How shall I control ferm temperature without investing a lot of cash?

[Elysium]

I am just wondering how I could control temperature for several 50-gallon fermentors? I dont want to spend a lot of money and buy coated fermentors. I'd like to get several 50-gallon fermentors and use the very same temperature to ferment my different beers. But is there a cheap way to do this?

I was thinking of creating a small fermentation room and get a hot/cold AC system installed. It might be really expensive though regarding the electricity bill.

Any thoughts on this?

 

[AnOldUR]

I am just wondering how I could control temperature for several 50-gallon fermentors?

You do realize this is a homebrew forum?

You may just be exceeding the 100 gallons per person per year legal limit.

 

[F_R_O_G]

i'v found this cooler that Jamil Zainasheff made http://www.mrmalty.com/brewstuff.php

 

[ianw58]

You may just be exceeding the 100 gallons per person per year legal limit.

That's a U.S. Federal limit. He's in Spain...

Just sayin'

 

[Black Island Brewer]

You do realize this is a homebrew forum?

You may just be exceeding the 100 gallons per person per year legal limit.

In the US, yes....what is the legal limit in Spain? This is, after all, an international homebrew forum...

 

[m00ps]

You do realize this is a homebrew forum?

You may just be exceeding the 100 gallons per person per year legal limit.

Haha, I forgot about that. Last year I'm pretty sure I passed that by March. I wonder how many criminals we have on this forum....

 

[pegcitybrewer]

WHAT!?! there's a limit in the US? Oh Canada, I love you so much. As long as I can drink it I can brew it (I'm pretty sure).

 

[broadbill]

There are no free lunches-

Scaling up costs money. Period....gotta spend money to make money.

Buying a used cold room (panels and compressor unit) is probably your best bet. Pray the compressor doesn't blow.

 

[mredge73]

Cold room may work best but won't likely be the cheapest solution.

One suggestion is to check out what behemoth does:
http://brewhemoth.com/

They install a drop down coil inside the fermentor and pump cool liquid through it.
There are many different solutions to building a chiller that are fairly cheap.
You could simply pump cold water through it cooled from a refrigerator nearby or build a glycol chiller out of a window unit.

 

[IslandLizard]

Madrid is a hot place except in winter. So 3/4 of the year you'll be looking for cooling needs, and perhaps a 1/4 to heating when needed.

Once the fermentors are brought to their target temperature, your cooling needs from that point on all depend on heat loss. In an ideal situation, where your heat loss to the environment (Madrid air) would be zero, you only need to cool what the fermentation generates. So a cold room with super-insulation will keep the cooling needs (and costs) to a minimum. An uninsulated 50 gallon barrel in the cold room will be cooled from the outside, but generates heat inside. Most commercial fermentors (much larger than a barrel) work similarly, relying on the cooling jacket and convection currents in the fermentor to keep the whole container of beer within a desired temp range (within 1-2 °C of target). Whether an additional coil inside the drum is needed depends on how well you can control the temps (recovery) and your fermenting parameters and requirements. A fan blowing chilled air onto a fermentor drum inside your cold room, maybe all you need.

Added:
Super-insulation in typically done with thick styrofoam walls (12") with minimal cold/heat bridges and prevention of other thermal leaks. A double envelope, a room within a room is a good example of creating such an environment. Cost would not be excessive for a 20'x30' room as such. A relatively small air conditioner would be plenty to compensate 1000 BTU per hour heat loss/heat generation.

 

[Elysium]

Madrid is a hot place except in winter. So 3/4 of the year you'll be looking for cooling needs, and perhaps a 1/4 to heating when needed.

Once the fermentors are brought to their target temperature, your cooling needs from that point on all depend on heat loss. In an ideal situation, where your heat loss to the environment (Madrid air) would be zero, you only need to cool what the fermentation generates. So a cold room with super-insulation will keep the cooling needs (and costs) to a minimum. An uninsulated 50 gallon barrel in the cold room will be cooled from the outside, but generates heat inside. Most commercial fermentors (much larger than a barrel) work similarly, relying on the cooling jacket and convection currents in the fermentor to keep the whole container of beer within a desired temp range (within 1-2 °C of target). Whether an additional coil inside the drum is needed depends on how well you can control the temps (recovery) and your fermenting parameters and requirements. A fan blowing chilled air onto a fermentor drum inside your cold room, maybe all you need.

Added:
Super-insulation in typically done with thick styrofoam walls (12") with minimal cold/heat bridges and prevention of other thermal leaks. A double envelope, a room within a room is a good example of creating such an environment. Cost would not be excessive for a 20'x30' room as such. A relatively small air conditioner would be plenty to compensate 1000 BTU per hour heat loss/heat generation.

Thanks for the reply.

I am no longer in Madrid, but Barcelona. I am thinking of renting a small place in the mountains where the water is famous for its quality.

I think a 12 inch thick foam layer might be too much (I might go for a thinner layer), but it is definitely an option. I wanna rent a rural house and find a room where 4-5 50 gallon fermentor would fit. I'd pump the cold wort via copper tubes into them from the next room. And as you were saying it too....use a small air-conditioning system too keep the temp at 65 F.

 

[IslandLizard]

Ah, didn't know you moved. Hopefully it's a change for better, and a surely a bit more temperate. Having a good and plentiful water source will make brewing life easier too. Are you thinking as this being a pilot for a larger brewery some time in the future? It would give you all the needed hands-on training.

12" high density styrofoam is a classic example of super-insulation. You can probably get away with 3-6" to find a balance between x investment and cooling cost over y years. There are other insulation options, such as fiberglass. The key lies in reducing thermal leaks and bridges. And don't forget the floor being a large heat sink. Later, if you find you need more space or a different climate zone (e.g., conditioning, or lagers), you can easily enlarge the space, or build a second unit. For 6 drums you don't need a room that large anyway. If you put the drums on trolleys they can be moved around without having to hoist them. Or leave them on pallets and use a pallet jack. You can fill, drain, and maintain them outside the cold room. Then you won't need the extra space for maneuvering and complicated hard piping either, just a simple blow off/venting system. They'll only occupy the room for fermentation.

Are those stainless or plastic drums or do you use a plastic bag inside ordinary steel drums?

 

[Elysium]

Ah, didn't know you moved. Hopefully it's a change for better, and a surely a bit more temperate. Having a good and plentiful water source will make brewing life easier too. Are you thinking as this being a pilot for a larger brewery some time in the future? It would give you all the needed hands-on training.


Are those stainless or plastic drums or do you use a plastic bag inside ordinary steel drums?

Hey.

Yeah. I do hope it is for the better. I really like Barcelona. I ride my bike everywhere...while in Madrid I couldnt have done it. Taxi drivers can be a massive pain in the ass there (and the face that they have no bike lanes )

Anyway....yes. This is mean to be a small brewery that hopefully will grow into something bigger.

The fermentors are SST fermentors from Belgium (they are sold in Barcelona). I still havent decided on the size. The thing is that I have a business goal and I need to calculate what my investment will be, what I can brew and how much...and how much I must brew to reach my goal. I think it will take months to plan this out properly.

Your ideas are really good regarding a cold room. Thanks a lot.

 

[IslandLizard]

Driving in Madrid is crazy, everyone is in a crazy hurry and you're right about those cabs with their hand signals. Plus it looked to me all roads on a circle were getting green light at the same time, and then the race started. Who got on first, wins.

Those are nice conicals. When you wrote 50 gallons, I was envisioning olive oil drums, flat bottoms.

If anything, conicals can make your life easier for trub dumps, yeast harvesting, and racking. Definitely a pro approach. Maybe it's the pix, the dump and racking ports look narrow by US standards, and I don't see any triclover fittings on them, which we sort of expect at that size and pro use. The dump port should be at least 1.5"-2".

Because of the skinny legs, high center of gravity and narrow aspect ratio, pallets and trolleys for moving are out of the question, those things will tip. That means they stay where you put them, unless you can widen the base (legs) enough to make them more stable.

Plenty to consider and plan over the next few months. Keep us informed, curious to see where you're taking this.

 

[Elysium]

Driving in Madrid is crazy, everyone is in a crazy hurry and you're right about those cabs with their hand signals. Plus it looked to me all roads on a circle were getting green light at the same time, and then the race started. Who got on first, wins.

Those are nice conicals. When you wrote 50 gallons, I was envisioning olive oil drums, flat bottoms.

If anything, conicals can make your life easier for trub dumps, yeast harvesting, and racking. Definitely a pro approach. Maybe it's the pix, the dump and racking ports look narrow by US standards, and I don't see any triclover fittings on them, which we sort of expect at that size and pro use. The dump port should be at least 1.5"-2".

Because of the skinny legs, high center of gravity and narrow aspect ratio, pallets and trolleys for moving are out of the question, those things will tip. That means they stay where you put them, unless you can widen the base (legs) enough to make them more stable.

Plenty to consider and plan over the next few months. Keep us informed, curious to see where you're taking this.

Thanks for the information. It will be my first time with these pieces of equipment...and I hope to learn well how to use them and make the most out of them.

Just a quick question: Those triclover fittings you mentioned...in what do they differ from the tap that is on this fermentor?

I do understand your concern regarding the fact that they might tilt. I think I'd be better off to plan the whole brewery in a way so that I could move the beer using copper tubes and food grade plastic with pumps.