Plumbing my brewery so I don't have to move hoses.

I finished plumbing my brewery with valves and hoses so that I no longer have to move hoses around during a brew session. I created a YouTube showing it: [ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISM8KvbBH5s[/ame]

I am uploading some pictures of the brewery and the piping schematic.

Seems like a cool idea - but all those valves would confuse the living heck out of me on a brew day...

stratslinger said:

Seems like a cool idea - but all those valves would confuse the living heck out of me on a brew day...

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yeah thats a lot of valves.. It doesnt have to be quite that complex though. I got lucky with the small dc pumps because I can use pwm instead of another valve to regulate flow and also the wort can be pushed backwards through the pump fine by another pump... plus they are so cheap I can intall a bunch inline and leave them there for their individual tasks. I dont move any hoses at all during brewing... only a few ball valves.. and the rims makes a perfect "Manifold" to replces much of the hoses... I have thought about eliminating more of the hoses and have the kettles connect direct to the rims via camlocks but I would loose some flexibility especially when I reconfigure them for cip cleaning. That hose hanging is the hose from my chiller that I fill my conicals with.

How complicated is the process of cleaning all that, and making sure that every section of the manifolds that needs cleaning gets it?

I was thinking about cleaning also. I think I would rather move hoses than have all that spaghetti... Right now my rig is 3 tier gravity. Only short pieces of tubing to get from the valve to the next vessel.

That's a lot of valves! Have you used it for real yet? How'd it work? I've thought about doing a static manifold in the past, but I always end up feeling too lazy and unmotivated to think through my valve placement. (I use a peristaltic pump with a reversible motor, so I can do some oddball stuff to avoid moving hoses). At the end of the day I just have like half a dozen hemostats on a magnetic knife strip and I use those to pinch off the hoses when I move them.

There are a lot of valves!

While planning it out, after putting it together and and continuing to look at it, I could for sure reduce the number of valves, as long as I don't want to change anything.

For example, if I have a 2way valve on the output of my MT, HLT or Boil Kettle and the hose goes to another 2 way valve on the other end, the second valve is probably not always necessary. Where there are 3 way valves with a "T" and a 2 way valve hung off the "T" ,I could eliminate the 2 way valve, as long as there is a valve on the other end of the hose. Nothing is going to get through that point unless the opposite end is opened. That is great during brewing but it would limit what I could do at that point if I ever wanted to move hoses or disconnect the other end for cleaning (i.e. the mash tun after mashing). So having a valve on both ends of a hose does give me the opportunity to pull hoses and move things around should I find the need, without a lot of forethought and mess.

Also, as Augiedoggie says If I added another dedicated tan pump or two I could isolate one or two spots and not have to keep swapping in the chugger pump. I may do this once I am convinced that I can eliminate grain particles from the RIMS recirculation portion. I also run water backwards through the pumps when I am filling the HLT.

Cleaning it shouldn't be a big deal. When I am done, since I have a sink right next to the stand I can circulate a few gallons of Oxiclean throughout and then run hot water through everything to rinse it.

In answer to the "How is it on a Brew day?" question. I will let you know.

I plan on brewing in a couple days. I do know that I will probably be drinking nothing stronger than coffee and soda.

It is hard enough for me to figure out brewing manually moving things around. I think using the new system is really going to tax my mental abilities at first.

stratslinger said:

How complicated is the process of cleaning all that, and making sure that every section of the manifolds that needs cleaning gets it?

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I run hot water through it from the HLT after brewing and every few brews or so I recirculate pbw or oxy through it... every now and again Ill pull a ballvalve apart just to make sure they are still clean behind the ball.

bittersweet once you have a few brews on this system under your belt it will be like second nature to you.

augiedoggy said:

I run hot water through it from the HLT after brewing and every few brews or so I recirculate pbw or oxy through it... every now and again Ill pull a ballvalve apart just to make sure they are still clean behind the ball.

bittersweet once you have a few brews on this system under your belt it will be like second nature to you.

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That's is pretty close to what I do too.

Hey Augiedoggy. I just got all the parts and put together an inline carbonater similar to the one on your build progress thread. Hope to use it on a keg of Milk Stout tonight or tomorrow. I'll probably start a thread showing it. Testing it in a bucket, it looks like it is going to work pretty well. At a total of about $30 using some hose and connectors I already had it is a bunch cheaper than the $180 Blichmann Quick Carb.

kh54s10 said:

I was thinking about cleaning also. I think I would rather move hoses than have all that spaghetti... Right now my rig is 3 tier gravity. Only short pieces of tubing to get from the valve to the next vessel.

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I see your point but I have a rims setup and honestly mine is configured so theres no wort left in the system... the sparge water is the last thing to be pushed through the hoses and manifold so its really more efficient than swapping hoses. I do plan on now moving the three way valve under my BK over to replace the tee next to it due to some other changes in hardware that make it rather pointless where its at.

dryboroughbrewing said:

That's a lot of valves! Have you used it for real yet? How'd it work? I've thought about doing a static manifold in the past, but I always end up feeling too lazy and unmotivated to think through my valve placement. (I use a peristaltic pump with a reversible motor, so I can do some oddball stuff to avoid moving hoses). At the end of the day I just have like half a dozen hemostats on a magnetic knife strip and I use those to pinch off the hoses when I move them.

Click to expand...

You know, there are so many valves and hoses that I just realized I have the plumbing schematic drawn incorrectly. The boil kettle out and the CFC out are reversed in the drawing. The picture is right.

I did some revisions to streamline mine abit today.. I know it doesnt look much different, I also angled the pipes so they drain more consistently.