I have an electric setup with a homemade controller and I use gravity draining since I'm never in a rush when brewing. I go HLT into my cooler, then into BK. But that's about to change. A buddy of mine is moving out of state and gave me all of his brewing stuff including a HERMS pot with coil, a Kal electric panel almost fully assembled, two march pumps, and even a s-t-i-l-l (shhh) and I felt like a kid on christmas morning. Other than changing up my routine for brew day, anything else I should expect as far as new troubles? In a weird way I'm disappointed that I can brew on a level bench because I was going to weld myself a cool gravity stand which would take up less floor space than a large brew bench. I'll probably figure out a way to attach everything onto one unit like a hose routed in from outside the garage and another drain hose, a filter mounted (in my care package), and all my gear.
My current Mash tun is a 36 qt cooler and I use a grain bag so i get very clear wort. If the HERMS pot is now going to be my HLT, then my current HLT has no use really. It's a 10 gallon pot with drain valve attached, sight glass, etc. My BK is a keggle. I suppose I should add some wall mounted fill ports for the hoses, since I normally top load my pots.
any other pointers? And to be clear, I've made damned good beer with my old setup and had NO plans to change...but this stuff was just too good to pass up.
My current Mash tun is a 36 qt cooler and I use a grain bag so i get very clear wort. If the HERMS pot is now going to be my HLT, then my current HLT has no use really. It's a 10 gallon pot with drain valve attached, sight glass, etc. My BK is a keggle. I suppose I should add some wall mounted fill ports for the hoses, since I normally top load my pots.
any other pointers? And to be clear, I've made damned good beer with my old setup and had NO plans to change...but this stuff was just too good to pass up.