Internal Calandria To Reduce Your Footprint

[Sir Humpsalot]

Does anybody else think the title of this thread sounds like spam?

How does an Internal Calandria work exactly? I searched the internets, couldn't find a good picture.

The reason I ask is that I'm trying to see how I could reduce the footprint of my brewery in anticipation of possibly either moving into a small apartment, or else (if we move into a larger space) allowing SWMBO to tolerate an actual brewscupture in the kitchen. Srsly!!!

I am attempting to "design/conceptualize" a 6 foot tall brew sculpture that sits on a floor space no larger than, say, 6 square feet and is capable of doing full boils on a kitchen stove. Of course, a pump would be used. I am wondering whether it would be possible to use a calandria to heat the wort, and then get it back into an insulated brewkettle, allowing for a constantly recirculating of the wort to keep the temps up above boiling with a minimal heat source such as a kitchen stove.

Or am I misunderestimating the power of the internal calandria?

 

[HenryHill]

Seems entirely feasible in an apartment kitchen.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calandria

But co-existing with SWMBO will be more difficult.

 

[WOP31]

Are you talking about using an electric element encased in a copper/CPVC tube and recirculating through that to raise or maintain temps? If so it is completly doable, just look at the SABCO set-ups, they use an element to maintain and step the mashes up.

Cheers

 

[Sir Humpsalot]

Are you talking about using an electric element encased in a copper/CPVC tube and recirculating through that to raise or maintain temps? If so it is completly doable, just look at the SABCO set-ups, they use an element to maintain and step the mashes up.

Cheers

Sort of, but I'm not talking mash temps. I'm talking about maintaining a boil through indirect heating.

 

[Lil' Sparky]

I partially understand how an internal calandria works. I'm guessing the complexity of such a system is well beyond the relm of homebrewing in your kitchen. I think I'd start looking instead in the electric heat stick direction for boiling.

Some breweries have a boiling unit outside of the kettle, sometimes called a calandria, through which wort is pumped. The unit is usually a tall, thin cylinder, with many tubes upward through it. These tubes provide an enormous surface area on which vapor bubbles can nucleate, and thus provides for excellent volatization. The total volume of wort is circulated seven to twelve times an hour through this external boiler, insuring that the wort is evenly boiled by the end of the boil. The wort is then boiled in the kettle at atmospheric pressure, and through careful control the inlets and outlets on the external boiler, an overpressure can be achieve in the external boiler, raising the boiling point a few Celsius degrees. Upon return to the boil kettle, a vigorous vaporization occurs. The higher temperature due to increased vaporization can reduce boil times up to 30%. External boilers were originally designed to improve performance of kettles which did not provide adequate boiling effect, but have since been adopted by the industry as a sole means of boiling wort.

Modern brewhouses can also be equipped with internal calandria, which requires no pump. It works on basically the same principle as external units, but relies on convection to move wort through the boiler. This can prevent overboiling, as a deflector above the boiler reduces foaming, and also reduces evaporation. Internal calandria are generally difficult to clean.

 

[Sir Humpsalot]

It just sounds to me like a fancy pressure cooker with something like a column going up.

 

[olllllo]

This will undoubtedly utilize 220v.
Prepare to knock that circuit out for you and your building.

My lazy google revealed "difficult to clean" and then I lost interest.

 

[Lil' Sparky]

It just sounds to me like a fancy pressure cooker with something like a column going up.

That's kind of what I picture for an external calandria. Even then, you don't know how tall the thing would need to be, how fast to circulate the wort, how many cylinders, etc. For an internal calandria, I have no idea how you would do this on a kitchen-level scale.

 

[Sir Humpsalot]

That's kind of what I picture for an external calandria. Even then, you don't know how tall the thing would need to be, how fast to circulate the wort, how many cylinders, etc. For an internal calandria, I have no idea how you would do this on a kitchen-level scale.

I guess an external would make more sense, if any sense at all. Again, I don't know anything more than anybody else, but I am curious enough to try and at least figure out how these things really work. Apparently Victory Brewing uses an external one...

I needs to see a picture, or a cutaway drawing or something... I'm not even completely clear yet on how they work. It sounds kind of like a Steam-Injected Mashing System... only for boiling. I'm thinking it could work to reduce the energy needs, and thereby allow for full boils from a stovetop provided that 5 of the 6 sides are insulated to minimize heat loss (something that can't be done with a pot on a stove).

 

[Lil' Sparky]

Take a look at this link. http://www.aaametal.com/breweries/calandrias.html

A calandria dramatically increases the total surface area of wort in contact with steam jacketing. Our calandria design integrates steam jacket columns, a shroud and a splash plate to create a vigorous, controlled, thermal flowÝpattern. This helps sweep bubbles from all surfaces and works to prevent boil-over. A rotating spraybar just above theÝcalandria facilitates thorough cleaning. The shroud can easily be removed for inspection.

It sounds like they pipe steam up through jackets in the boil kettle to transfer the heat. Got any ideas how to do that on a 8-10 gallon pot scale? I bet some of the steam mashing guys may have some ideas.

 

[Sir Humpsalot]

This actually is looking promising.

I can envision a "boil kettle" sitting in a tall (small footprint) brew sculpture. from there, you pump/transfer wort into a smaller calandria vessel which boils it for a few minutes and transfers it back to the brewkettle. After enough transfers are complete, the full boil is done.

 

[Lil' Sparky]

This actually is looking promising.

I can envision a "boil kettle" sitting in a tall (small footprint) brew sculpture. from there, you pump/transfer wort into a smaller calandria vessel which boils it for a few minutes and transfers it back to the brewkettle. After enough transfers are complete, the full boil is done.

I think it probably uses a pump to continuously move wort (slowly) between the kettle and calandria. I couldn't tell if that's what you were saying.

 

[Lil' Sparky]

Curious - why the adversion to electric heating elements if you want to go small and indoors? If it was me, I'd try to limit the number of pieces of equipment and keep it as simple as possible.

 

[Sir Humpsalot]

Curious - why the adversion to electric heating elements if you want to go small and indoors? If it was me, I'd try to limit the number of pieces of equipment and keep it as simple as possible.

I am afraid of electricity, I like fire, and running 220 would add to the difficulty.

 

[Sir Humpsalot]

I think it probably uses a pump to continuously move wort (slowly) between the kettle and calandria. I couldn't tell if that's what you were saying.

Yeah... that's kind of what I'm thinking would work... And let's face it, if you're boiling indoors and you can sit and watch TV without fear of boilovers, that can greatly reduce the amount of time "wasted" brewing. You should be able to multi-task a bit more.

 

[Lil' Sparky]

... I like fire, ...

What REAL man doesn't like to play with fire?

 

[Lil' Sparky]

So are you thinking of plumbing some columns or a coil of copper inside a pressure cooker/steamer vessel then? I think it'll be an interesting experiment!

 

[Sir Humpsalot]

So are you thinking of plumbing some columns or a coil of copper inside a pressure cooker/steamer vessel then? I think it'll be an interesting experiment!

I'm not exactly sure what I'm thinking of yet. Maybe a coil of copper going into a pressure cooker filled with water. Run the wort through the copper tubing and squirt it back into the bottom of the brewkettle.

 

[WortMonger]

Got interested in looking into more research on this idea. So, I wanted to bump it to see if we have the technological minds on the forum to come up with a homebrew scale internal calandria? I can't wait to see if we could think this out. Very interesting in both electrical and gas ideas.

 

[ClaudiusB]

Does anybody else think the title of this thread sounds like spam?

External, made by a German homebrewer post #88

http://hobbybrauer.de/modules.php?name=eBoard&file=viewthread&fid=12&tid=9261&page=4&orderdate=ASC




Cheers,
ClaudiusB

 

[WortMonger]

Damn that dude has a sweet setup. I wonder the exacts though. I am quessing that big Siemens machine could be simplified and that he is using the equivalent to our 240V for his heating elements? It was really hard to follow, even with the translations, but... generally looks to be an insulated brew kettle, pumped through heating elements and then back on top of the kettle with the spray set to allow for less boil over problems. Of course that was very general, but I don't see it as anything more than an over-sized RIMS for a mash tun in theory. Now for more specifics on what would work element-wise, pump-wise, and control-wise and we could have us a HBT version. :rockin:

 

[kladue]

GreenMonti had an internal version working on steam, an electric external would not be difficult but pump plumbing and element wattage/surface temperature would need to be thought out.
A conventional RIMS tube would be a bad idea as flow over the element is too slow and the surface temp of the element would be high enough to burn the sugars and proteins in the wort, as demonstrated numerous times by others. The internals of the tube would need to be reworked to get the wort flow over the element fast enough to limit surface temp to under 300 degrees, but pressure drop and pump capabilities would be a factor, definitely not an application for a March 809.
Steam from a pressure cooker is not sufficient for this application, pushing one with a larger burner is just making you a contestant for the Darwin awards as they were designed for less than 2K btu input and the relief valve will not vent fast enough to keep pressure low enough to keep it from blowing up if it is pushed with a larger burner.
The flash boiler with an output of about 10KW is about the only device able to generate the steam volume and temperature needed as demonstrated by GreenMonti in his boiling tests.

 

[WortMonger]

I loved GreenMonti's thread! I can't believe the pictures got removed. I have made a flash boiler and thought about using it, but was looking at electric as a first notion. The boiler I built looks like this:

I just don't know if this would be up for the task without a new pump or not. I use the March 809. Without having Monti to talk to, that only leaves you kladue . Do you think this boiler could be utilized to boil the kettle more efficiently than a burner underneath it like now? I would wrap and insulate the boil kettle to lose less heat from the sides.

 

[kladue]

I believe the consensus was it was easier to direct fire the boil kettle, but steam will get the job done as GreenMonti demonstrated with the copper tubing coil. The last update he sent was the steam jacket for the boil kettle, and have not heard if it was successful. I have designed a scale model of the popular internal calandria design, but never had the heads cut for the 1/2" tubing so I could send it up to GreenMonti to build and test. I have seen a single large diameter copper tube used in an European brewery, but it was heated with high pressure steam at 350 degrees, which is easy with a flash boiler and superheating the steam generated.
If someone was determined to do the electric thing then designing a baffle system that kept the flow close to the element surface, and at high enough velocity to limit surface temp, it should work in theory. Running at boiling temperatures would mean that you would need a large inlet pipe, and enough vertical head pressure to keep the wort from flash boiling in the pump, and enough head pressure capability to handle the back pressure of the flow baffles in the RIMS tube.

 

[Blauhung]

these kinda things are normally used in industrial settings as a centralized steam supply starts being very cost effective and heat efficient at higher heating loads. Steam is also easily reused for multiple heating steps by altering steam pressure and pressure of the substance to be heated. Steam is awesome as it dumps a lot of heat at a constant and well defined temperature when it undergoes a phase change. The problem is that steam doesn't really get cost effective for boiling things at atmospheric pressure unless you start out with steam at very high temperatures and pressures. If you start at just over atm pressure, you no longer have the ability for heat reuse that makes it cost effective. Steam at high temps and pressure becomes very very dangerous to work with and requires much more in terms of safety considerations.

Edit: Steam is also frequently used in the food and beverage industry as it can be re-purposed for sanitizing and cleaning dirty processing equipment.