Help please ideas needed for a 3 gallon/10 litre brewery build.

[aamcle]

I'm considering building a really small rig, I don't drink much so something that would produce a case or a case and a half would be great.

I'm not fond of biab even though its the obvious choice, I want something compact, easy to store and clean but with enough automation (PID?) to get reproducible results. I would also like to be able to do step mashes.

I would really appreciate your thoughts on this.

Many thanks. Aamcle

 

[iijakii]

I'd look at the Countertop Brutus 20 thread for inspiration if you aren't wanting to do BIAB.

 

[Wipper]

I just finished a version of this and did my first brew on it this past weekend. Far exeeded my expectations
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f170/110v-recirculating-ebiab-2-5-gallon-batches-341219/

 

[sablesurfer]

What specifically are your marks against BIAB? My first system was a 6 gal pot from Big Lots, a 120v RV water heater element, a small generic topsflow pump from ebay, and a PID system I rigged up based on many of PJ's drawings.

Worked so well I did about four brews before I started cutting holes in the 9 gal system to upgrade. Will still be BIAB.

You get great simplicity for recirculating mashes, you can step mash to your heart's content, and you really don't have to worry about HLT if you have big enough pot for grains and water. You can do bigger beers using less water and just heat up the last few gallons on the stove for when you mash out.

 

[aamcle]

I don't like lifting a heavy bag full of very hot grain and I found it to be messy.

How did you balance the flow so the pump didn't suck the area under the bag dry?

ATB. Aamcle

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Home Brew mobile app

 

[jCOSbrew]

I saw someone doing countertop eBIAB with an anova sous vide immersion circulator. It costs about $200 which is probably comparable to a basic PID control panel build.

For a 3 gallon batch, the grain bag will not be too heavy. 10 gallon high gravity batch is another story.