pump advice for $50 Herms Build

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Looks similar to the ones some on here are using..........I think the ones they are choosing are by "U S Solar", or something like that.

There is a lengthy thread about them, and the pros and cons of the different models, of which the one you posted looks very similar.
 
Also interested. Something like this would be a lot easier on the wallet than a march pump if your only using it for $50 HERMS.

Stealthcruiser, do you have a link to that discussion?
 
Only rated to 100 degrees, doesn't give you much latitude....that's the deal with March and Chugger pumps, they are rated to 250 degrees...
 
Only rated to 100 degrees, doesn't give you much latitude....that's the deal with March and Chugger pumps, they are rated to 250 degrees...

It looks like it's rated to 100 degrees Celsius, enough for mash temps
 
Only rated to 100 degrees, doesn't give you much latitude....that's the deal with March and Chugger pumps, they are rated to 250 degrees...

They work fine with boiling liquids.... been using two for a year now. I believe using a ball valve to control their flow burns them up so I use cheap pwm speed controller's and adjust the flow with a knob.
March and chuggers pumps are way to big for the flow leveIs I'm looking for... plus 100c is 212f.... you tell me how your ever going to find yourself pumping a liquid hotter that 212 in the home brewing world?
 
They work fine with boiling liquids.... been using two for a year now. I believe using a ball valve to control their flow burns them up so I use cheap pwm speed controller's and adjust the flow with a knob.
March and chuggers pumps are way to big for the flow leveIs I'm looking for... plus 100c is 212f.... you tell me how your ever going to find yourself pumping a liquid hotter that 212 in the home brewing world?

So pwm works just fine for flow control then? How did you implement your pwm control? Can you elaborate on why a ball valve would burn em up?

Any problems to speak of from the year of use? Or tips?

Would you like any more questions? ;) cheers :mug:
 
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They work fine with boiling liquids.... been using two for a year now. I believe using a ball valve to control their flow burns them up so I use cheap pwm speed controller's and adjust the flow with a knob.
March and chuggers pumps are way to big for the flow leveIs I'm looking for... plus 100c is 212f.... you tell me how your ever going to find yourself pumping a liquid hotter that 212 in the home brewing world?

misread the specs, didn't realize it was Celsius. Nice to have the buffer of 38f, like I wouldn't like to put 15 gal of wort in my kettle 15 gal pot before I start to boil.
 
Seems like I remeber this pump being 10 or 15 cheaper just a few months ago. I want to say I saw it for something like 12.
Has it increased in price that much? I know some of the links are "like" pumps but still haven't seen one below 20.
 
Nice it does indeed, and people in the reviews say its good for homebrew.

I'm a little weary of this pump. It's strange to me that neither listings give the manufacturer or any kind of model number. I'd be more comfortable if I could call up the actual manufacturer and talk to them about the food safety part, or look into the company. Given the lack of information, and the eBay sellers location, it would seem these are probably built in China so I wouldn't be able to talk to them anyway. Would you be comfortable with your wort flowing through it?

Sometimes I can be a little paranoid when it comes to chemicals and food.
 
misread the specs, didn't realize it was Celsius. Nice to have the buffer of 38f, like I wouldn't like to put 15 gal of wort in my kettle 15 gal pot before I start to boil.

The thing is your liquid won't go over 212 degrees.... at 250 degrees it would likely be steam..... when I have a roaring boil in my system it doesn't even register 212

These pumps are made in china like most of the bigger stainless pumps, the difference is no one have rebranded them and marketed them as their own like the others... so there's no crazy markups the magnets on these are coated making them food safe many members here have bought them and disected them.

You can find these pumps in both 12v and slightly stronger 24v and they range in price depending on who you buy them from... I got mine for 18 bucks shipped from a seller in cali.
 
I have a (three of them) black version of these solar pumps, and they are magnetically driven. Over the course of one year I've had two of them fail. I don't know the reasons.

But technically speaking I think a restricting valve would work. In my current setup I have restricting valves on just one of the pumps. This pump has survived the two other pumps which failed which had 0 restriction what so ever to them, not even a short hose or anything, just straight in straight out. They were submerged, but the electricity-part works, its just that they don't spin the impeller anymore.

I don't think burning out a motor if your have a restriction after the output is the issue. Like long hoses or a valve. If it craps out I think it's because its a cheap china-pump. The worst thing is having a pump (motor) spin freely without restriction, then the motor will spin as fast as it can. If you put restriction then there's not much of a difference between halfway open and fully closed, to the motor. The motor encounter a restricted flow. If it's fully closed than it will spin at the speed it's able to, It will not try to spin faster or anything since it does only pull a given amount of amperes. Since it's magnetically driven the impeller will just "slip".
 
Please link to the "a lot of".


The motors are brushless. A valve on the output side of these pumps is the way to control flow rate. If your thing is overcomplicated bling, go for the pwm controller.

How is an 8 dollar digtal option overcomplicated bling? You have two options, depend on the pump to fail in specific areas (slipping, overtemp,etc.) or regulate the speed of the pump via pwm. An eight dollar controller is great protection for a twenty dollar pump. Not to mention (I can only imagine becuase I do not brew AG yet) there are probably instances in which a slow speed drain is better than full suction impeded by a bv.
 
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So do you run a battery to the controller, then the controller to the pump?

no I use a simple 12v powersupply.... you can buy a wallwort style like a phone charger for a few dollars of buy an acual 12v powersupply for inside the control panel to power all the pumps and a cooling fan for my ssr heatsinks...if I had bought the 24v pumps it would have made my built simplier since I use 24v actuated relays instead of contractors for my electric heat element power on top of my ssr's
 
Please link to the "a lot of".


The motors are brushless. A valve on the output side of these pumps is the way to control flow rate. If your thing is overcomplicated bling, go for the pwm controller.

I understand your logic and I dont want to sit here and argue with you... you can certianly do whatever you want.
If you go and read throught the "other" huge 12v pump thread thats a like 100 pages long you will see a lot of complaints from people who seized them up these people were using ball valves to restrict the flow..someone in that thread chimed in that they had been using pwm speed controllers instead and this worked very well for them for a long time with no issues... as the thread goes on I could not find a single person who was using the pwm controllers that had a pump seize (obviously you could still do this by running them dry or without priming)

these pumps are a lot like aquarium pumps which I have been using for years. I have seen these magnets melt to the plastic housings and the bushings that hold the magnet shafts fail prematurely on them when they are being heavily restricted by cutting clogged instakes or filters making more resistance on the blades and magnet/shaft assy this way vs just using pwm which doesnt appear to cause any mechanical stress on them at all since its slowing the power and drive of the manget vs fighting it.
Wave makers also use a softstart feature which is similar to turning up the speed knob on the pwm because most of the pump wear is on a full off to on startup.

my pumps were $18 I dont think a $7 pwm speed controller is wastefule bling here it work and works well for me for a year now.... Especially when compared the oversized stainless pumps like chugger and march
 
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The plastic housing around the magnet can sometimes warp causing the magnet to seize and become stuck in the housing.
I have been pretty lucky since I have about 30 brew sessions on mine and I have never once disassembled the pumps.
 
Just an update, I was looking at these pumps and it appears someone emailed the manufacturer and has declared them not food safe at homebrew temps. I'd love to hear how they aren't, not that I distrust random Amazon reviewers or anything.
 
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the 17 to 25 dollar tan pumps are FDA approved for food use at boiling temperatures however the black ones that a lot of people have been buying for $25 myself included on Amazon are not food safe at boiling temps because they're made of ABS plastic I stopped using my black one for that reason and continue to use the 2 tan pumps and im purchasing a third to replace it.
 
the 17 to 25 dollar tan pumps are FDA approved for food use at boiling temperatures however the black ones that a lot of people have been buying for $25 myself included on Amazon are not food safe at boiling temps because they're made of ABS plastic I stopped using my black one for that reason and continue to use the 2 tan pumps and im purchasing a third to replace it.

Do you have a link to a particular pump that you use or suggest.
 
Just an update, I was looking at these pumps and it appears someone emailed the manufacturer and has declared them not food safe at homebrew temps. I'd love to hear how they aren't, not that I distrust random Amazon reviewers or anything.

Is there any more info in this? This would mean thousands of homebrewers looking for new pumps.
 
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....the black ones that a lot of people have been buying for $25 myself included on Amazon are not food safe at boiling temps because they're made of ABS plastic ....
My google skills suck. I can't find anything to back up this statement about ABS. I've seen references to mechanical problems and higher temperatures, but not the exact temperature or if there are food safe implications. Do you have a link?


Do you know what material the grey pumps are made from?
 
My google skills suck. I can't find anything to back up this statement about ABS. I've seen references to mechanical problems and higher temperatures, but not the exact temperature or if there are food safe implications. Do you have a link?


Do you know what material the grey pumps are made from?
lots of links just google "abs plastic safe for hot liquid or food use" and you dont need to google it because there is a recent thread here where someone was reviewing the black pump and contacted the distributor who told them they are abs and in fact not safe for hot food or liquid. abs can leech chemicals at hot temps....they wont kill you but they are slowly being phased out... I believe they are not allowed to be used for baby bottles and such already for this reason... some forms of abs are safe at certain temps.. but it depends on what the manufacturer put in the plastic to color it or otherwise alter it... bottom line the $25 ones that copy the topsflo design are not intended for food use. so we dont know much abut them. they also have no marking that say "abs" or otherwise. they could be dumping whatever waste they have at the factory into the mix to get rid of it.. unfortunatly its not uncommon in china so I woulnt take anything for granted.

remember at one time lead water pipes were "perfectly safe"
 
Is there any more info in this? This would mean thousands of homebrewers looking for new pumps.

I doubt we are talking thousands considereing the knock offs have only recently been marketed by us sellers as food safe (some guy buys a few hundred and resells them on amazon saying whatever he wants about them to get sales.)...The topsflo and the "us solar" companies distribute pumps that are made with the same molds and likely by the same factory in china but those are made under their specifications and out of a more expensive food safe plastic... Chinese companies love making thier own knockoffs of the products they make for distributors but they usually cheapen them up as much as possible and rely on the real deal to boost their knockoff sales... these could be made of anything, really.
Its all about marketing these days
I just installed a $7,000 "HP" plotter today that the packing slip said was clearly built by the "calcomp Optical Electronics (Suzhou) Co LTD for Hewlett Packard singapore (private) LTd.
The funny thing is the whole layout was screaming epson... even the paper spindles were completely identical to hps biggest competitor?
You need to be an educated consumer when taking chances on no name stuff is all im saying, I have one of these "ABS" pumps myself and learned the hardway... I disassembled the tan ones and you can clearly see they were designed for food use with coated magnets.(an extra expense)
 
Just an update, I was looking at these pumps and it appears someone emailed the manufacturer and has declared them not food safe at homebrew temps. I'd love to hear how they aren't, not that I distrust random Amazon reviewers or anything.

If you read the ad carefully it says food safe..... but then later it says can be ran with hot WATER at 212 degrees instead of mentioning liquid or food here...
 
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the 17 to 25 dollar tan pumps are FDA approved for food use at boiling temperatures however the black ones that a lot of people have been buying for $25 myself included on Amazon are not food safe at boiling temps because they're made of ABS plastic
lots of links just google "abs plastic safe for hot liquid or food use" [......]
That search was useless and returned the same results I've already seen. So, you don't have a link to information on or know at what temperature ABS is no longer food safe?

I've read that thread and the post with the reply from one manufacturer on one specific model that somehow makes you believe that all of the black pumps in this price range are the same. Your posts are full of paranoia and speculation, but no facts.

I especially like the way you selectively believe one claim of "food safe" and reject another. Do you know for a fact that the tan pumps are FDA approved as you claimed in an earlier post? I haven't seen that in eBay listings I've looked at. You say you will be buying one. Will you link to the seller?

If you read the ad carefully it says food safe..... but then later it says can be ran with hot WATER at 212 degrees instead of mentioning liquid or food here...
If you read it, under Areas of Use it says, "Food Liquid Transfer" and "Hot Wort Transfer Pump for Home Brewing". The "Can Run With Hot Water (212o F)" is under a heading describing mechanical properties. You're trying to imply something that isn't there.
 
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