 42 pounds of ice wasn't an option so I added the CFC- I bought it from the "classifieds" here pretty inexpensively, about $50 or so I believe. It works great- but our tap water is about 45 degrees.
 
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