Budget false bottom.

[onelegout]

Hi HBT!

Checking in from sunny England with some pics of the latest addition to my 10 gallon eHERMS, a budget false bottom for my mash tun.

Items needed:
Oxo 'Good Grips' Splatter screen with handle:

http://www.amazon.com/Oxo-Splatter-Screen-Folding-Handle/dp/B0007VO0DU


3x small stainless steel bolts and nuts.

a brass tank connector or similar

Total cost = around £20 or $30 at most.

I cut the handle off the splatter screen and then cut and flattened the handle mounting point securely.

I then cut the hole for the tank connector, and the 4 holes for the bolts (which are used as stilts to keep it from collapsing.)

I fitted the tank connector and bolts fixed with nuts on the underside. I then grabbed the angle grinder and cut two slots in each side of the mash tun's opening so that I didnt have to make the false bottom a folding one.

I plan to fix it with 15mm copper pipe using a small length of hose to join it to the outlet. Any tips for keeping it securely on the bottom of the keg?

Some pics:

- H

Here's some pics.

 

[NoNothing]

DAMN, nice, and I went and spent a boat load for my NB false bottom.

You crafty bastard, Ill raise a pint in your honor!

 

[TriangleIL]

How well does this work?

 

[Walker]

nice!
.....

 

[bendavanza]

I would think your dip tube would hold it down well if you use rigid copper.

 

[onelegout]

glad you guys like it I've yet to test how well it works but I can't see any reason why it would be worse than a commercial one as they're the same concept when it comes down to it. I'll be rebuilding my brewery this weekend and brewing on it again next week so I'll let you know how well it works!
bendavanza - Cheers for the tip yeah for some reason I had decided to use some silicone hose to join the two as I thought it would be easier to remove but now I realise that I dont have to worry about the compression fittings getting loose from being tightened and loosened all the time as it doesn't have to be a watertight seal! will definitely use copper.

 

[ScottyBones]

looks great! do you have a lot of dead space below the bottom? i notice the pickup doesn't go very low

 

[onelegout]

there' s about 20mm of dead space, which isn't much wort at all. If you were worried about it you could always drill out the back of the tank connector (I think you guys call it a bulkhead fitting or something?) to 15mm and solder in a small peice of 15mm pipe so that it reached the bottom.

 

[ScottyBones]

very cool. is that a sanke keg for your kettle?

 

[onelegout]

I'm not sure what a sanke keg is It's a keg that I got from a keg scrapyard here in the uk

 

[SAMPLER]

This was a post on the "Green Board" last year sometime and from what I remember the results were very positive.

 

[Cpt_Kirks]

This is SO tagged for when I get back from vacation!

:rockin:

 

[J-Malone]

Is there an update on the effectiveness of this as a false bottom?

 

[forcabrew]

I am alos intrested in the effectiveness on this false bottom as I will be working on my keggles in the next few weeks.

 

[KozHops]

Any updates on this? I just saw this at Target for $20

 

[noodle23]

I'm not sure what a sanke keg is It's a keg that I got from a keg scrapyard here in the uk

Wait a minute wait a minute... there are scrapeyards for kegs in the uk? why can't i find those here in the us?

 

[Nightbiker]

we recycle ours into tin cups for orphans.
Excellent re-purposing of materials Onelegout. Very cool (and inexpensive).
I cant imagine that its efficiency would be anything different than any other false bottom. The holes on the thing look comparable to the false bottom in my MT...

 

[stlbeer]

Any updates on this? I just saw this at Target for $20

Wow - just found the ad at Target:

http://www.target.com/gp/detail.htm...110944&ci_sku=B001QA46TE&ref=tgt_adv_XSG10001

 

[Apoxbrew]

So what's the size of this? Link says 7 and 8 inches, but open pics make it look more like 12 given how well it fits the keggle.

 

[timbudtwo]

I have only read about false bottoms. I am assuming this is how it works to filter off all the stuff (drawn to represent this design.)

Is this right?

 

[bovineblitz]

^ correct

 

[timbudtwo]

^ correct

unfortunate page break was unfortunate.

But thank you

 

[bovineblitz]

unfortunate page break was unfortunate.

But thank you

I have mine set to something like 40 posts per page so it looks good to me

 

[timbudtwo]

I have mine set to something like 40 posts per page so it looks good to me

I use autopager (after noticing what happened) and now I have all posts on the same page .

 

[KozHops]

So what's the size of this? Link says 7 and 8 inches, but open pics make it look more like 12 given how well it fits the keggle.

pretty sure it said 13 on the packaging

 

[timbudtwo]

just picked one of these up, will let you know how it goes with pix!

 

[drumming102]

yea let us know. I'm getting one if so

 

[timbudtwo]

I'm going to cut off the top of my keg tomorrow so I will see how this fits. Going to use some brass or ss steel fittings and use some rigid copper tubing to hold it down all nice and tight like.

Hopefully pix tomorrow

 

[timbudtwo]

So I have one of the older style kegs that is bulbous, or pot belly I guess. Found it on the side of the road on one of the bulk trash pickup days (yes, I do that.) It was a bit hard to fit in, but it sat wonderfully against the bottom.

So I went down to the depot to try to find the parts. Was going to get a brass ball valve with a compression nut, almost 7 bucks. And some copper pipe and a 90 degree elbow. And then after trying to figure out how to mount this thing with a couple different brass fittings the price was getting close to 30 bucks. There has to be a better way to mount this to the stainless screen.

To the op: what is the part name you used on there (the base)? I couldnt find it for the life of me.

 

[timbudtwo]

So I was thinking of doing something like this:

However, I don't think I will need the O-rings if I am just getting it to clamp onto the ss mesh.
However, I cannot find those thin locknuts at home depot. I am in the tri valley and all I have is the depot and lowes (trash), OSH (double trash) and ace (expensive but has crazy parts.)

My idea was to have some rigid copper from the keg wall go to a 90* that will extend down and put a bit of pressure on the ss mesh to keep it against the base of the keg. I would just solder the brass to the copper for the connections on the interior.

Anyone know of an easier/cheaper way to accomplish this?