HLT for HERM system

[mccarba]

This is my first post here, but I've been reading a lot of the threads and they have been extremely helpful. I've been brewing for just over a year and made the transition to all grain brewing about 3 months ago. I've decided to go all electric and also increase my batch size to 10 gallons. I have a room in the basement that can be dedicated to my brew setup. I've decided to go the HERMS route and I recently purchased two 20 gallon kettles from Spike brewing for my BK and MLT. For the HLT I hope to use a kettle that I got from my father.

My cousin is a welder and heard that my father was frying turkeys and he decided to make my father a stainless steel kettle. The problem is that the kettle is 30 gallons!! It was way too big to fry turkeys and you would spend a small fortune on peanut oil to get the level high enough to submerge the turkey.

So the pot sat in my father's garage for years. My father gave me the pot for free, which saves me the cost of a kettle, but I've read about 304 and 316 food grade stainless kettles. How do I determine if this is food grade and will this really mater for the HLT? From what I've read the hazards are with corosion and these normally take place in the presence of chlorides. I plan on using filtered water so this shouldn't be a problem right?

Kind regards,
Tony

 

[audger]

if its stainless steel, it shouldnt matter all that much what type of steel it is; 304/316 or other. they are all fine to use.

chlorine from regular city tap water really wont effect the pot, the concentration is too low and water isnt going to be left in the pot 24/7. just dont clean it with bleach or similar cleaners. the nice thing about stainless is that you can use anything from mild oxiclean all the way up to very harsh acids or caustic soda without much issue. chlorine is the one of the only few bad things you want to avoid around stainless steels.

 

[mccarba]

Awesome! That's what I figured, but I'm about to build my bench for the setup and I didn't want to start until I knew for sure. Thanks.

 

[Samuel9609]

Okay, so this kind of ties into the original posters system in the fact that he will have to find someway to regulate temperature but im also kind of hijacking (sorry) to ask a quick question. I am in the process of building my HERM setup and going tri clamp all the way. I do not want to have to buy a tee fitting to accept the temperature probe bc by the time I put the tee on and a 90* elbow my fittings are going to be sticking out about 6 inches from my HERM. I was wondering if anybody has looked into the smart clamps? I attached the picture of one and my idea (since they are around 200 a piece!!!!) is to buy just the smart gasket ($30) and a normal triclamp and then just drill a hole in the outside of the tri clamp and line up the gasket. Anybody got any ideas why this might not work.

 

[thelorax121]

I just found out about the smart clamps a few days ago. I am interested if anyone has used them yet as well, but given the price it's probably a long shot.