My growth.. extract to E-biab

[BGBC]

Interested to see how this turns out. Looking good.

 

[Woodbrews]

Great thread, thanks for documenting your build. I have a very similar setup with a Bayou Classic 10-gallon pot. I have the steamer basket that goes with it, but I've never used it. The only time I've had a problem with circulation is when I was brewing with a massive grain bill. For that brew, I just stirred the mash by hand.

 

[watermelon83]

Alright, had to wait till I got the appropriate temp probe in. The one I had purchased initially was a weldless type. It was before I decided on recirculating the mash to the lid. Of course, I forgot until the day I wanted to test it that this was the case. Today, the new one came in, thank you Auber for lightning fast shipping and great customer service!

There were two issues upon firing it up, the first was crossing the wires on the PID output to the ssr. Flipped those and it worked great until I lost a wire on my temp sensor cable. The break was at the fitting and needed re-soldered. No biggie. So now.....


View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1419459871.932141.jpgView attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1419459894.743746.jpg

I am now recircing and heating the water to 143 to get ready for the auto tune.

 

[watermelon83]

Auto tune is complete and it took about 1m 10 seconds to get from 153 to 157 with 1-2 degrees overshoot.

In all fairness there isn't more then 4-5 gallons in the pot though.

 

[watermelon83]

First brew day! I milled my grain twice due to my mill issues. Turned out looking okay, I think. I left my recirc on so the grain had a nice slow fall from strike temp to mash temp. It was a mistake, oh well.

So far things are going fairly smooth. Probably to smooth. Lol. Temps are holding within a degree or two. I've stirred the mash twice so far. I watched the temp when I did and it didn't move. I'm happy for that because I would imagine there would be a drop if I had stratification issues. A couple pics:

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1419961883.034905.jpgView attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1419961902.249695.jpg

 

[wilserbrewer]

Nice work! I will admit I'm just a touch jealous of your automation...

Temps are holding within a degree or two. I've stirred the mash twice so far. I watched the temp when I did and it didn't move. I'm happy for that because I would imagine there would be a drop if I had stratification issues.

BUT, I am also a bit lazy...so I guess I will just continue to wrap the mash kettle with grandma's old horse blanket and RDWHAHB....j/k
cheers to your success!
wilser

 

[watermelon83]

Thanks Mike! None of it would have been possible without handling your bag!!!! I plan on wrapping the kettle eventually, I was watching this one like a nervous mother though.

Just measured my FG 1.063! only a few points off and 72.69% efficiency! Not bad fer me first time and all.

 

[soccerdad]

Great thread Mr Melon - thanks for posting

 

[misterkidd]

Really informative thread so thanks, Melon. I'm delighted that its worked out well. Proof that ebiab can work with the right planning. I'll take lots away from this for my own upcoming build.

 

[watermelon83]

Well poop. I had to kettle cool down to 120, now it's in the carboy and ferm fridge until pitching temps. I did not get 5 gallons only 4.5ish making my efficiency more like 62% Oh well, my mill sucks, need to get that sorted and somewhere my water calcs went wrong. I know my boil-off was right, must be somewhere else.

 

[misterkidd]

Just teething issues, I'm sure, Melon man. Re: volume, was there any wort left over in the pipes? If so did you account for this?

 

[watermelon83]

None in the hoses, I blew the wort back into the bottom of the kettle, through the pump using the hose on the lid. Felt like an arse, but it was effective.

It would seem my BS settings are fubar. I ran my number's through priceless's calculator and it showed I should have started with 1.4 more gallons of water. Which, all things considered (my squeezing the bag, using a lower output on boil cycle, etc.) seems to be the correct number. I think I'll just use BS to formulate/study recipes and use the one priceless has made to calc the water. At least until I get I get a feel for my system.

 

[watermelon83]

Just wrapped up brew number two. Same base recipe with a few subsitutions

13 lbs of Vienna became 12.5 lbs of Vienna and .5 lbs of flaked wheat. I lost pert near a half of pound dicking with my grain mill yesterday. It did crush much better, just well enough to have not ordered it's replacement as of yet. I had the wheat on hand and it didn't have to be crushed so in it went.

I used CTZ to bitter and finished with Mt. Hood, we'll see. Anyhow onto the important stuff. I used around 9g of water to start with, measured to 8.75" in the pot. Mashed for 75m (ish), I wasn't in a hurry. Poured the bag drippings back in and boiled for 1-1/2ish. I stopped the boil when I was close to my target water height, and I nailed it. I wise man told me that there is about 4% volume reduction as wort cools form boiling, I applied that math to what I knew would be left after dumping via the valve and added the current height to get my stop level. I dumped the whole thing into a 5g cube put the lid on and turned it upside down. It's in the garage now cooling to pitching temp.

My SG while hot (taken with my pos refractometer) is 1.061. I'll check it again tomorrow before I pitch, but a definite increase in efficiency!!! I guess I don't quite understand why its lower then expected though. My ph was 5.3 after mash in, I know I maintained 156 for the entire mash, it was certainly long enough. I even squeezed the bag a bit to get at least the easy sugar out of it.

 

[misterkidd]

I'm in the "so long as you can get consistency, a few efficiency points don't matter too much" camp, personally. Good that you've managed to increase it on this batch.

Just bought myself this...

http://www.gwscateringequip.co.uk/v...d-sold-separately-productcode-t556-7376-p.asp

...along with fittings for a SS ball valve, 2.4kW SS element. I'm gonna go with maintaining mash temp with insulation initially, and maybe add the recirculating/automated bells and whistles in the future. I struggled to find a bayou pot, or anything with a basket, here in the UK. Could be a problem if I do choose to recirc system in the future, but I figure something will work itself out ^_^

 

[watermelon83]

Before I found the basket and pot combo, I thought seriously about just getting some extra stiff SS mesh and making a cage to cover the element. I imagine in the grand scheme of things, it would accomplish the same thing the basket does, keep the bag off the element. If your going to recirc, I can see it creating some issues with flow, but I believe those would be easily fixed by increasing available surface area.

 

[watermelon83]

Well I now have seven delicious brews under my belt on this system so I felt it was time for an update. My effeciency issues went the way of the cassette tape after I purchased a monster mill. I now have zero issues hitting my target numbers. I also purchased a CF chiller from Zchiller. Works like a wet dream, with winter water temps I actually have to warm my wort to pitching temps with just one pass through the chiller.

I have decided on what I believe is a fair cleaning regimine for the equipment. I save one of the 2-3 five gallon buckets of CF run-off and pour it into the empty pot. I let it circulate for a few seconds the pump the majority (4g) of it back into the bucket. I unhook the chiller and dump what I can out of it into the bucket. I then scrub the stone off the inside of the pot and element and swirl/dump it into the bucket as well. In the summer, I'll save that water for the wife to water her plants with. For now, it goes down the flor drain into the sump. Once so far, I added PBW to the water and turned the element on until I hit around 190f. I did notice a lot more sediment when I did this, so I have decided that once per 2-3 brews the system will get the mega ******.

I cannot express how happy I am with this system, I am so glad I took this leap.

 

[wilserbrewer]

Good news melon!
Perhaps now that you have the chilling overdone you should plumb the hot water into the chiller for the final adjustment to pitching temps....I kid....happy it's working....send me a pint I'll pay the postman.
Regards
Wilser

 

[Gavin C]

Thanks for the update to this great thread. have been watching it slide down the BIAB forum with much regret. I would love to go eBIAB at some stage. The electrical side of things just opens up a whole other world of geeking out for me. Learned a lot from your post. Nice job

 

[stever1000]

Lots of good information, thank you