I have been looking around at the various brew stands that are for sale or made by DIYers and there seems to be many different ways to build them. The brew club I am a part of happens to have a talented welder as a member that likes to do just such projects, so I am trying to figure out a good setup. I store my brewing equipment in a 7'x10' shed, so the size of my stand is important. So far I have been put off by both the 1 tier stands due to their large footprint and also the 3 tiers which seem to reach for the sky. Obviously I need some sort of compromise. There are a lot of talented DIYers on this board that have come up with some great ideas, so I would like to get suggestions/opinions.
After reviewing what is out there, I took notice of the MoreBeer 1550. It seems to be a nice ratio of height and floor space. But, the $2500 price tag is my problem with that. I know that includes all of the kettles as well, but at this point I don't need anything more than my megapot and rubbermaids. So, I want to keep with this idea, trying to maximize on gravity, while minimizing on space and electrical requirements.
So far I have come up with this prototype as the framing for my 5 to 10 gallon batch brew stand. The idea is to have one burner underneath the right platform, which can be used for both mashing and boiling.
The process would be to heat up the kettle to 170 degrees, then gravity feed that water down to the HLT cooler. After that I would cover the HLT and lift it to the top (Will it be too heavy with 10 gallon batches?). I would then decide if I wanted to do step or infusion mashing. For step, I could leave the megapot on the burner. For infusion, I could put the MLT cooler on the lower left platform, heat the water in the kettle, and gravity feed the strike water. All of my brews would be fly/continuous sparged, either into the kettle directly or do the other cooler (depending on how I decided to mash). If into the other cooler, then I just move the cooler up to the top platform and gravity feed into the kettle. Since the top platform is only 4' off of the ground (once wheels are added), this seems like a pretty easy solution which would probably be somewhat portable for offsite group brews as well.
Some thoughts:
-Is kettle location too low? 2' off the ground seems to be a potential back pain waiting to happen.
-Is lifting a cooler full of water up 4' unrealistic? One pump could be easily added to transfer up both the sparge water and the wort.
-Should I leave the option open to add burners at each platform? If I did, I would need to add more framing below the lowest shelf. Any ideas on the minimum distance from the ground a burner should have?
-I'm at a loss for how to design a good platform within the framing for a burner. Anyone have a good info source on this?
-The "Tippy-Dump" ability of the MoreBeer system seems interesting. Is it really that hard to dump the grains?
After reviewing what is out there, I took notice of the MoreBeer 1550. It seems to be a nice ratio of height and floor space. But, the $2500 price tag is my problem with that. I know that includes all of the kettles as well, but at this point I don't need anything more than my megapot and rubbermaids. So, I want to keep with this idea, trying to maximize on gravity, while minimizing on space and electrical requirements.
So far I have come up with this prototype as the framing for my 5 to 10 gallon batch brew stand. The idea is to have one burner underneath the right platform, which can be used for both mashing and boiling.
The process would be to heat up the kettle to 170 degrees, then gravity feed that water down to the HLT cooler. After that I would cover the HLT and lift it to the top (Will it be too heavy with 10 gallon batches?). I would then decide if I wanted to do step or infusion mashing. For step, I could leave the megapot on the burner. For infusion, I could put the MLT cooler on the lower left platform, heat the water in the kettle, and gravity feed the strike water. All of my brews would be fly/continuous sparged, either into the kettle directly or do the other cooler (depending on how I decided to mash). If into the other cooler, then I just move the cooler up to the top platform and gravity feed into the kettle. Since the top platform is only 4' off of the ground (once wheels are added), this seems like a pretty easy solution which would probably be somewhat portable for offsite group brews as well.
Some thoughts:
-Is kettle location too low? 2' off the ground seems to be a potential back pain waiting to happen.
-Is lifting a cooler full of water up 4' unrealistic? One pump could be easily added to transfer up both the sparge water and the wort.
-Should I leave the option open to add burners at each platform? If I did, I would need to add more framing below the lowest shelf. Any ideas on the minimum distance from the ground a burner should have?
-I'm at a loss for how to design a good platform within the framing for a burner. Anyone have a good info source on this?
-The "Tippy-Dump" ability of the MoreBeer system seems interesting. Is it really that hard to dump the grains?
