Mini brau controller capability

Does anybody know if a temperature controller for a heating kettle like this

http://brausupply.com/products/brau-mini-controller-with-timer-and-alarm

can be split with a common adapter to take two heating elements. Would this work or would it cut the wattage in two.

I only have a 120v capability because of my apartment and need two heating elements for my rims system

Hey there,
This controller is either for a 1500W element or a 2000W element. It can't be split as the wiring and your household circuit isn't designed for the load. At best you would trip a breaker, at worst you could start a fire. What I do with my 2 element 5G setup is plug the second element into a separate GFCI circuit and use it as a booster to bring up to strike temperature quicker. Set the alarm to let me know I'm at mash in temp and then unplug the manual element and use the controller to maintain. Again, when I want to boil do the same and then moderate the output of the element plugged into the controller to maintain a rolling boil.

brausupply said:

Hey there,
This controller is either for a 1500W element or a 2000W element. It can't be split as the wiring and your household circuit isn't designed for the load. At best you would trip a breaker, at worst you could start a fire. What I do with my 2 element 5G setup is plug the second element into a separate GFCI circuit and use it as a booster to bring up to strike temperature quicker. Set the alarm to let me know I'm at mash in temp and then unplug the manual element and use the controller to maintain. Again, when I want to boil do the same and then moderate the output of the element plugged into the controller to maintain a rolling boil.

Click to expand...

That's great thank you. Exactly the info I was looking for. One more question. Is one 1500w element enough to hold the temperature for the mash? A) for 5 gallons and b) for 10 gallons? Or as accurately as you can estimate?

I'm able to bring a 5 gallon batch to a boil with one 1500W element. It is slow to get it there, however and I keep a lid on to help it gain temperature faster until it gets around 200F. So the answer is yes to answer your question about maintaining mash temperature for 5 Gallons.
For 10G I would say the answer is no.

Brewslikeaking - I'm offering some unsolicited advice about the automation thing. Even a thin mash is going to show extreme gradients when heated from one spot (like the bottom). Ideally you would have an automated paddle to stir the mash to maintain a fairly even temperature. Where you place your probe is going to report/control THAT location and as an (overheated) bubble of fluid makes its way up and hits the probe the "mash temperature" may fluctuate wildly, but this is really showing the variations in the mash; for certain the mash is not at one temperature. Placing the probe near the bottom will be best to protect from scorching the mash when you are just trying to keep it at about 154F or so. If the bottom temperature exceeds about 165F from the stratification in the thick mash, those enzymes are toast - permanently denatured - (as in "mash out" ) and won't do anymore conversion.

I love the idea of "set it and forget it" control, but be cautious with this method and do some tests with a probe to see how much temperature gradient/differentials you are getting. My sense is that you will have widely varying temperatures in the mash, from too hot at the bottom to something close to the SetPoint at the probe; but even at the probe the temperature is likely quite variable due to bubbles of overheated fluid making their way slowly to the top through the mash.

If you are committed to an automated system my method won't be of any use to you, but I place the mash (for a 5 gal batch - 11qts water and about 8.5 pounds malts) in a box of expanded polystyrene foam insulation board (2" thick bottom, 1" thick sides and top) that just fits the kettle. This will hold my mash temperatures to within 2 deg for up to a 1.5 hr mash and the temperature is very uniform. This is not useful - because of the weight - for people making more than 5 gal batches. But think about an automated stirring paddle and sensor placement if you go with a bottom-heated automated setup for mash control.

Cheers!

I totally agree with you. I recirculate during the entire mash process for this reason. I conducted an experiment and drilled my test kettle for an additional probe near the element and found that with the pump running the probe temps were within 1/2deg of each other. Without a pump running they were wildly different readings.

Is there any downside to pumping when used with smaller volumes like 5gal? Is there any detrimental effect on the wort from the turbulence of the pump? That is a sweet solution and very tight temperature control. I suppose you could do gentle inline heating if you are pumping and skip the bottom element issue completely.

I personally can't find any downsides to pumping. With the element underneath, or in a rims tube not much difference there at all. Wort is being passed by an element in both situations using a pump. An upside though is very clear wort

I've built it and I am putting my temp probe at the point where the wort is being recirculated as seen in this picture. If you can see its up the top at the lid. I'm worried about scorching but if the description on my heating element isn't lying it's ultra low watt density so aparantly that doesn't scorch. I've yet to brew with this since I just finished building it but if you guys like I'll post my results. I am however worried about the dead space "below the grain basket" and how that will effect my recipes. Some input from the guys at brau supply or anyone else would be much appreciated

View attachment 1431999996492.jpg

That looks very nice. So you control the pump flow by restricting the flow I assume.

About the dead space... It wouldn't work with the bottom heat, but if you combined an inline wort heater with something like the design of my lauter tun you would totally have it. I got tired of dead space and built a bottom-draining lauter tun for sparging; it's design would avoid the problem of dead space. I think that it is for use with bottom heat sources that the drains are often on the side and they can only be so close to the bottom with that design. Have a look at my lauter tun:
http://people.umass.edu/~dac/projects/lauter-tun/LauterTun.html
The website has more pictures, I just attached one here.
I probably offend some people who mash in coolers, but I was concerned about the safety and other factors of the plastics used. This design just works beautifully. If I had tools or doing it commercially, I would weld the spacers to the bottom of the screen; as you see, I just array them and drop the screen on top. It is full flow top to bottom and uniform across the whole bed. But it wouldn't work with bottom heat...

I'm not quite sure what the worry of "dead space" is? You mean that space underneath the grain basket? My interpretations are this:
You are recirculating the mash so there really isn't any dead space. It's all moving at a decent rate maximizing enzyme interaction with your grain by bringing what's underneath your basket and recirculating it back to the top. This is happening for your entire mashing process which helps you with increased efficiency.
It looks to me like you've built yourself an awesome system
Crush it fine and let us know how you do!

Brewslikeaking said:

I've built it and I am putting my temp probe at the point where the wort is being recirculated as seen in this picture. If you can see its up the top at the lid. I'm worried about scorching but if the description on my heating element isn't lying it's ultra low watt density so aparantly that doesn't scorch. I've yet to brew with this since I just finished building it but if you guys like I'll post my results. I am however worried about the dead space "below the grain basket" and how that will effect my recipes. Some input from the guys at brau supply or anyone else would be much appreciated

Click to expand...

Came across this thread searching for info about this controller.
I wouldn't put the pump on top of the controller like that-a leaky fitting or pump and the controller could be toast!
Damn, picture didn't attach to the quote!

singybrue said:

Came across this thread searching for info about this controller.
I wouldn't put the pump on top of the controller like that-a leaky fitting or pump and the controller could be toast!
Damn, picture didn't attach to the quote!

Click to expand...

I won't, just set it up like that for the picture. Haven't brewed with it yet

Brewslikeaking said:

I won't, just set it up like that for the picture. Haven't brewed with it yet

Click to expand...

And all this time I was thinking I was the only one who wasn't brewing while sitting on my livingroom sofa!