Building E-Brewery one element at a time

[JayUnt]

Hello All,

Short time brewer, short time HBT member and first time poster.

I am looking to upgrade from my turkey fryer propane setup to an electric brewery in my basement. As from what I've seen a lot on this forum, $$ is the limiting factor.

I found this instructable that looks pretty simple, even for a non-electrical person (I would be getting a electrician friend to do the spa panel and all of the important pieces, as to not kill myself and burn down the house).

This tutorial is for a single heating element with PID. As of now i don't have a pump but I am thinking that eventually I would be expanding to pumps and more heating elements. The enclosure he says to get is pretty small looking so it doesn't look like it can fit more switches, lights, bells and whistles.

Would it be a safer bet to just start off with a larger enclosure, so I can just keep adding on to it? Or is adding on not an option (i.e. I would have to take everything apart when I wanted to add a new element/pump), and I should just go with what he has? And I would take it apart later or possibly just make a new panel for each additional element.

Thanks,

Jason

 

[jeffmeh]

I would recommend spending some time considering what your "end game" might be. If you figure that out, it is possible to lay out some intermediate steps without having to throw away too much. And yes, that is a very small enclosure, and would likely be a throw away if you wanted to add capabilities.

 

[JayUnt]

Thanks.

My total end game would probably be, 2 heating elements, 3 pids, 2 pumps and a power switch.

I'm probably going to go the route of 1 element and 1 pid for a bk/hlt. Then eventually add 1 pump. Then eventually add another element and pid for hlt. And then lastly the last pump.

So I'm safe to assume that it's possible to keep adding on as long as there is room in the enclosure and there is enough power to it as well. Right?

 

[jeffmeh]

Sure, but you would also want to understand how you would ultimately lay out the panel, so that switches, lights, outlets, etc. go where you want them, and the internals are wired with an eye toward the future.

 

[JayUnt]

Perfect! I've been reading a lot of threads and seeing a lot of layouts where people go all out on their control panel. Even though my control panel will be very basic at first, I will keep in line with what they are doing.

It might look goofy at the beginning, with one pid and switch on a large box. But in the end it will be easier to not have to redo all previous steps when adding a new feature.

Thanks again for your help

 

[jeffmeh]

No worries. I'm a BIAB brewer and have had the plans for a single vessel e-brewery for years. Unfortunately, life has intervened and I cannot make it a priority. It would have been nice today, as I wanted to brew but the snow storm got in the way.

 

[alien]

A little bit of planned redundancy is OK if it helps keeps initial costs low in terms of time and money. I don't think I'm the only brewer to start with a kit, move on to BIAB, 2 vessels, 3 vessels... I don't use the brew bag any more but it was cheap.

That's to say IMO it is better to start small so that you that you can get up and running and actually brew something. The exception to that is if you know exactly what you want and are following a set of plans to the letter.

You can repurpose small controllers. I went with a single PID with 120V output which I have used so far only for operating an electric smoker and sous vide. I am planning to put a coil inside an electric kettle as a heat exchanger for a HERMS. The temperature will be controllable by the same PID. If and when I upgrade the controller, the PID will still be useful for the smoker and possibly also a temperature controlled FV. Likewise I have a standalone 12V PWM controller for the pump. If I upgrade that will still be useful to control a stir plate.

A couple of words about enclosures. As a general rule of thumb, you can't go wrong with bigger. But something that is portable might have more uses than a massive metal box. Toolboxes make cheap portable enclosures. And if you want something cheap and versatile, you might look to plastic rather than metal. It is also lighter and easier to drill.

My $.02

 

[JayUnt]

Good point. After thinking about it, I do have a plastic toolbox just sitting in my basement. I think I might just use that for now. It will allow me to learn how to wire everything up and not care about messing up a more expensive enclosure. Down the road when I want to add more pieces, I'll go for the bigger box. At that point I'll have my basement all setup, so portability won't be an issue.

Thank