My mash tun build

[Brewski1975]

Nothing new or amazing here but it makes me happy to be one step closer to all grain. If anyone has any recommendations on what could be changed, by all means please let me know. I did a dry run with water only and had about 3 cups of water left after draining I plan on making a sparge arm also but haven't put a lot of thought into how to work that out yet...

 

[noodle23]

Nice job.
I built the BYO sparge device. Basically use some 1-1/4" pvc with a four way, a shower head that flows at no more than 2.5gpm and a barb fitting that has a female threaded side. Drill a hole in the center of the four way and insert the shower head arm. Attach the shower head on one end and the barb on the other. I use a pump and a ball valve to slow the flow rate.

 

[pinback]

That's a nice cooler and a nice job on the conversion! Looks good. I'm sure you'll get good efficiency.

 

[Ma23456]

Is about 2 qt loss at the bottom bad?

 

[Brewski1975]

Nice job.
I built the BYO sparge device. Basically use some 1-1/4" pvc with a four way, a shower head that flows at no more than 2.5gpm and a barb fitting that has a female threaded side. Drill a hole in the center of the four way and insert the shower head arm. Attach the shower head on one end and the barb on the other. I use a pump and a ball valve to slow the flow rate.

I think I saw something like that just last night posted on youtube also. I thought it looked like a good set up.

 

[noodle23]

I think I saw something like that just last night posted on youtube also. I thought it looked like a good set up.

It works good for me. Just remember to get one made out of a metal and open the shower head at the of the day to clean it. I didn't do this and came back to about a week later, when i smelled it.

 

[Brewski1975]

Is about 2 qt loss at the bottom bad?

I'm really not sure, I guess I'm hoping others with more knowledge will chime in if I'm concerned over nothing. I've seen posts of others doing a dry run and having only a cup or two of water left in the tun after.

 

[noodle23]

I'm really not sure, I guess I'm hoping others with more knowledge will chime in if I'm concerned over nothing. I've seen posts of others doing a dry run and having only a cup or two of water left in the tun after.

I don't think it would be a problem as long as you remember to include that amount when you calculate the amount of water you need. Meaning that if you know you will be losing x amount then you can add that much more in order to hit you boil volume. just my 2 cents

 

[Brewski1975]

I don't think it would be a problem as long as you remember to include that amount when you calculate the amount of water you need. Meaning that if you know you will be losing x amount then you can add that much more in order to hit you boil volume. just my 2 cents

I was thinking exactly that Noodle, thanks for you input.

 

[LandoLincoln]

I'm really not sure, I guess I'm hoping others with more knowledge will chime in if I'm concerned over nothing. I've seen posts of others doing a dry run and having only a cup or two of water left in the tun after.

It doesn't really matter. As long as you compensate for it in your brewing schedule.

 

[Brewski1975]

It doesn't really matter. As long as you compensate for it in your brewing schedule.

Well then maybe I was worried for nothing, good to know... Thanks for the input guys

 

[Brewski1975]

Still interested in sparge arm ideas, maybe I should open a new thread for it but figured I'd check here first... Any ideas for this kind of cooler?

 

[Staestc]

It's kinda cool we came up with almost the exact same manifold solution Brewski!

I went with a short piece of tubing to connect to the manifold in order to keep the center pipe flat on the bottom of the cooler. I wrapped a stainless steel spring that is inside the tube to get it to bend enough. That reduced the amount of loss to the cooler bottom a lot since the siphon vacuum lasts longer. I assume that since your center pipe rises as it get close to the manifold that the slits near the manifold are off the bottom and break vacuum first.

(Edit: I looked again at your pictures and see you have no slits in the center pipe so disregard previous. Not sure why you have 2 quarts left.)

I cut my pipe slits using a band saw with stop blocks to keep the depths the same and taped each pipe to piece of scrap wood to keep them from spinning.

My manifold looks pretty much just like yours.

I can' wait to give it a try! And the price was hard to beat!

 

[Staestc]

I did cut slits in my center pipe to try and get a nice even spacing across the entire bottom, but I seriously doubt that it will perform any differently that yours.

 

[Staestc]

And now I see that I posted all those pictures on your original thread and not on the one where I started! :smack:

Oh well, live and learn!

 

[Hamaki]

The 2 quarts, or however much, left at the bottom of the tun is wort, not just water and impacts efficiency. It's far more important to be able to hit the same numbers every time than to shoot for high but unpredictable efficiency.

 

[Smellyglove]

Post a picture of the lid.

When I was brewing in a cooler I made a return-manifold by making an "H" of copper pipes, hammered the four ends together so they would seal, and in the middle of the "H" i put a T. Drilled a hole in the lid, and connected the returning hose with a short piece of copper on its end in the hole, so it would fit inside of the "T" which was pointing up into the lid. The whole thing was held in place by drilling holes at the edge of the lid where it goes over into being vertical, and slide the hammered tips of the manifold into these holes. Worked flawlessly.

 

[Staestc]

Post a picture of the lid.

When I was brewing in a cooler I made a return-manifold by making an "H" of copper pipes, hammered the four ends together so they would seal, and in the middle of the "H" i put a T. Drilled a hole in the lid, and connected the returning hose with a short piece of copper on its end in the hole, so it would fit inside of the "T" which was pointing up into the lid. The whole thing was held in place by drilling holes at the edge of the lid where it goes over into being vertical, and slide the hammered tips of the manifold into these holes. Worked flawlessly.

Can you post a picture of that please?
Thanks,

 

[Smellyglove]

Can you post a picture of that please?
Thanks,

I don't have it anymore, but here's the pics. I made holes instead of slits since I wasn't recirculating at a high flow back then, just to get even coverage.

 

[Staestc]

Thanks for the pictures. With the top on how did you see to adjust sparge water flow rate to keep it constant, or were you batch sparging?


Travis'n'Texas

 

[Smellyglove]

Thanks for the pictures. With the top on how did you see to adjust sparge water flow rate to keep it constant, or were you batch sparging?


Travis'n'Texas

I just opened the lid and peeked inside and used some grains which were stuck on the inside walls as level reference.