Couple Ebrew questions

[HumulusHead]

Hey guys!

Pretty much have my new Ebrew setup done. It's at least done enough where by brew kettle is in working order with the control panel so I'll be able to brew. Someday need to get parts for the HLT, but that's gonna need to wait for funding ha.

Anyways, I have a couple questions about my system. I did a test run on it, and I want to make sure it all sounds normal.

My first question is about the heating element. When I send power to the heating element I feel that it's not getting enough power. I have one of those all stainless 5500W elements from brewhardware.com. When I send power to the element, my amp gauge says something like 20amps. My system is a 30 amp system. If I figured correctly, a 5500w element with 220v should be 25 amps.

Is this normal? I've read that the elements sometimes don't provide the wattage that is advertised. Could this be my case?

2nd question is about my SSR. I have a 40amp SSR that controls the element. It's attached to the heat sink that came bundled with it. The heat sink is on the outside of my panel. The heat sink gets super hot!! Like burns my fingers when I touch it. The SSR however doesn't feel hot to the touch. Seems like the heat sink is doing its job, but is it normal to be that hot??

A related question. The wires that lead to the heating element plug on my control panel get almost hot to the touch. Like not hot enough that it melts anything, but I'm worried that with an hour boil they may get hotter. It's 10awg wire. Should this be a concern to me or is it normal for the wires to get warm/hot like that?

I'm confident I wired everything correctly. I spent many months researching and designing and wiring my control panel, but as always, there is room for some human error.

I guess I'm just curious what you guys think about all of this. Maybe you guys have experienced similar things and can chime in. Maybe you guys also have some pointers to keep in mind too?

Just let me know what you guys think!! Thanks in advance

 

[iijakii]

Amperage is fine. They're usually off by a tad. You're off by 2 or 3. No big deal.

My heat sinks never got that hot, but as long as your SSR isnt hot I wouldnt worry about it. Youre right in that heat sink is doing its job.

My power cords got warm, but not hot. I bet it's fine, but make sure the insulation is properly rated?

 

[HumulusHead]

Amperage is fine. They're usually off by a tad. You're off by 2 or 3. No big deal.

My heat sinks never got that hot, but as long as your SSR isnt hot I wouldnt worry about it. Youre right in that heat sink is doing its job.

My power cords got warm, but not hot. I bet it's fine, but make sure the insulation is properly rated?

Thanks for the reply! I am thinking the SSR is fine, just wanted to check.

It's not the power cord that gets warm, but the internal wiring from the SSR to the element plug. Gets pretty warm. Not quite hot.

I went a goofy route and used 10 awg wire for my internal wiring that I pulled from a sjoow 3 strand cord. I'm assuming 10awg is 10awg. It's looks the same as the stranded you can buy separately.

 

[Brumateur]

Heatsink temperature can be up to 150-180F with no problem for SSR.
Wire can be worm, it's not a problem either. Wires from SJOOW cord are fine to be used for internal wiring.

 

[iBrewR]

My first question is about the heating element. When I send power to the heating element I feel that it's not getting enough power. I have one of those all stainless 5500W elements from brewhardware.com. When I send power to the element, my amp gauge says something like 20amps. My system is a 30 amp system. If I figured correctly, a 5500w element with 220v should be 25 amps.

At 240V your element will draw about 23 amps
At 220V your element will draw about 21 amps

 

[HumulusHead]

At 240V your element will draw about 23 amps

At 220V your element will draw about 21 amps

Ah. That's good to hear. I must have been using a wrong formula!

 

[jeffmeh]

Yes. The resistance is fixed so you must calculate through that.

 

[itsnotrequired]

Ah. That's good to hear. I must have been using a wrong formula!

the formula is fine, it is the input values used. an element listed as 5500 watts at 240 volts will only draw a maximum 22.92 amps at 240 volts. due to construction tolerances, it may draw slightly less. also consider the voltage. your home may only have, say, 230 volts available. at that voltage, it simply cannot draw 22.92 amps, even if 'perfectly' manufactured.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Id try to blow a fan or something across your heatsink, mine also got super hot. High heat won't cause it to fail, but it does stress it and it will likely fail earlier than normal.

 

[HumulusHead]

Id try to blow a fan or something across your heatsink, mine also got super hot. High heat won't cause it to fail, but it does stress it and it will likely fail earlier than normal.

I may just do this. I do have two small computer fans I could rig up to blow across these.

 

[augiedoggy]

I have 4 4500w 240v elements and they all draw different amounts of amps from 17.1 to 18.6. as mentioned there is some tolerance but the rating is the max amount possible. I have a 1,000w element thats actually only 800w.. (20% less than advertised)

I use a 12v pc fan to blow through the cheaper $3 ssr heatings I used and I havent had any issues in alomost 3 years now.... my heatsinks and ssrs are mounting inside the control panel one of them is a dual ssr for my HLT and rims so it sees double duty/heat at times.