Dual RoboBrew HERMS idea. Feedback welcomed!

[mdrose]

Hey fellow homebrewers:
I’m working on an upgrade to my brewing set up, and would love some input and comments from any of you with some more experience than me in this area.
My current set up is a RoboBrew V3 35L and SS Brewtech chronical 7 gallon. Ive made many batches over about a year with this set up and i’m generally happy with it, but looking to upgrade in volume and also ability to better control my mash temp.
I already pulled the trigger to buy a 14g SS Brewtech chronical, and now my plan is to add a RoboBrew Brewzilla (65L) and still connect in my smaller RoboBrew 35L as a HERMS HLT and also use the RB 35L for cooling the wort at end of boil by filling with ice water and running my wort through the HERMS.
Since both RoboBrews have built in pumps, i think I’ve figured out a way to plumb this al together for an efficient brew process with much less moving around of hoses and lifting and emptying the vessels.
Attached is a diagram showing the set up.
This should allow me to just move valve levers and press pump switches to fill up the tanks, circulate and control wort temp for mash, boil, cool and even rinse for cleaning with much less moving around hoses and vessels. Not shown is a pulley system i’m planning to lift the malt pipe for sparging.
I would appreciate any comments, ideas, suggestions or pointing out potential problems for this system before i go forward with installing 220V outlet and buying the big RoboBrew 65L. But i think ive considered everything and I’m pretty psyched about my plans.

 

[Pete S]

Thanks for sharing the diagram. I haven't homebrewed in 30 years, but I'm thinking about getting back into it. I've looked at most of the all grain all-in-one systems and user reviews for them. Some people seem to have great success with them, while other people seem to have problems with overly compacted grain beds, wort/trub burning on the bottom, and being able to brew high ABV beer without using malt extract. I don't drink much high ABV beer, so that doesn't matter to me too much. It seems like the grain bed problems are mostly due to grain that's milled to finely, or more often due to too high of recirculation flow rates. I'm torn between just getting something like an Anvil foundry vs. going with 3 pot system. For a three pot system, I was thinking about going with one 10 gallon SS Brewtech kettle, a 10 gallon SS Brewtech mash tun, and something like the 6.5 gallon Anvil Foundry to act as a HERMS and to provide sparging water, but not for mashing and boiling. Total cost of that with a pump and recirculation kit for the mash tun would be $1200+ vs. $470 for the 10.5 gallon Anvil Foundry with their recirculation kit. If I was going with the separate mash tun and boil kettle, I'm not sure that the larger Anvil offers any advantages.

Some of the HERMS and RIMS systems and controllers get really expensive. The Anvil Foundry has precise temperature control and it comes with a stainless steel wort chilling coil, for $275USD. Alternatives would be a Digiboil kettle + a separate heat exchange coil, or a RoboBrew unit. I can't find much in terms of people using one of these as a HERMS unit, but it seems like it should work fine to me, as you were thinking as well. With a 3 pot system, I was figuring that I would:
1) heat my mash water to strike water temp in the SS kettle
2) heat water in the Foundry to mash temp, with the wort chiller submerged, and hooked up to recirculate wort from the mash tun via a pump
3) fill mash tun with strike water, stir in grain, rest, recirculate, etc.
4) raise temp in Foundry to mash out temp (or slightly higher), while continuing to slowly recirculate
5) once mash tun is at mash out temp, turn off pump, and move coil to an ice bath in another pot or cooler, switch coil outlet to SS kettle
6) slowly drain mash tun to SS kettle and sparge with water from Foundry (which is at mash out temp)
7) boil wort...

I was still thinking through this process when I saw your post above. I hadn't really considered using the same heat exchange coil for both HERMS and chilling down the wort for the fermenter, but it only makes sense to do so. Thanks.

Have you implemented what you wrote above? Does my approach sound reasonable?

-Pete

 

[joelbear5]

While I don't have any experience with the RoboBrew products, I have built my own electric HERMS brewery, so hopefully my feedback has some value.

I upgraded from a RIMS system and haven't looked back. The RIMS heater coil burned the grain particles that made it past the filter at the beginning of the wort circulation. I think your planned system is sound, so I'll give some tips that I learned the hard way.

1. Don't try bending your own coil. Just buy one! I used this one in my HLT Keggle. HERMS Coil, 304 Stainless Steel, 42' x 1/2'' OD Tubing
2. I went with pull-through solder compression fittings. Pull Through Solderable 1/2'' Compression I regrettably went with stainless ferrules, but so far still have one leaking, so I just recommend going Nylon instead (I'm switching to Nylon). I think Nylon will be strong enough since the coil is supported top and bottom.
3. It looks like you have an excessive use of valves. I would use cam-lock connectors and move silicone hoses around as needed - maybe add additional valves later. I recommend only using cam-lock hose connectors because when they are hot, they are the easiest to disconnect without burning yourself. The BLQD connectors are very difficult to remove and require grasping with your whole hand (and sometimes both hands) to disconnect. Not fun when they are 160°F.

 

[Heer4beer]

I was actually thinking about doing something very similar. I have a mash and boil and has been using it for the past few years with little to no issues. I found a hell of a deal on a 3V keggle gas system that I could not pass up. Currently my fermentation chamber can only support 1 5 gal batch at a time and I was afraid that using a uncovered keggle for a mash tun would have serious temperature changes during a 1 hour period.
I was about to pull the trigger on a RIMS system and just call it a day but after reading reviews about scorching it put me off a little..
My new idea is basically what you’re doing by filling my mash and boil with my strike water and using my 50ft SS immersion chiller to pump wort through while it’s submerged in my “temp controlled” hlt (mash and boil)

If you go through with your idea I’d be very interested to hear in how it’s working out for you. I would like to avoid drilling holes in my mash and boil So I can still use it as an all in one EBIAB system in the garage in the colder months.