$50 Dedicated HERMS

Falcon3 · Feb 10, 2015

You could probably get away with it, but it wouldn't be without risk. 1300watts pulls a little over 10 amps- the STC is rated for 10amps. If you preheated your HERMS water, the STC would go on and off much more rapidly, so you'd probably be ok, but there is still the risk of pulling too much and having serious problems.

I would NOT use it to preheat your water- going from tap temp up to mash temps would mean the STC would be ON for way too long- almost definitely overheating the internal wiring and ruining your STC, as well as putting yourself in danger for fires.

If you were dead-set on using the STC with 1300watts, I would DEFINITELY do as someone above stated, and wire up an AC-AC Solid State Relay- this would put the burden of the amperage on a much better piece of equipment.

atoughram · Feb 10, 2015

grrickar said:
So would an STC1000 be able to switch a 1300W hot plate? Not that it is needed for this, but thinking I could heat my water for the mash on it as well prior to calling it into service for HERMS.

Also, just a thought - I go SS for all my kettles that contact wort but in this case since it isn't in contact, so would an aluminum kettle transfer the heat to the water (and the coil) quicker?

This is the hot plate I was looking at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000I14C7I/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

Nope - thats 11 amps - STC's are only good for 10 amps.

You could have the STC switch a SSR that could switch a hot plate though.

poptarts · Feb 10, 2015

Yea get an AC-AC SSR they are like 10$ on ebay for a 40A one, well worth it if you are going to get near the limit of the stc.

grrickar · Feb 10, 2015

I wasn't planning to use the STC in the loop to preheat the mash tun water, just use the plate on high to get there, mash in, then use some remaining water in the HERMS kettle. At that point I'd call the STC into service to maintain the temp for the recirculation. I was suspecting that 1300w would be pushing it.

CarbonTom · Mar 2, 2015

Genuine said:
View attachment 205629

Here's the American wheat I brewed with this system. I had the clearest wort I've ever seen. Hit all my numbers and it was nice keeping a mash temp for an entire hour. Can't wait to brew again in a couple weekends!

Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

Hey where did you get the glass? Is it a stone or DFH one, or is it plain? I've been searching for a plain one foreverr

grrickar · Mar 6, 2015

I made a copper coil from 10' of 1/2" tubing, and I bought a 20 qt SS kettle cheap.

I have tubing and camlocks and a pump. My 10 gallon mash tun is an Igloo Cooler. It holds temp decent, but I was thinking of the economy HERMS setup, and I think there are two ways about it - interested in thoughts of which would be better:

I have a hot plate to heat the 20 qt vessel, and an STC to control the temp.

Option 1: Put the coil in the 20 qt vessel and heat the water, temp controlled by STC, and pipe the wort from the mash tun thru the coil, then back in top of the mash tun.

Benefits: I am essentially vorlaufting for the duration

Cons: risk of grain bed compaction? losses to wort transfer

Option 2: Put the coil in the mash tun, circulate temp controlled hot water from the HLT thru the coil and back into the HLT

Benefits: Possibly better heat transfer? Tubing is cleaner, as is inside of coil, no transfer losses of wort since it isn't going anywhere

Cons: Outside of coil will need more cleaning. Still have to vorlauft

Interested to hear who has tried which method and what the results were...

poptarts · Mar 6, 2015

Option 2 is dumb, option 1 is the only real option. Compaction of grain bed is not a real concern and loss of wort in the coil can be prevented by pumping sparge water through the coil during the sparge.

gromitdj · Mar 7, 2015

I don't think option #2 is dumb.

I believe another benefit to #2 is that it will likely result in a more precise control of the mash tun as a whole, since it will essentially maintain the entire mash volumes temperature rather than a small portion of it at a time. My opinion is strictly based on assumption, however.

It may require a little more effort in clean-up. My suggestion is to try them both and report back before settling for a permanent installation.

JohnSand · Mar 7, 2015

Great thread. Thank you all.

dirkomatic · Apr 10, 2015

This thread inspired me, although I'm a stainless, camlock guy, in cheap about everything else. I found an 18' 3/8" stainless coil on ebay for $38 shipped and built this with that coil and camlock fittings. The stupid fittings cost $30.

I had a short thermowell which I put in a stainless tee for the sensor. I'm not sure if the temp rating / food safeness if that probe.

But I just built it and tested tonight and I must say, I'm very pleased. Thanks poptarts for thinking of this...

I tested pumping at some different rates to see how things would work with a mash going. At times, there was a 2 degree drop, but it recovered in 6 minutes.

I started with 120 degree water in the mash tun and the HERMS kettle and was able to raise it to 130 in about 20 minutes.

I am using about 1.75 gallons in the HERMS kettle and circulated 3.75 gallons. I can't wait until I get a weekend to brew and try it for real.

View attachment 1428723082440.jpg

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poptarts · Apr 13, 2015

Right on, that HERMS coil is way nice.

dirkomatic · Apr 13, 2015

Thanks. When I saw that coil on ebay, it sealed the deal. I couldn't pass on it... Although if I hadn't seen your HERMS here first, I wouldn't have been looking for that coil 😊

dstauth · Jun 9, 2015

Just finished mine last week and used it on the weekend. Took a little getting used to but it worked great and I hit my numbers. I put the temp control and my cheap solar pump into a toolbox so it can be portable. Thanks for this thread!

atouk · Jun 13, 2015

What a great idea! I'm definitely incorporating this into my build. I had been pretty bummed that my budget didn't allow for a herms HLT setup, but this I can definitely squeeze in since all I need to buy is the copper and hot plate. The rest I have already.

gwcr · Sep 3, 2015

dstauth said:
Just finished mine last week and used it on the weekend. Took a little getting used to but it worked great and I hit my numbers. I put the temp control and my cheap solar pump into a toolbox so it can be portable. Thanks for this thread!

Great looking setup! What pump are you using? Just started looking at the solar ones and can't tell if they are actually food grade or not.

dstauth · Sep 6, 2015

gwcr said:
Great looking setup! What pump are you using? Just started looking at the solar ones and can't tell if they are actually food grade or not.

I'm using the 24V version of the tan solar pumps. There is a huge thread on them and it seems the tan versions are considered food grade. Here is the one I bought on ebay http://www.ebay.com/itm/Solar-DC-12...3M-new-/251478928442?var=&hash=item3a8d4fec3a

It does a great job and if I ever need to replace it, it won't break the bank. It doesn't show any signs of dying, but I might buy a backup pump just in case.

gwcr · Sep 8, 2015

dstauth said:
I'm using the 24V version of the tan solar pumps. There is a huge thread on them and it seems the tan versions are considered food grade. Here is the one I bought on ebay http://www.ebay.com/itm/Solar-DC-12...3M-new-/251478928442?var=&hash=item3a8d4fec3a

It does a great job and if I ever need to replace it, it won't break the bank. It doesn't show any signs of dying, but I might buy a backup pump just in case.

Thanks!

nfuids · Nov 25, 2015

KegWrangler said:
I ran a few quick calcs...

Looks like the hot plate is 800W. If the 8qt pot is full of water in the range of 160*F and the heat transfer between plate and pot is 100% you could raise the temperature of the 2 gallons in the pot ~ 2.5*F every minute.

So If you are running 150*F wort through the HERMS at 1gpm you should be able to step about 5*F per minute (assuming perfect transfer of heat from Plate to pot through HERMS, etc). Unfortunately this would be the temp gain of that 1 gallon so the mash temperature increase would be that divided by the total mash volume (1*F/min for a 5 gallon mash, 0.5*F/min @ 10gallons...etc).

If you intend to use the HERMS to maintin temp and set your HERMS temp to match then more thermal mass is better. However, as it sounds that you want to be able to step the temperature up quickly, a smaller thermal mass sounds right.

Anyway, good luck...I am interested to see how the real world results turn out as I have been prepping a similar build but with a 1500W water heater element in a 3 gallon pot (running 2/3rds full for smaller thermal mass).

How do you do such calculation?

Genuine · Dec 10, 2015

I'm looking to upgrade my current heat source from the hot plate to a bucket heater. Mine right now in a 50 degree garage and even colder floors, is having a bit of trouble keeping temp in a keggle mash tun. I think the bucket heater being right in the water maybe better

Here's my current set up now, haven't shared it yet:

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1449769731.602680.jpg

poptarts · Dec 10, 2015

have you tried some reflectix around the mashtun? But you are correct an element directly in the liquid will be much more efficient but you will need a relay or and SSR that can handle more than 10 amps if you go like over 1000w.

Genuine · Dec 10, 2015

The bucket heaters I've been finding are right at 1000w. However I've been searching to see if adding a SSR would allow me to control my 2000w HotRod with the STC-1000 but haven't found a definite answer.

poptarts · Dec 10, 2015

Genuine said:
The bucket heaters I've been finding are right at 1000w. However I've been searching to see if adding a SSR would allow me to control my 2000w HotRod with the STC-1000 but haven't found a definite answer.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/25A-AC-AC-S...012129?hash=item51b0d3a821:g:A7gAAOSw-vlViS7Y
This will do exactly what you need. For 2000w just make sure you have a 20a circuit not a 15.

Turkeyshot · Dec 11, 2015

poptarts said:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/25A-AC-AC-S...012129?hash=item51b0d3a821:g:A7gAAOSw-vlViS7Y
This will do exactly what you need. For 2000w just make sure you have a 20a circuit not a 15.

How do you wire the SSR to the STC-1000? Does the relay have its own power wired to it or is it just in line after the STC-1000?

mattrox · Dec 12, 2015

Turkeyshot said:
How do you wire the SSR to the STC-1000? Does the relay have its own power wired to it or is it just in line after the STC-1000?

You de-solder the relay from the STC and run the + & - that fed the stc relay to an ssr.

I haven't done it yet, but I think the STC 1000+ thread has some pictures of how to do it. I plan to use one to control a 1V system I'm planning.

poptarts · Dec 12, 2015

mattrox said:
You de-solder the relay from the STC and run the + & - that fed the stc relay to an ssr.

I haven't done it yet, but I think the STC 1000+ thread has some pictures of how to do it. I plan to use one to control a 1V system I'm planning.

there are plenty of ways to not solderer anything

ianw58 · Dec 12, 2015

Sub'd. Thread told not working on my tablet this am.

poptarts · Dec 12, 2015

Turkeyshot · Dec 12, 2015

poptarts said:

Okay, thanks! I will have to give it a try. And by looking at the drawing it looks like the STC-1000 relay is triggering the SSR which will then be switching on the element and then handling the load.

poptarts · Dec 13, 2015

Turkeyshot said:
Okay, thanks! I will have to give it a try. And by looking at the drawing it looks like the STC-1000 relay is triggering the SSR which will then be switching on the element and then handling the load.

correct.

Turkeyshot · Dec 13, 2015

Perfect! Thanks again.

$50 Dedicated HERMS

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