Show us your sculpture or brew rig

[ndinh]

Just got my rig delivered today. It's not finished, but the hard part is done.

View attachment 225378

View attachment 225379

View attachment 225380

Just wondering where you got those grates? I'm looking for something to hold up my kettles which are smaller than my brewstand openings. Thx.

 

[runkelia]

My scientific state of the art brewing system.

 

[ndinh]

So I just want to say that I love this rig. I don't want a control box, because it feels like I'm steering away from "manual transmission". I have thoughts of making something fairly similar, but with a few minor differences. Drop the BK down to the level of your diamond plate, so I can gravity feed from the MLT. I have a pump, so I could conceivably do recirculating from the HLT or the BK if necessary.

Any issues with the burners going next to the cooler? Obviously cannot direct fire... but I was worried about heat from burners nearby.

EDIT: Pic didn't copy in with the quote. It's the rig in post #3332.

Thanks. Generally the igloo is fine where it is but there is a little bit of plastic that is melted on the bottom right side. This past weekend, I did a couple things to upgrade the rig. I cut a square piece of wood to put underneath the igloo so it won't touch the brewstand at all. I bought some thin 13" x 5" SS sheets and screwed one on each side of the igloo as a shield so now it should be protected. Good luck with your future brewstand. Not sure how you'd mount your BK burner if it's set that low. If you decide to go single tier, you can definitely get away with using one pump for everything.

 

[swigz]

Almost done!!


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[Btaz]

My 5g setup. I'm looking to get a pump for 10g so that I don't have to lift anything and to setup a propane HERMS system

 

[hunter_le five]

Not mine, but pretty sweet (and pretty impractical). Makes 24oz batches.

What's the term for this? Femtobrewery?

 

[pfgonzo]

That's awesome looking! Where did you see that?

 

[dmcman73]

That's awesome looking! Where did you see that?

http://www.coroflot.com/Freddiepaul/Beer-Tree1

 

[hunter_le five]

That's awesome looking! Where did you see that?

Here.

 

[pfgonzo]

Fun project! I wonder why the tree appears to have both a plate chiller and a hose-based counterflow chiller.

 

[eric19312]

Fun project! I wonder why the tree appears to have both a plate chiller and a hose-based counterflow chiller.

Looks like the plate chiller is just a heat sink to cool the water going into the counterflow chiller.

I don't see how you keep the mash temp up or stir the mash to dough in.

 

[Huaco]

Hipster brew stand... Impractical, Nobody uses it, and it looks way better than it performs... plus, it costs exponentially more than it should!

 

[1fast636]

Hipster brew stand... Impractical, Nobody uses it, and it looks way better than it performs... plus, it costs exponentially more than it should!

Yep, or could be a really rich homebrewers end table of such maybe art piece lol

 

[Fizzycist]

My posts are always huge and wordy, so instead of clogging up this one I posted mine in a new thread.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/finally-i-present-my-brew-stand-499922/

 

[Black Island Brewer]

This is my second brew stand. My first is elsewhere in this thread,. I built this to teach homebrewing at a local community college. It's a 70k btu camp chef, a 10 aluminum pot with lid, removable Reflectix insulation around the pot, bubble wrap insulation on the lid, a long stem thermometer through the lid, a swiss voile bag, a ratchet pulley, angle iron risers and cross member to secure the pulley to, and an immersion chiller. Just need to add a ball valve and an elbow pickup tube. Made four batches on this so far. Was initially going to sell it once I was done with the class, but they want me to do it again winter quarter, so I'll keep it for now.

 

[Black Island Brewer]

Done! Ball valve added.

 

[Carlscan26]

This is my second brew stand. My first is elsewhere in this thread,. I built this to teach homebrewing at a local community college. It's a 70k btu camp chef, a 10 aluminum pot with lid, removable Reflectix insulation around the pot, bubble wrap insulation on the lid, a long stem thermometer through the lid, a swiss voile bag, a ratchet pulley, angle iron risers and cross member to secure the pulley to, and an immersion chiller. Just need to add a ball valve and an elbow pickup tube. Made four batches on this so far. Was initially going to sell it once I was done with the class, but they want me to do it again winter quarter, so I'll keep it for now.

Nice rig! Can you share some details (and pics) on how you mounted the angle iron to the burner? I do biab sometimes and have that burner - looks like a great add on for me.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[AgoraBrewCo]

Finally finished it.

 

[Black Island Brewer]

I'll post a pic tomorrow, but I just put the bottom of the riser to the corner of the burner frame and drilled through both, then secured with a carriage bolt and wing nut. On the top ends I cut a v-shaped notch out that the cross member can rest on. A couple of well place machine screws on both ends of the cross member keep it from sliding out of the notch. And an eye bolt in the middle of the cross member holds the carabinier for the pulley.

 

[phoenixs4r]

Not quite done... Getting to it though

 

[brettwasbtd]

Not quite done... Getting to it though

Info on your lighting?

 

[Black Island Brewer]

Nice rig! Can you share some details (and pics) on how you mounted the angle iron to the burner? I do biab sometimes and have that burner - looks like a great add on for me.

Here are the close-ups of the angle iron frame for hoisting my bag.

 

[Braveteacher]

Couple king size bed frames plus an old car jack...lifted 170lbs no problem. Still got a lot of cleaning and painting to do...but it works! I plan on doing some kind of bottle cap art bar top for the back...stay tuned!

 

[phoenixs4r]

Info on your lighting?

Just a standard 4 tube 4' florescent light fixture.

 

[Carlscan26]

Here are the close-ups of the angle iron frame for hoisting my bag.

Thanks! Looks like my burner is different from yours - mine had round tubing for the pot to sit on.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[NoahBeach]

Brewed an APA last night so decided to snap a few pics of mine for this thread.

Highlights:

• Wooden Single Tier, Two Burner (BG-14), Three vessel (15G pots, 10G Cooler MLT). 100% inspired by this thread.
• Stainless 2"x2" pot support.
• Wind/heat shielding around burners.
• Concrete board around wooden frame.
• Gas manifold.
• Single pump, batch sparging.
• Thermowells in HLT and MLT for temperature probes.
• Inline temperature probes for wort leaving BK, wort leaving CFC, as well as ground water temperature.
• Hard plumbed inline filter w/ hose quick disconnect.
• Hard mounted CFC, plumbed.
• "Weather resistant" electrical junction box with (4) outlets, one switched outlet for pump.
• "Weather resistant" switch for pump.
• Camlock quick disconnects.

One of the few "build" pictures I have.

In action, yup thats right...baby monitor plugged into the brew stand!

Rear

Filter/CFC Connection Close UP

Filling the HLT (valve is on frame to the left),

Brew Kettle

Mashing In (the CFC/Ground Water probes are just measuring ambient air at this time)

Transfering first runnings to BK, sparge water heated.

Recirculating w/o cooling water to sanitize pump/CFC/lines (I really need to shorten those hoses haha).

After recirculating through CFC to get BK temp down to < 140F, now transfering to carboy, ground water is 65.1F, CFC out is 67.8F

Thanks for looking!

 

[wbarber69]

Looks good. But that CFC would be a lot easier to drain if it was kept horizontal instead. In this configuration it's always gonna be holding liquid.

 

[NoahBeach]

Looks good. But that CFC would be a lot easier to drain if it was kept horizontal instead. In this configuration it's always gonna be holding liquid.

True it would, but I always just hit it with a compressor as part of clean up after running oxy and rinsing, dries it right out.

 

[NewBrewB]

That is a real work of art, NoahBeach. I'm especially love the clean look of your water filter and filling line run.

 

[NoahBeach]

That is a real work of art, NoahBeach. I'm especially love the clean look of your wafer filter and filling line run.

Thanks!

 

[dmcman73]

Also, any reason why you're supplying water to the CFC after your filter? Seems like you would be wasting the filter life to filter water that doesn't need it, plus, your not getting the maximum flow of cooling water to the CFC. I would tap the CFC cooling water supply before the filter.

 

[NoahBeach]

Also, any reason why you're supplying water to the CFC after your filter? Seems like you would be wasting the filter life to filter water that doesn't need it, plus, your not getting the maximum flow of cooling water to the CFC. I would tap the CFC cooling water supply before the filter.

This is what I had in mind when I went to go rig the plumbing, unfortunately where I mounted the filter space is at a premium. I probably could have rigged something up with a copious amount of elbows, but I decided to just simply removed the filter from the enclosure after filling up my HLT with sparge water. This takes away the flow restriction, as well as allows the filter to mostly dry out before I finish brewing, allowing my to store it for next brewday.

 

[dmcman73]

Just add a T between the hose and the elbow and add a valve going to the cfc. Wouldn't that work? Constantly threading and unthreading the filter housing like that is going to create a leak from either cross threading or wearing out the seal.

 

[wbarber69]

Or he could step up to the next model of filter that has a bypass valve built right in.

 

[NoahBeach]

Just add a T between the hose and the elbow and add a valve going to the cfc. Wouldn't that work? Constantly threading and unthreading the filter housing like that is going to create a leak from either cross threading or wearing out the seal.

DOH! Yeah that would actually work, ugh, time to order another T and valve haha. Sometimes my brain doesn't work.

Also some additional info was asked for in the wood brew stand thread on the temp probes, thought I'd add it here too.

...I also really like your digital thermometer setup. Can you provide more details on how you have them setup and wired and a closeup picture of all those little white boxes?

Thanks in advance!

I use the waterproof DS18B20 probes connected to a Raspberry Pi which is mounted to the brew stand. I use two different "models" of DS18B20's, both are waterproof, one is just "high temp" (the white cabled probes) where the cable jacket is PTFE (vs PVC) and rated up to ~250F.

The DS18B20's are 1-wire probes, and therefore work best when connected in a bus configuration. My first attempt using these probes with the RP was in a "star" configuration, and it was extremely unstable (probes drop, temps unreadable, etc), since I switched to a bus, no issues at all. I'm in IT and have tons of it so I chose to use standard Cat-5 cable/keystone jacks to run my bus. Rather than trying to splice and connect lots of tiny wires together, I decided to just try and use Cat-5 keystone jacks and punch down both wires (the probe and the Cat-5 cable) into the jack. This "spliced" both wires together, and gave me a jack to plug another Cat-5 cable into to extend the bus. The "white boxes" are simply surface mount keystone boxes ($1.50 at Home Depot), with one of the keystone ports blanked.

As always, pictures tell it all:

HLT "box"/probe going into HLT thermowell

Run between two boxes

Both cables, punched down into same keystone

Eventually runs back to this box, where the RP lives, yes wires are a bit of a mess there, tacking those down is on the "to-do" list

For the connections where I'm reading inline temps (BK out, CFC Wort out, CFC H2O in) I use these probe compression fittings from Brewhardware.com

For the HLT/MLT, I use these thermowell's from Brewhardware.com

For the actual interface, it is just a combination of Python scripts (which actually talk to the probes/store temps in database) and PHP/Javascript (using this library for the actual gauges) that I hacked together and access via a webserver running on the RP. The temps on the web interface are automatically refreshed about every second for each probe (depending on probe delay). It is still a work in progress, but usable.

 

[dmcman73]

DOH! Yeah that would actually work, ugh, time to order another T and valve haha. Sometimes my brain doesn't work.

Order a 3 way "L" valve. This way you won't need a T and a valve and the L will work where it will divert the water either to the CFC or through the filter, not both.

Get one of these (not sure what size you need, this is a 1/2inch one): http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00O5D1ARU/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20


Remove the elbow from the water filter and replace it with a threaded nipple. Thread the water supply hose connector to the center "inlet" of the 3 way valve, thread one "outlet" end of the valve onto the threaded nipple on your filter. Then either thread the hose directly onto the other "outlet" of the 3 way valve or thread the elbow you removed from the filter into it pointing towards the CFC.

It looks like you have a temp sensor on the cooling water feed to the CFC?

 

[NoahBeach]

Remove the elbow from the water filter and replace it with a threaded nipple. Thread the water supply hose connector to the center "inlet" of the 3 way valve, thread one "outlet" end of the valve onto the threaded nipple on your filter. Then either thread the hose directly onto the other "outlet" of the 3 way valve or thread the elbow you removed from the filter into it pointing towards the CFC.

That will work perfect! Excellent idea!

It looks like you have a temp sensor on the cooling water feed to the CFC?

Yeah, it is my ground water probe. I adjust wort temperature by controlling the speed it travels through my CFC. I obviously cannot get it any colder than ground water temps (usually a degree or so above ground water temps), so that way I know my target temp.

 

[BadDeacon]

As another ITish guy, I must say that is all very well thought out and put together. Maybe one day I'll get a setup like this as well!!!

&#127867;

DOH! Yeah that would actually work, ugh, time to order another T and valve haha. Sometimes my brain doesn't work.

Also some additional info was asked for in the wood brew stand thread on the temp probes, thought I'd add it here too.



I use the waterproof DS18B20 probes connected to a Raspberry Pi which is mounted to the brew stand. I use two different "models" of DS18B20's, both are waterproof, one is just "high temp" (the white cabled probes) where the cable jacket is PTFE (vs PVC) and rated up to ~250F.

The DS18B20's are 1-wire probes, and therefore work best when connected in a bus configuration. My first attempt using these probes with the RP was in a "star" configuration, and it was extremely unstable (probes drop, temps unreadable, etc), since I switched to a bus, no issues at all. I'm in IT and have tons of it so I chose to use standard Cat-5 cable/keystone jacks to run my bus. Rather than trying to splice and connect lots of tiny wires together, I decided to just try and use Cat-5 keystone jacks and punch down both wires (the probe and the Cat-5 cable) into the jack. This "spliced" both wires together, and gave me a jack to plug another Cat-5 cable into to extend the bus. The "white boxes" are simply surface mount keystone boxes ($1.50 at Home Depot), with one of the keystone ports blanked.

As always, pictures tell it all:

HLT "box"/probe going into HLT thermowell

Run between two boxes

Both cables, punched down into same keystone

Eventually runs back to this box, where the RP lives, yes wires are a bit of a mess there, tacking those down is on the "to-do" list

For the connections where I'm reading inline temps (BK out, CFC Wort out, CFC H2O in) I use these probe compression fittings from Brewhardware.com

For the HLT/MLT, I use these thermowell's from Brewhardware.com

For the actual interface, it is just a combination of Python scripts (which actually talk to the probes/store temps in database) and PHP/Javascript (using this library for the actual gauges) that I hacked together and access via a webserver running on the RP. The temps on the web interface are automatically refreshed about every second for each probe (depending on probe delay). It is still a work in progress, but usable.

 

[GoodDogShelby]

Almost done with version 3.0 of my brew rig. Old version was made of 1/4" wall 2"x2" square tube and was heavy as all get out. I got my hands on some 45mm x 45mm extruded aluminum. Took about 50 lbs of the frame alone. I should have the gas plumbing done in the next week.

 

[TechyDork]

DOH! Yeah that would actually work, ugh, time to order another T and valve haha. Sometimes my brain doesn't work.

Also some additional info was asked for in the wood brew stand thread on the temp probes, thought I'd add it here too.



I use the waterproof DS18B20 probes connected to a Raspberry Pi which is mounted to the brew stand. I use two different "models" of DS18B20's, both are waterproof, one is just "high temp" (the white cabled probes) where the cable jacket is PTFE (vs PVC) and rated up to ~250F.

The DS18B20's are 1-wire probes, and therefore work best when connected in a bus configuration. My first attempt using these probes with the RP was in a "star" configuration, and it was extremely unstable (probes drop, temps unreadable, etc), since I switched to a bus, no issues at all. I'm in IT and have tons of it so I chose to use standard Cat-5 cable/keystone jacks to run my bus. Rather than trying to splice and connect lots of tiny wires together, I decided to just try and use Cat-5 keystone jacks and punch down both wires (the probe and the Cat-5 cable) into the jack. This "spliced" both wires together, and gave me a jack to plug another Cat-5 cable into to extend the bus. The "white boxes" are simply surface mount keystone boxes ($1.50 at Home Depot), with one of the keystone ports blanked.

Another IT guy here. I am just starting to build my single tier eHerms stand and was trying to think of the best way to chain together all my DS18820 probes. Was originally thinking of a patch panel and splicing in the control panel, but your idea of using surface mount keystone jacks is perfect!!!

You just saved me a ton of time cleaned up what would have been a night mare to wire!!

I am also using a RasPi to run things, but i am going to give the Strange Brew Elsenore software a go and see how it works.

I'll add my set up to this thread when we get it all put together.