New HERMS setup question

[farmskis]

I have been in the process of setting up my three 8 gal kettle HERMS for about a year now. I am to the point of installing my coil and I had an idea the other day. I can not think of any negatives but since I have not used a system like this I am curious if I am missing something.

My thought is to mount my herms coil in a lid. This way I can use it in my HLT to heat mash. Then also at the end of the boil I will stick it on my BK and circulate ice water through it to cool my wort. Will this work? Doing it this way ensures I don't need to pump my wort (and risk clogging from hops) and I can just pump ice water. I don't plan on pumping my wort as I will siphon it to the fermenter. (I plan on 5 gal batches)

One thought of a possible negative is that the steam collecting on the lid during the initial cooling will be contaminated as it drips into the wort...but I would spray it with a sanitizer to deal with this.

I just thought that having one mounted in a removable lid vs in the HLT might be beneficial. Thoughts?

 

[lschiavo]

It sounds like a good plan. I can't see any real issues. Depending on the size of your coil, it may be a bit of a hassle to transfer from HLT to bk. I'm also not sure an immersion chiller is the best way to go. Being in the north as well, I scrapped my IC for a plate chiller real fast. My water is cold and cheap. I pump from the boil kettle through the chiller and use a hop bag to keep things from clogging up.

 

[Jaybird]

I think its a good idea. Just a thought, I would just put good Cam Locks or QD's on there to make the swap easier, faster and cleaner. make sure its all clean and sanitary and you should be good. I am a NO LID EVER kind of guy on my BK but thats just me and my crazy ideas of condensation. But I you may be onto something there.

Picts when you have it all up and going!

Cheers
Jay

 

[farmskis]

That is the idea.. Cam locks are the plan. I do agree with the no lid ever. In fact when I got the kettles I was thinking what do I need the lids for. I think in this tho since the lid would only be going on for the last bit I think it is worth a try.

 

[Winger22]

I've read posts where two identical batches were done. One with a lid during boil and one without. In blind taste tests the testers could not tell the difference.

 

[summerofgeorge]

It's been done before. Maybe you can get some tips from others.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=293192

 

[GotPushrods]

I did this about 5 years ago only to discover several others seemed to co-discover it at about the same time. It's not new, but not exactly common.

I use this concept in my 2-vessel no-sparge eHERMS. BK acts as the HERMS HLT during the mash, then drain and remove lid/coil and it becomes the BK. Then add the lid/coil back for chilling.

The beauty is the simplicity. Just 1 heating element, 1 PID, 1 temp probe, 1 coil, 2 pumps. All the benefits of a recirculating system without the complexity of the giant control panel and 3 vessels or cloudy mess of BIAB. Only 'drawback' is no-sparge which I would never EVER go back from now.

 

[farmskis]

I'm glad to see others have done this. It is looking like it will work out just fine.

 

[farmskis]

Only 'drawback' is no-sparge which I would never EVER go back from now.

Just curious... You prefer the simplicity over the ability to sparge? I'm guessing your finished product does not suffer. I plan on sparging since I am building a 3 kettle setup. I have simplified it about as simple as I could using 3 kettles. I am not as simple as yours but not far off. I have an additional element, kettle, and a pwm for boil control plus a few extra switches in my "toolbox" control box.

 

[GotPushrods]

Just curious... You prefer the simplicity over the ability to sparge? I'm guessing your finished product does not suffer. I plan on sparging since I am building a 3 kettle setup. I have simplified it about as simple as I could using 3 kettles. I am not as simple as yours but not far off. I have an additional element, kettle, and a pwm for boil control plus a few extra switches in my "toolbox" control box.

Absolutely. You gain nothing quality-wise by sparging, just more time, efficiency and the *potential* to add flaws. I'm getting 75-80% brewhouse efficiency now for most average gravity beer I brew. Saving a few pounds of malt for all the potential hazards just isn't worth it to me. The key is getting good recirculation and as close to 100% conversion as possible. During the mash I watch the gravity rise, looking for a leveling off near my target leaving a few points for the rise to 170. I always see a bump after gravity has leveled off when I ramp to mashout. Usually I'm on schedule but if it's still rising and not leveling off near where I expect I'll extend the rest. Once you've maxed out what you can get into solution you're only losing grain absorption. I think a lot of no-spargers leave a lot on the table by blindly following a schedule.

 

[augiedoggy]

Absolutely. You gain nothing quality-wise by sparging, just more time, efficiency and the *potential* to add flaws. I'm getting 75-80% brewhouse efficiency now for most average gravity beer I brew. Saving a few pounds of malt for all the potential hazards just isn't worth it to me. The key is getting good recirculation and as close to 100% conversion as possible. During the mash I watch the gravity rise, looking for a leveling off near my target leaving a few points for the rise to 170. I always see a bump after gravity has leveled off when I ramp to mashout. Usually I'm on schedule but if it's still rising and not leveling off near where I expect I'll extend the rest. Once you've maxed out what you can get into solution you're only losing grain absorption. I think a lot of no-spargers leave a lot on the table by blindly following a schedule.

Now im curious.. What hazards are you speaking about with sparging with a system like this?
If the mash was complete your more or less just rinsing the sugars out of the grain you missed when draining the first time while topping off your kettle. Its already been established sparging temp means very little and gravity can easily be adjusted with boil intensity and length if needed.

 

[GotPushrods]

Now im curious.. What hazards are you speaking about with sparging with a system like this?
If the mash was complete your more or less just rinsing the sugars out of the grain you missed when draining the first time while topping off your kettle. Its already been established sparging temp means very little and gravity can easily be adjusted with boil intensity and length if needed.

I should reiterate that there's nothing inherently wrong with sparging, you just don't gain anything special from it. I sparged for many years. The only thing you gain is higher efficiency (which on the commercial level is not trivial) and possibly working around some tun size constraints. You can mitigate the hazards, you just need to be aware of them.

For starters, you've carefully crafted the water profile and pH of the mash. Most people these days are now aware of the pH of the sparge to avoid tannins but it's still something to consider. That doesn't account for the lower osmotic pressure of sparging with pure RO water which may have it's own drawbacks irregardless of pH, although I think that needs more study.

Then there's the need to reset and filter the grainbed (batch sparging anyway) to re-clear the runoff of all the malt lipids and phenols.

And that still doesn't take into consideration what the LoDO folks would have to say about another step involved in deoxygenating the sparge water. I'm still mildly annoyed at the lack of double-blind triangle tests on a finished product. But I've seen such vast improvement from just cold-side O2 mitigation that I'm patiently optimistic. Not to mention I respect Kunze enough to hear it out. So no-sparge in that arena is just another can't-hurt, it's already optimized to minimize oxidation.

As for completeness of conversion, it's more than that to me. It's also about setting a fermentability profile. It's not just a done-or-not-done iodine test, but 'done' is really a minimum criteria. I'll mash short at mid-140s and long at high-150s or visa-versa. It's easier for me to control that profile knowing that my last ramp to >170 will lock in what I have done. Again, you can mash out and sparge but I like to know for sure I'm done setting that dextrine profile and just move on.

Overall the no-sparge is just so much easier for me personally. I've been brewing long enough that I've been through the gamut of beginner in buckets to super-complex and I've settled on a system that has a nice compromise of all the benefits in the areas that are important to me while minimizing complexity everywhere else. I don't think it's inherently better than other ways of brewing, but I do like to preach my preference to give others those options.

 

[farmskis]

My coil is on the way. 1/2 in and I am mounting it through the lid to see how that works. I will update how it works out.