Anyone experiencing charring on their wooden brew stand?

[burntgraphite]

Specifically, my question is; does anyone who places their burners on stands on top of a wooden brew stand experience any charring with the wooden top? Also, can you please let me know what kind of burner you're using?

I'm trying to establish the rough temperature range that I can expect to see under my burners. I'm building a new brew stand and evaluating materials. Since wood tends to char between 120c and 150c, I can establish a baseline with that info.

My working draft is basically this down below, and I'm determining whether I need heat shields on the plank top, or if burners placed on stands directly on the top is safe enough. Haven't figured out whether it's worth plumbing in the gas and water lines yet. Couple of days of design work left on the project, and haven't decided whether I want plank, plywood or something else as the top and shelf material. A heat range should tell me that.

Please ignore the lumber stack in front of the table, I keep those out there to replicate common cuts for further use.

 

[day_trippr]

I ran a pair of Blichmann floor burners (bg14 elements on high pressure propane) atop 20" patio blocks until I finally got around to building my rig. It was amazingly cool under the burners, to the point that the patio blocks would be damp from condensation at the end of the brew day, even in summer. I mounted the same pair of burners in my stand and again it's quite cool under the burners. So I would not be concerned wrt charring the top.

That said, depending on the burners the stands may scratch or even gouge the wood top over time, plus spills favor some kind of easily cleaned surface vs wood. So I would be inclined to go with either the metal shown, or even tiles...

Cheers!

 

[burntgraphite]

Thanks! One of the best lambic Brewers I know has his stand tiled in, so I may consider that. Easy-ish cleanup, and cheaper than stainless.

 

[LittleRiver]

Any aluminum sheet (preferably shiny) will be effective at reflecting radiant heat. I have my burner on a wooden stand. I cut a circle from a big disposable baking pan to go under it, and glued it down with contact cement.

 

[brewgar]

Any aluminum sheet (preferably shiny) will be effective at reflecting radiant heat. I have my burner on a wooden stand. I cut a circle from a big disposable baking pan to go under it, and glued it down with contact cement.

I love this solution. Also your immersion chiller system.

 

[PsychoBiter]

We have a Blichman burner and that dude was rough on the plywood under it. During a long boil it was pretty charred and smoking. We had to keep putting water on it. Since then I cut a piece of cement backer board underneath and no issues.

 

[postalbunny]

I brewed with my burners on top of an old coffee table for the longest time... i found it in the trash and needed to raise my kettles above the pumps. The issue isn't going to be heat, it's going to be clean up. Best case is water spillage, worst case will be boil overs or chemicals. If you don't care about the table, as i didn't, then you'll have no issue. Otherwise you'll want to make sure you have good drainage somehow to help facilitate cleaning. Steel is probably the better option, but wood could be made to look very nice.

 

[mirthfuldragon]

That said, depending on the burners the stands may scratch or even gouge the wood top over time, plus spills favor some kind of easily cleaned surface vs wood. So I would be inclined to go with either the metal shown, or even tiles...
Cheers!

Ceramic tiles are cheap, durable (when properly glued down and without any voids between the tile and the backer), fireproof, and clean up easy. I built a rolling cart serving cart and used 24" tile for the top, and it works great and looks better.

 

[Dustbowl]

Any aluminum sheet (preferably shiny) will be effective at reflecting radiant heat. I have my burner on a wooden stand. I cut a circle from a big disposable baking pan to go under it, and glued it down with contact cement.

+1, I brew on a plywood stand, with a Blichmann Hellfire burner. I used some aluminum flashing to mitigate heat buildup on the stand...

 

[burntgraphite]

Out of curiosity, I bought a laser thermometer and put the burner on cement. In case anyone needs the data later, during about a 50% burn on a Bayou Classic I was measuring an average of 178f. Surrounding cement was 90, air temp was 82. So there's a delta of about 96 degrees at a half burn.

If this ol burner is more or less linear in BTUs, which it probably isn't, I could expect a delta of about 180 at full burn. Since summer here in Dallas is regularly over 100, I'd definitely see some charring on my wood stand, because that will start at around 250f for soft woods. So, I guess I'll look into some heat shielding.

Thanks all for the input!

 

[universalfrost]

+1 for the tile idea...

Ive used an old table in the past with a dark star burner and a pair of anvil burners on it... the dark star burner was too low to the surface and generated a lot of heat underneath, so i put a couple of cheap larger 24" tiles underneath it to protect the table top from fire (it had a finished top that i was afraid would start on fire before the wood. problem solved as the tiles protected the table top from heat. The anvil burners were cool under the actual burner and didnt generate any heat on the table top surface to raise a concern.

 

[jmfitzgerald]

i wanted to chime in a bit here...
i built this rig about 2 years ago, and it's still in great condition. if you can see, i mounted the burners so there is virtually no flat surfaces below the burners, so there is PLENTY of open ventilation that moves through the burner as the heat rises. I had concerns too, but taking the approach of lots of moving air (pulling cool air through the burner as the heat rises), the wood doesn't even get warm to the touch. this works very well.

 

[kh54s10]

I have a turkey fryer burner for my HLT and a Bayou Classic SP10 for my BK. They are at the height of the legs (altered for the turkey fryer) above Gloss white paint on my stand. It is in storage now and my burners are now sitting on plywood. No heat related discoloring at all. Boil overs though are another story.

 

[Franktalk]

This https://www.ssbrewtech.com/collections/accessories/products/ekettle-10-gal-silicon-mat will solve your charring issues.