Stainless Teapot Heating Elements

Before I go and buy a bunch of these things, I figured I'd double check with the experts first.

Right now I'm using two 120V 1500W elements in my boil keggle. They work fine, but I'd like to get them lower in the keggle for smaller batches. Also I don't like the rust on the base and would prefer all stainless.

I found these stainless teapot boil elements on ebay. They are 220V 3kw, so I'm going to use 4 of them at 120V. I can mount them all to the base of my keggle since they're only 5" diameter, and my math indicates they are ULWD.

I'd prefer a boil coil, but my 2x120V nixes that, and that can't be changed. So any reasons why I shouldn't buy these right now?

I have no knowledge of them, but you do understand that with 4 of them at 120v you will still be at 3000w, yes?

Yes, two of these in parallel should get you back up to 1500 watts which would run off of a 15amp circuit. You can get pretty creative with switches to change the total power in increments of 750 watts.

Thanks guys, I decided what the hell and bought four of them. Just installed them and they are looking pretty promising! All steel, nice and low in the kettle, ulwd, and fit perfectly. The only downside is the base is concave, so I'm going to have to make sure that i dry it out after cleaning.

That looks pretty slick, and the option of switches to control power is nice and simple.

I used to use a friend's system in the UK with a 3kW kettle element in a keggle, and that was fine for 40 UK pint batches (about 6 US gallons), so I don't think a 3kW kettle is lacking power. And you can turn it into a 12kW monster if you get (lots of) 220V at some point*.


* or, y'know, be all sensible and boring and up one of the elements to 220V for a ~5kW kettle.

dyqik said:

That looks pretty slick, and the option of switches to control power is nice and simple.

I used to use a friend's system in the UK with a 3kW kettle element in a keggle, and that was fine for 40 UK pint batches (about 6 US gallons), so I don't think a 3kW kettle is lacking power. And you can turn it into a 12kW monster if you get (lots of) 220V at some point*.


* or, y'know, be all sensible and boring and up one of the elements to 220V for a ~5kW kettle.

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Yep, I've been using 3kw in my kettle for a few months now and haven't had any problems getting a strong boil. Even got a boilover once! Granted, my keggle is insulated, but 3kw does the job nicely

Although 12kw does sound pretty sweet

Nice setup. Would you mind sharing who you brought them from and how much they cost as well as your instillation of the elements (pictures would be helpful). I'm thinking of building a small gallon and a hall HERMS and one of these would be perfect. I'm trying to keep the amp requirement as low as possible.

thanks

tom

millstone said:

Nice setup. Would you mind sharing who you brought them from and how much they cost as well as your instillation of the elements (pictures would be helpful). I'm thinking of building a small gallon and a hall HERMS and one of these would be perfect. I'm trying to keep the amp requirement as low as possible.

thanks

tom

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Sure thing, just installed them right now and am testing them by trying to boil 11 gallons of water. Would probably work well for a small herms, although you need some space underneath your vessle, unless you mount on the side. As for power, just measured and looks like each pair of them are using about 1630 watts, which is perfect for me.

Bought this one: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00A8VIRDI/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

You can get it for $12 on ebay I think, but I wanted fast shipping. There are other wattage ones as well in the same style.

How are you attaching these to the keg? Have you got a photo of the underside?
Cheers

Great info. Am I correct is saying that each unit will use about 815 watts (6.8 amps)? My plan is to use a damaged corny bottom about 12"-14" high, drilling out the bottom rubber with a hole saw, surrounding the element base with a piece of PVC pipe, and covering it with a PVC cap with the wire coming out the side of the cap. Found a similar unit to yours on eBay for $12.88 shipped. Also, pictures of your install would be nice.

thanks

tom

To the poster above, yep it looks like they are sucking up about 815-825 watts on 120V per element. Also, it looks like I had the same idea as you on the pvc install =)

Ok so now for some pics. The install of the actual element is pretty trivial due to the clamshell design.


Here is the element being put inside the kettle. The holes I drilled are the same size as for a standard water heater element.



Silicone gasket goes inside the kettle. On the bottom of the kettle, attatch the bottom half of the clamshell and screw on the nuts.



So thats the easy part. The more interesting part is making the enclosure for it. Since the base of this element has some threaded rods, you have some interesting options for enclosing it that you wouldn't with a normal water heater element.

I decided to make my enclosure with 1.25" PVC (although 1" probably would have worked). Here are the parts



Parts list per enclosure
1.25" PVC tee
1.25" PVC cap to 1/2" NPT thread
1.25" PVC cap
10-32 coupling nut
10-32 nuts
1/2" NPT plastic cable strain relief
a few inches of 10-32 rod, cut from a 3' length
1 washer
Optional?: Some insulation material (I used a thin silicone sheet)



One of the best parts of this element is that attaching the ground is trivial. Just attach the ground wire to a terminal, then sandwich it between two nuts on the threaded rod that's sticking out as shown.

On the other rod, attach the coupling nut. This coupling nut will attach to the custom 10-32 threaded rod that I cut to size, essentially lengthening the rod. You can use this long thread to hold the PVC enclosure tightly to the base of the kettle using a nut and a washer, as you can see in this picture:



Note two things I forgot to mention. First, I had to drill a small hole in the 1.25" pvc cap to get the 10-32 rod to go through. Second, I used a sheet of silicone to cut out some gaskets anywhere the pvc was touching metal. I wanted it to be water tight, but more importantly I wanted to make sure the PVC wouldn't melt from touching the burning hot metal. I later heat gunned the pvc at its hottest spot and it was 150 degrees, which I think is fine.

Here's the final product on the stand.



It's a tad bulky since I have 4 of them. I could make it a bit cleaner and more condensed, but this is hidden under my kettle so I won't have to look at it. Plenty of room for my bottom drain tri-clover valve as well.


And finally, the test run. I took 11 gallons of 165 degree water, temporarily covered the pot, turned on the elements and waited to see how long it took to boil. It took 28 minutes to reach boil, and I removed the cover for a while to confirm that it would keep the rolling boil.



Who says you need 4500 watts to get a good rolling boil with 11 gallons?

Overall I have to say I'm pretty happy with this install

Great write-up. Your pictures and explanation of the install has inspired me to get started on my project. Thanks for taking the time to show your project.

tom

Great project...thanks for sharing!

I've toyed with the idea of a countertop brew sculpture for very small batch using 12 quart Bain Marie pots. Split the boil amongst 2 or 3 pot rig. These might be a bit underpowered but its interesting.

Well I've used these elements for a good 10-15 batches now. So far they've worked great!

I was inspecting them last night though and spotted something that concerned me. The shiny exterior seems to be kinda flaking off, and I'm starting to see what looks like rust underneath. This has caught me off guard because I assumed these were stainless and did not have a metallic coating.

Any thoughts on the pics below?

I have used my HERMS with the coil for 6 brews, just took a look at the coil and no discoloration or flaking, still shinny. All I'm heating is water not wort, could yours be a discoloration from the wort? Can you feel the surface to see if it is actually flaking (just checking, not meant to criticize). If it's a discoloration, maybe a scrubby and some PBW? Could it have been coated with a shinny surface over a dull stainless tube? I just checked mine with a magnet to see if it sticks and it did. Because of the dull surface under the shinny surface, it almost looks like dull aluminum. I'll keep an eye on mine.

Tom

thefost said:

Any thoughts on the pics below?

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Could that be zinc plated copper and not stainless?

If so, here's a link on how to remove it.

I soaked in a strong Starsan solution and cleaned with a Scotch-Brite pad to remove the plating from mine. Went from shiny to copper.

thefost said:

Well I've used these elements for a good 10-15 batches now. So far they've worked great!

I was inspecting them last night though and spotted something that concerned me. The shiny exterior seems to be kinda flaking off, and I'm starting to see what looks like rust underneath. This has caught me off guard because I assumed these were stainless and did not have a metallic coating.

Any thoughts on the pics below?

Click to expand...

Any update on your issue with the heating elements?

tom

Very late to the party here, but that is a simply genius idea to use tea kettle heating elements. I hope the flaking ended up being something you could fix.

I've scrubbed them a bit with a scour pad and BKF and am not getting much flaking. I plan to remove the elements and give them a good acid soak or use sandpaper and see what happens.

any update on flaky elements? did they turn yellow after acid soak?

Subscribed!
The set up looks pretty slick. I'm new to the party, are these all being run at the same time on the same 120 V circuit? Are you running anything else on that circuit like a pump(s) and not tripping your breaker (my electrical knowledge is nil)?

Last one. Any possibility of bending that element so the circle is centered in the kettle and the connection is off to the side? A 90* bend would get you mounted from the bottom and 180* may get you from the side?