Mash Tun Manifold Suggestions

Hi to all that are viewing this post. I decided to make a manifold for my mash tun because I wanted something more sturdy than my stainless steel braid that is from a faucet connector. When I did a trial run with the new manifold I was disappointed with the amount of water left on the bottom of the tun. The amount of water was a little over 1qt, when I tested the braid is was under .5qt, any suggestions on what I did wrong with the design of the manifold?
Edit: I just did another test with the manifold, and this time I tilted the mash tun back and forth and got another .5qt, so the end result is manifold left 1qt, braid left .5qt.

I have two comments.
If you use plenty of sparge water, the left over wort will not be a problem. Whatever's left should be pretty weak anyway, if you sparge a good pre-boil volume.
The size of your manifold is a concern since it's touching the sides of the tun. For best efficiency, you may want to cut down the straight pieces so that the rectangle is about 1-2 inches from the side of the tun, all he way around. Otherwise, you might get channeling around the perimeter of the tun, where the fluid tries to go around the mash, and not rinse it properly.
Other than that, it looks good.

horseinmay said:

I have two comments.
If you use plenty of sparge water, the left over wort will not be a problem. Whatever's left should be pretty weak anyway, if you sparge a good pre-boil volume.
The size of your manifold is a concern since it's touching the sides of the tun. For best efficiency, you may want to cut down the straight pieces so that the rectangle is about 1-2 inches from the side of the tun, all he way around. Otherwise, you might get channeling around the perimeter of the tun, where the fluid tries to go around the mash, and not rinse it properly.
Other than that, it looks good.

Click to expand...

+1


check out http://www.howtobrew.com/appendices/appendixD.html

horseinmay said:

I have two comments.
If you use plenty of sparge water, the left over wort will not be a problem. Whatever's left should be pretty weak anyway, if you sparge a good pre-boil volume.
The size of your manifold is a concern since it's touching the sides of the tun. For best efficiency, you may want to cut down the straight pieces so that the rectangle is about 1-2 inches from the side of the tun, all he way around. Otherwise, you might get channeling around the perimeter of the tun, where the fluid tries to go around the mash, and not rinse it properly.
Other than that, it looks good.

Click to expand...

Horse, thank's for the advice, will make more clarence to the sides of the mash tun.

cpatel479 said:

+1


check out http://www.howtobrew.com/appendices/appendixD.html

Click to expand...

Cpatel, thank's for the link.

Does the size of the copper for the manifold really make a difference?

Horse, what do you think about this adjustment? I shortened the width, do you think I should shorten the length?

if you batch sparge the size of the manifold does not matter. Only fly sparging do you need to be worried about channeling

ekjohns said:

if you batch sparge the size of the manifold does not matter. Only fly sparging do you need to be worried about channeling

Click to expand...

Ek, thank's for that information, I batch sparge, so I wish I had this information before I modified my equipment.

Don't sweat the modification the amount that you did will be insignificant. The about of liquid you have remaining is likely do to how high the slits were cut but 1qt is nothing compared to the 6-7 gallons (26 or qts) you already collected. Do you leave 1 qt of water when testing or with grain?

Did you have any amount of "head" at the output end? What I mean by this, if you have a valve that allows the liquid to drain, did it have a hose aimed down to a lower level? This would help with the slight hump that your design has.

The hump in my mash tun is about 3-4" and I can drain down to 1 cup.

MC

What Misplaced Canuck is trying to say ..... Is that the Manifold is only half the equation of draining. It looks like you have decent design for a first try. But you need to make sure you are creating a syphon on the outlet of your tun. Don't just drain out the valve to your Kettle. Put a piece of hose that is a lower than the bottom of your tun. You need the syphon of the wort draining to suck out more liquid from your tun. Without it, it will only drain to the level of your valve.

ekjohns said:

Don't sweat the modification the amount that you did will be insignificant. The about of liquid you have remaining is likely do to how high the slits were cut but 1qt is nothing compared to the 6-7 gallons (26 or qts) you already collected. Do you leave 1 qt of water when testing or with grain?

Click to expand...

EK, you mention the height of the slits, what height should they be? As far as the water, the one qt is when I test it with water alone no grain.

Misplaced_Canuck said:

Did you have any amount of "head" at the output end? What I mean by this, if you have a valve that allows the liquid to drain, did it have a hose aimed down to a lower level? This would help with the slight hump that your design has.

The hump in my mash tun is about 3-4" and I can drain down to 1 cup.

MC

Click to expand...

Misplaced, the hose is aimed down from the valve to he manifold.

Reaver said:

What Misplaced Canuck is trying to say ..... Is that the Manifold is only half the equation of draining. It looks like you have decent design for a first try. But you need to make sure you are creating a syphon on the outlet of your tun. Don't just drain out the valve to your Kettle. Put a piece of hose that is a lower than the bottom of your tun. You need the syphon of the wort draining to suck out more liquid from your tun. Without it, it will only drain to the level of your valve.

Click to expand...

Reaver, If I understand what you are saying it will be impossible to create a syphon with this tun because the valve is one inch from the bottom of the tun, that is the closest I could drill the hole.

Hey junior... what Reaver is saying is to take a piece of hose (a couple of feet long, maybe), and make sure the DRAIN end of the hose is below your cooler. Put your cooler on a table or a bench and the END of your drain hose in the bottom of a bucket. That will create the siphon that should drain almost all of your liquid. My cooler MLT leaves less that a pint of liquid.

junior said:

Misplaced, the hose is aimed down from the valve to he manifold.

Click to expand...

I was referring to OUTSIDE of the mash tun. I assume you have a valve, at the output (outside) end of that valve, do you have a hose pointing downwards? This will greatly help the flow from the mashtun to the receiving vessel.

MC

Misplaced_Canuck said:

I was referring to OUTSIDE of the mash tun. I assume you have a valve, at the output (outside) end of that valve, do you have a hose pointing downwards? This will greatly help the flow from the mashtun to the receiving vessel.

MC

Click to expand...

Misplaced, if this is what you are talking about with the hose on the outside of the tun, I tried it and it made no difference.

junior said:

Misplaced, if this is what you are talking about with the hose on the outside of the tun, I tried it and it made no difference.

Click to expand...

That's a fairly large diameter hose. Is it filling completely when you sparge? If not, that's part of the problem. If there's air in the hose, this will be the place where the siphon is lost. It looks like you might be using 5/8 or 3/4" hose, I'd bring that down to 1/2 or 3/8". This will prevent air from being sucked back.

MC

Provided that there is no air coming into the system (which would loose the siphon), this is what you should be able to achieve:



(and what I mean by the lowest drawing point on the second part of the pic, is that you can hypothetically siphon below the bottom of the mash tun).

My guess, again, is that the hose isn't filled and air is introduced.

MC

Misplaced_Canuck said:

Provided that there is no air coming into the system (which would loose the siphon), this is what you should be able to achieve:

(and what I mean by the lowest drawing point on the second part of the pic, is that you can hypothetically siphon below the bottom of the mash tun).

My guess, again, is that the hose isn't filled and air is introduced.

MC

Click to expand...

Misplaced, I found .5 tubing wil try it, does the length of the tubing matter as long as it is lower than the bottom of the tun?

junior said:

Misplaced, I found .5 tubing wil try it, does the length of the tubing matter as long as it is lower than the bottom of the tun?

Click to expand...

The higher the drop, the more suction it will have [if my college grade physics recollection is good enough].

I'd suggest 3/8", it can drain plenty fast.

Also, to understand siphons: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siphon

MC

just cut it to the length that is at the bottom of your collection pot on a normal brew day. that way you do it once and do not have to cut another length when brewing. Make it long enough to reach the bottom to prevent splashing of hot liquid

Misplaced_Canuck said:

The higher the drop, the more suction it will have [if my college grade physics recollection is good enough].

I'd suggest 3/8", it can drain plenty fast.

Also, to understand siphons: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siphon

MC

Click to expand...

Misplaced, Siphon accomplished. Squeezed some 3/8 tubing on and with holding down middle tube was left with 7oz of water, I am sure when I mash the weight of the grain should keep the middle tube down so I should get the same results. Thank's for all of your help in this matter, cheers. Edit: I changed the set up on the middle of the manifold so it would sit flush with the bottom of the tun, now there is only 4oz of water left in tun. Once again thank's to all that helped me.

junior said:

Misplaced, Siphon accomplished. Squeezed some 3/8 tubing on and with holding down middle tube was left with 7oz of water, I am sure when I mash the weight of the grain should keep the middle tube down so I should get the same results. Thank's for all of your help in this matter, cheers. Edit: I changed the set up on the middle of the manifold so it would sit flush with the bottom of the tun, now there is only 4oz of water left in tun. Once again thank's to all that helped me.

Click to expand...

Well done! Glad I/we could help!

MC