Coffee Urn Brew

[daspooper]

Hello,

I've been wanting to take my brewing off the stove as it tends to prevent other things from happening in the kitchen on brew day, but I've been wanting to stick with electric. After watching the Old Farts Brewery on youtube, I realized that it would be most simple to buy a large coffee urn, or Burco as they call them in the UK. Unfortunately the largest I could find from American retailers was 4 gallon; I thought I had found larger, but many of these manufacturers refer to 5 oz cups of coffee, not the standard 8 oz cup, when they are referring to volume.

I was able to find an urn that would hopefully be able to work comparably to my current 8 gallon kettle; it is a 30 L, or about 7.9 gallon, urn, but it is shipped out of the UK so I assume that it has their electrical jack, which I think is BS 1363.

Now that I found the urn, my question is on power adapters; when I google for uk to us 240V power adapter, I am getting transformers that convert the uk 240V to us 120V. What I need is a device that allows me to connect the male bs 1363 to a female l6-30 with no power transforming. Is there a device or cord that I can buy to use outright, or do I have to make the device that connects the terminals with a bs 1363 female and a nema l6-30 male?

Now that I've been thinking about it, maybe the best thing to do would be to buy an STC which can run at 240V; then I'd run the nema l6-30 into the control box and then connect the heating connections to the bs1363 via a mounted faceplate. Would that be a better solution? I suppose then I could step mash pretty easily.

I'm also concerned about the fact that the boiler will be 50 Hz while we're on 60 Hz here; it seems like this shouldn't be much of a concern unless there is a timing circuit in the urn. If there is, then that will be off due to assuming 50 cycles will come through per second, but 60 actually will.

The main benefit that I'm seeing is cost as this boiler will be about $200 (plus the adapter/heat controller box) while every electric brew kettle I've seen is around $400 (plus temperature controller). There's also the added benefit of the heating coil being outside of the wort, so you don't need to worry about it during the boil, whirlpool, or cleaning.

urn that i found: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lloytron-E1...sh=item1c85206f81:g:G~kAAOSwfpVZFbq5#shpCntId
If anyone sees anything particularly heinous with this boiler, I may be able to contact a friend in Europe to see about her buying a more suitable one and shipping it to me, but that would still leave the problem of converting the EU/UK power to US sockets.

My current setup is an 8 gallon brew pot with BIAB in which i brew 5 gallon batches with a preboil volume of ~6.5 gallons. In my first few brews I've mashed with 5.25 gallons, lifted the bag onto a strainer, and sparged over the bag with 2.25 gallons. I think that a 2500 W element, while slow, should be sufficient.
Thanks!
(woo first post)

 

[pocketmon]

I would go with this boiler
https://www.morebeer.com/products/turbo-boiler-2000-watt.html

It's less watt but 120v.

 

[daspooper]

I would go with this boiler
https://www.morebeer.com/products/turbo-boiler-2000-watt.html

It's less watt but 120v.

Thanks so much for the link! I must have been using the wrong search terms. 2 kW should be sufficient for what I want, and 120 V will be way more convenient!

 

[pocketmon]

Thanks so much for the link! I must have been using the wrong search terms. 2 kW should be sufficient for what I want, and 120 V will be way more convenient!

The reason is that this thing is sold as a distilling boiler. (so you can use it as a distiller by getting some more accessories. )

 

[daspooper]

The reason is that this thing is sold as a distilling boiler. (so you can use it as a distiller by getting some more accessories. )

I noticed that; at first I was confused why there was a hole in the lid, but then after some googling I figured it out. This is exceptionally great as I used to distill, but I grew tired of running my 1 liter setup for hours to harvest a few hundred milliliters of hooch, granted the product was about as close to 95% as you can get at home so a few hundred milliliters is all you'd expect to get out.

I would prefer not to spend the $300 on the condenser accessory and continue to use my old fractional distillation column with condenser; I'm thinking a rubber bung with a hole for the column will suffice for sealing, and I have the clamps, which I previously used, to hold the column to prevent it from moving during a distillation.

My variac is rated for 10 A, though; would it run the turbo boil at a maximum of about 1200 W, or would the 10 A fuse blow? I suppose that I would want to build a PID/SSR which could handle switching the 2000 W element on and off to have the best control.

woo hooch train!

 

[pocketmon]

I noticed that; at first I was confused why there was a hole in the lid, but then after some googling I figured it out. This is exceptionally great as I used to distill, but I grew tired of running my 1 liter setup for hours to harvest a few hundred milliliters of hooch, granted the product was about as close to 95% as you can get at home so a few hundred milliliters is all you'd expect to get out.

I would prefer not to spend the $300 on the condenser accessory and continue to use my old fractional distillation column with condenser; I'm thinking a rubber bung with a hole for the column will suffice for sealing, and I have the clamps, which I previously used, to hold the column to prevent it from moving during a distillation.

My variac is rated for 10 A, though; would it run the turbo boil at a maximum of about 1200 W, or would the 10 A fuse blow? I suppose that I would want to build a PID/SSR which could handle switching the 2000 W element on and off to have the best control.

woo hooch train!

You need a new controller for sure. Even if the fuse doesn't blow, it is not safe. Don't risk it.

 

[daspooper]

So I ended up getting the Turbo Boiler off MoreBeer, but it turns out that the item was mispackaged at the manufacturer; the device is actually 1500 W (they have since fixed the listing.) This explains why they had listed the 2000 W for $119 there, but it is listed at $200+ everywhere else. I was pretty concerned that this would be too low power, but even with no insulation I was able to get 5.5 gallons of water to boiling (thermometer read 212 F and it was rolling) from ~76 F in 75 minutes. Not the fastest, but not the slowest. I guess because the volume of water is tall and skinny it is more efficient than typical brew kettles.

I've noted that the picobrew doesn't boil wort; instead it keeps the wort around 207 F and recirculates during the "boil." The recirculation simulates the mixing that a rolling boil imparts on the wort. From what I've read, it also seems like this is sufficient to drive off DMS in pilsner heavy grists. I would then assume that even if the TB doesn't get me a good rolling boil with 6.5 gallons of wort, then I may invest in a recirculating pump to mitigate the lack of a rolling boil. I could also use the pump for moving liquid between containers as the TB doesn't have any handles on the boiler or the lid which will be another change to my process; I'm not used to keeping anything in one spot throughout the brew day, woo kitchen brewery.

I'm moving this upcoming weekend, but I would be very surprised if I don't brew the weekend of the 22nd. I'll post back then about how the TB handles a 6.5 gallon wort boil; hopefully I don't have to transfer to my old kettle and go to the stove.

 

[daspooper]

Turns out owning a house requires time to do things other than brewing?!? lolol, anyways, I was delayed a week, but I got a brew in with the Turbo Boiler 1500 Watt. I wrapped two layers of reflectix around the boiler, and I left the stock spigot on it; I got 1/2" silicon tubing around it for racking to fermentor.

I wanted to go with a single vessel, no sparge BIAB for this brew so I mashed in 10.25 lbs grist to 7.5 gallons water for 90 minutes at 149. Well, I actually started the night before; I measured the 7.5 gallons of deionized water into the vessel, added salts and lactic acid according to Bru'n Water's yellow balanced profile, heated the water to boiling, and shut it off. When I returned the next morning, the water was sitting at 154 F which is where the priceless biab calculator said my strike temp should be. I got mashed in at 9 AM and threw a sleeping bag on top of the system; I checked on the kettle several times during the mash, and the temperature seeemed to stay the same, but at the end of the mash my digital thermometer read 280 F (!?!); this was because the thermometer was being dripped on, so it stopped working properly. If it lost a degree or two, I wouldn't be too upset. I didn't write down the exact time it took to get from ~149 F to boiling, but it was somewhere around 40 minutes to an hour. By 2 PM I was racked to the fermentor. The boil may not have been as vigorous as others would like, but it was more vigorous than I used to get on my stove top with a typical 8 gallon brew pot.

I was a little annoyed with the hole in the lid, but for this brewday I put a glove (one of those green blichmann gloves) on top; that seemed to help prevent evaporation during the mash. The hole did prove advantageous, I think, at the end of the brew when I wanted to whirlpool; I put my stainless spoon into the boiler, and then put the lid on with the end of the spoon sticking out of the hole. Now I can stir while the wort is cooling and prevent too much stuff from falling into the kettle. I've seen some reviews of these boilers where people mention scorching on the kettle bottom; I didn't experience this. When it was empty, I could see on the bottom where the spoon was picking up some stuff that was sticking, but a normal PBW wash after use cleared the stainless right up; it seemed like normal use dirtying to me. A nice thing about the spigot was that I had no liquid left in the kettle after draining; my hops retained some liquid in their hopsack, but I was able to tip the kettle easily and get all of the liquid out of the kettle via the spigot.

I do want to change a bit with the pot before the next brew; I'm going to expand the hole that the spigot is in to allow a 1/2" ball valve weldless kit to be installed. I also think adding a few more layers of reflectix will help with heat retention, but most of the suggestions I've seen on HBT have said 2 layers. I also want to find a 12" lid that will sit on the top of this nicely during the mash.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with this after a single brew. I would recommend this to someone that wants to brew 5 gallon electric batches off the stove. It was pretty weird brewing in the garage, but my wife really appreciated me not occupying the kitchen for 5 hours and cleaning time. I suppose I'll post back into this thread after a few more brews to give an update on how it is working.

 

[Grogg]

Don't use rubber in direct contact with high abv liquid or vapor. it will leach bad flavors and dangerous chemicals from rubber. Use only PTFE, cork or flour paste to seal tower to a still. Just a safety concern and don't want you to get sick if you use it for making the stronger stuff. Cheers.

 

[daspooper]

Thanks for the advice; I think I'm a ways away from using this for distillation. I learned on a distilling forum about the effects of different corks. As I'm thinking about it more, I'm not sure how simple it will be to seal a ground glass joint to a cork stopper. I'll definitely get a few corks to try different methods, but there is no reason to do something stupid for a bit of hooch.

 

[daspooper]

I was reminded of this thread after a user contacted me about my experience with the turbo boiler. I'm pretty happy with it! Here is the reply I sent so other interested users can have the information.

I am liking it so far. I typically brew ~10 pound grist full volume BiaB batches with an efficiency between 65-75% depending on the grist. I have found it to work out for brews up to ~14 lbs of grain. I do a bit of sparging with that much grain, but I can get it done with only one additional small kettle.

If you are OK with waiting for the heating, you are going to be alright with this system. At 1500 W, it takes probably 90 minutes to go from room temp to boiling. It's probably about an hour to go from room temp to strike temp. I tend to do chores while waiting for heating; I also heat water the night before so I don't have to wait as long in the morning. I think you can also put this on a timer so it starts at just the right time to be at strike when you want it, but I've not tried this yet.

The boil is not the most vigorous; I think some people might think that it is not strong enough, but I have never had problems with DMS with pilsner malt.

You'll definitely want to get a step drill bit if you don't have one to extend the spigot whole out so you can use the normal ball valve setup on it. I don't think I left the plastic included one on it after the first brew.

I don't like that it doesn't have handles, but that is probably a good thing. I don't think it would be safe to move this around with 5 or so gallons of hot liquid. The walls are a little bit thin compared to normal brew kettles, but they are sufficient.

I did run into trouble one brew day when the heater didn't want to kick on; fortunately it is easy to access the simple electronics, and I was able to fix it. One of the terminals had formed a bit of rust, so I cleaned it off, tightened the connections, and it was working better than the last batch. I think this was pretty normal given my cleaning method; I was putting the TB in my basement slop sink to wash it, so water was splashing up into the bottom. I have since switched to cleaning it outside with the hope that less water can get inside the housing.

I think this is a great way for those new to all-grain to move into BiaB out of the kitchen. I can also see this being used in a more traditional 3 vessel system where this is used to either heat sparge water or boil. My current setup is to use the TB as my sparge water heater and my boil kettle, and I use a 10 gallon igloo cooler for my mash tun; I mostly did this so I could make bigger beers without worrying too much. My brew buddy is going to get a propane burner and 15 gallon kettle; at that point the TB will become a hot liquor tank for sparging 10 gallon batches. I think we will use the propane to heat up the strike water as it would take too long on the TB.