Help designing cheap supplemental heater

[Holtzmanator]

Hi gang! I've been brewing for 7-8 years now and though I was active on the forums I havnt been in quite some time and ended up making a new account. Anyways, here's my problem-

About a year and a half ago I moved from a house in Michigan into an apartment in Chicago. Since then my beer quality has gone completely down hill, and really does not taste that good. Most of my beer has been coming out watery, even IPA's, and some have developed off flavors. I've only done about 4-5 bathes since moving here, and all have been drinkable, but nothing I would ever write home about.
My setup is a 10 gallon aluminum pot with a valve for the boil, and a 10 gallon igloo cooler for the mash tun with a bazooka screen. I use a home made copper coil wort chiller that cools the batch in about 25 minutes. The only thing that changed since I moved here was how I do my boil; I used to do it in the yard on a propane burner, but now I am forced to brew in the kitchen on the stove. Though it looks to be gently boiling, the beer rarely goes above 206-208 degrees with two stove burners on max. I have been thinking that the temperature is too low for all of the flavors of the hops to be absorbed by the wort. My other thought on off flavors was that I havnt been using yeast starters or taking readings because my stir plate and hydrometer got lost in the move, but I have replacements on the way.
My real question is what is the cheapest way I can supplement my stove to get a stronger boil? I am a very DIY sort of guy, and built my own equipment and temp controllers for my kegerator, so DIY isn't a problem. I see 120v elements are cheap, but I'm clearly missing something because all the setups I look at are so expensive! I built my kegerator controller for $30, so in my mind I should be able to outfit my pot with a supplemental heating coil with a $150-$200 budget and still run it on the stove, but when I look up kits for RIMS or even for DIY it comes to over $300 just for the controller, and another $350 for a RIMS tube and pump, and at that price I may as well sell everything I have and get a grainfather or something similar. Any suggestions on doing 120v electric heating to supplement the stove for cheap? Also sorry for the long rambling post, I'm posting this from my phone and the formatting/search/etc aren't working very well. Thanks!

 

[mredge73]

Honestly I don't think your fault is with the boil but going with your theory you have a several options:

An easy and cheap way to supplement your boil would be adding a $35 bucket heater that runs on 120vac at about 1500W.
https://www.farmandfleet.com/produc...TSIdquFUmJ6z6HVs2tcXocuH9BkO2xWDjahoCbCbw_wcB


Better solution:
If you can pull you stove out a little from the wall you will find a 30a 240vac outlet that the stove is plugged into.
You can use this to power a EZ boil controller wired to a 5500w water heater element built into your kettle.
You are a DIY guy so you can do this with purpose made fittings for under $200.

The controller will cost you ~$75 once you fit it to a box and cable:
http://www.auberins.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=560

The element housings go from $20-$60 depending on what you have and don't have:
https://www.brewhardware.com/category_s/1895.htm

All SS Element will run about $40:
https://www.brewhardware.com/product_p/element5500_ripple.htm

 

[Holtzmanator]

Thanks for the recommendations! Unfortunately I don't have access to 240v anywhere in my unit, I checked and the stove and all appliances are 120v. I may try the bucket heater, there's lots of weird reviews of them out there (some people claim they turn off at boil and others don't) but that seams like my best solution for the time being. I'm going to keep scouring the forums and I'll post whatever I end up doing, thanks!

 

[Island_Dan]

https://www.brewhardware.com/product_p/hotrodrtu1500std.htm

There is the solution to your boiling problem. It sits in your kettle and adds a bunch more heat. The two changes you had is your water and you went from a propane burner to your stove. If you measure your boil off rate on the stove however, you should be able to adjust your brew day too allow you to achieve the same boil results as you did outside with propane.

 

[AkTom]

I'd bet your water is different too.

 

[madscientist451]

Your 10 gallon pot is too big for stovetop use. You're just getting too much heat loss. Get a smaller, 6 gallon pot and downsize your batches to 3.5 gallons.
A 7.5 gallon pot may work as well.
Another option is using two pots. I've used a 6 gallon and a smaller 3 gallon pot on my stovetop. You have to account for more water loss to evaporation, but you can brew 5 gallons of beer doing that.
Look on your local craigslist, there's used brewing stuff available all the time.
Or just get the heatstick like has already been recommended.
If you suspect water issues, an easy experiment is to buy distilled water for one batch, and add 1 teaspoon per gallon Burton Salts for your IPAs.
You'll notice a big difference in your beer, you can then get more involved with water chemistry if you want to.

https://www.morebeer.com/products/burton-salts-1-oz-bag.html

You can still make a yeast starter without a stir plate, just use a 1.5 ML wine bottle or a 1/2 gallon jug and give it a swirl now and then.

When you get your boil problems solved, your next project should be temperature control.

 

[mredge73]

Another solution would be to use 2x 120vac elements in a single vessel plugged into separate circuits.
You only need one controller but obviously the cost of the elements and housing will double.

Similar to this guy, just exchange the BCS for a EZ boil:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=623146

Note
It takes 62.5 minutes to heat 6 gallons of water to 212 degrees F from 70 degrees F with a 2000 watt element.
I would install 2x 2000w if you choose this route and cut this time in half.
Also, as others have pointed out try to find a consistent source of water. Grocery stores around here sell RO water for $1 per 5 gallons, hopefully you can find something similar where you are.

 

[mredge73]

Also, check this out:
https://brausupply.com/collections/...w-system-scratch-and-dent?variant=25461862224

 

[TallDan]

Thanks for the recommendations! Unfortunately I don't have access to 240v anywhere in my unit, I checked and the stove and all appliances are 120v. I may try the bucket heater, there's lots of weird reviews of them out there (some people claim they turn off at boil and others don't) but that seams like my best solution for the time being. I'm going to keep scouring the forums and I'll post whatever I end up doing, thanks!

You said you're a DIY type, so build a heat stick.

If you want to go fancy, start here:
https://www.brewhardware.com/product_p/hotrod.htm

otherwise, take inspiration from that and build something similar. The idea revolves around a 120v water heater element to put in your kettle and supplement the heat from your stove.

 

[Holtzmanator]

Thanks for all the help guys! I ordered a heat stick from brewhardware and a refractometer to replace my broken hydrometer. I'm also replacing all the lines in my kegerator when I do my spring cleaning, so hopefully that will help a bit, but probably not much since I clean them often and they aren't that old. I'll try to remember to report back as to how my next batch turns out. Thanks again!

Edit: I also forgot to mention fermentation temperature, I have pets that need to be under 70 degrees, so none of my fermentation ever goes above that. Cheers!

 

[augiedoggy]

Thanks for all the help guys! I ordered a heat stick from brewhardware and a refractometer to replace my broken hydrometer. I'm also replacing all the lines in my kegerator when I do my spring cleaning, so hopefully that will help a bit, but probably not much since I clean them often and they aren't that old. I'll try to remember to report back as to how my next batch turns out. Thanks again!

Edit: I also forgot to mention fermentation temperature, I have pets that need to be under 70 degrees, so none of my fermentation ever goes above that. Cheers!

Just a heads up... Even though the ambient air temps were your fermenter sits may be under 70 the fermentor can and will go above that at the high krausen point where the yeast are most active... its can actually go significantly above the ambient air temps which is why measuring the wort temp and not chamber temp (if using a fridge or other temp controlled box) is important.