I went from a 3V keggle system with gas kettle, electric HLT/HERMS and cooler mash tun. I really love this thing, especially once you read through this thread and get it dialed in. I'm making some of the best beer I've made in the last 10+ years of home brewing and you can't beat the simplicity of the AF especially with clean up.
I got the C.U.SS brewing tri-coil- specified for the Anvil 10.5. It sits perfectly in the foundry.
I went from a 3 vessel gas Rims system, and I don’t regret downsizing one bit. Once you get the AF system down I’m sure you’ll enjoy it. I haven’t noticed any major changes in my beers with the exception of efficiency in the very beginning. You’ll see a lot of guys on here (myself included) that use a bag in the malt pipe (clean up is so much easier with it) and crush a little finer. I ended up building a small stand on wheels for mine and utilized my old pid control panel to control my pump and get secondary temp readings, cause why not. It’s much easier to clean as well.
I honestly never really targeted a specific water to grist ratio with my foundry. I use beer smith FYI and did not include an "recoverable dead space" to denote the water below the malt-pipe and around the sides that aren't in contact with the grains. With that being said, I know that the mash will always be thicker in the malt-pipe than what beer smith tells me it will be. By my calculations on the 10.5g foundry, the malt pipe fits 7 gallons if its filled to the brim and about 6.5gallons if its filled to just below the ridge the disc sits on. So it will definitely be thicker. My approach though has always been that I keep it as thin as reasonably possible while still allowing for a 1-1.5gallon sparge. I also have my equipment profile setup to purposefully take more losses into the fermenter to get just the clean stuff in the fermenter with minimal trub. So in the end, I probably use more water than most anyways. But these types of data (how much wort loss are you willing to leave behind, boil off rate, etc) are what matter to me more than the water to grist ratio. I digress but with my last two NEIPAs (17lbs of grains), beer smith told me my water to grist ratio was 1.85 and 1.75. So that might give you a basis for comparison. Keep it loose will also help with recirculation to help with temperature stability and also help prevent any stuck sparges.
I have started doing no sparge with smallish grain bills, so I go with the amount of water I want to start the boil. However, with 13.25 lbs of grain I would likely do a dunk sparge with a 1.5 or 2 gals just to get all the sugar I can. With 13.25 lbs and basically 6 gals you still end up with almost 2q per lb. The difference appears to be about .2 gal per lb, that's not much.
After 10 or so brews with the Anvil, I have learned that what works for me is to ignore Anvil's recommendation and use a 1.75 ratio along with 8 oz of rice hulls in with the grains. I just increase the sparge amount to get my pre-boil level up to 7 gallons. I also always use the small ring adaptor and have used as much as a 15 lb grain bill without a problem. My efficiency is consistently in the 70%-75% range. I think all the brew's have been decent and all of my family and friends seem to really enjoy it. Maybe because it's free, I don't know?
Those nubs are the exact reason why I never considered it as well as I thought the same about my bag. When I was using the bag in malt-pipe though I was getting 75-78% mash/lauter efficiency on average with grain bills ranging from 13-19lbs. So I was happy with those numbers for sure on this system. The higher grain bills obviously took a little more stirring and recirculating slowly to avoid a stuck mash but still had solid mash/lauter efficiencies (with a 1-1.5gallon sparge).
It did for me, but I changed a couple other parts of the process at the same time such as more sparge water, rice hulls.
I bolted my chugger pump down to my brew cart (harbor freight furniture mover) took care of that problem. I’ve got a inlet, outlet, PID thermowell in a “T” fitting and a burp valve, all of which are valved and it doesn’t move one bit.
In regards to the SS pump head, I agree with @tracer bullet in that this in the eye of the beholder, also meaning it really depends on how you want to run this system. For me, I haven't pulled the trigger on this as of yet. The plastic pump head works well on its own and the connections are very secure with the white clips. But here is where the SS pump head MAY be helpful: 1) if you have a pump outlet valve to control flow, it would seem that the SS pump head would be better. I use a ball valve that is in-line with the output hose (not directly attached to the pump) and needed to built a simple stand from wood to support the ball valve. 2) if you like to brew with free roaming pellets (like I do), I have had a small handful of times (out of about 40 brews total) where pellets (for me that's been Saaz) can clog the plastic inlet because the plastic inlet has a restriction on the inside. Im not sure if the SS pump head has this same internal restrictor, my guess would be it doesn't but not sure. 3) if you plan to do any hose changes from the plastic pump head, over the course fo the mash, the tubing almost seems to "bond" to the plastic head and its a PITA to remove the tubing while its hot. I do a hose change because I actually drain the mash off to a second vessel and in order to get it back to the foundry for the boil you need to switch the inlet/outlets off the pump. Having a SS pump with proper QDs would make this switch easy peasy.
That flow appears good to me.
Are you referring to the three-sided strips in the inlet? What are the pros/cons in removing those? I suppose potentially could allow something in that might damage the pump impeller but surely pellet hop mush would not. Twice now I have clogged the pump with pellet hop debris.
