The most expensive way to Homebrew

[MintonHVAC]

do you keg or bottle

Because most of our beer is consumed rather abruptly, we find the kegging beer it's the most effective way to dispense without introducing excess oxygen or light.
A commercial refrigerator like the true gdm-12 is a great refrigerator because there are no condensing tubes in the walls of the refrigerator and you can easily install Taps anywhere on the side.

 

[MintonHVAC]

Because most of our beer is consumed rather abruptly, we find the kegging beer it's the most effective way to dispense without introducing excess oxygen or light.
A commercial refrigerator like the true gdm-12 is a great refrigerator because there are no condensing tubes in the walls of the refrigerator and you can easily install Taps anywhere on the side.View attachment 555945

And you can typically pick them up used for about a hundred bucks!

 

[day_trippr]

Still enough functional cells to spot a software bug in this image...
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/attachments/1517433951525-jpg.555933/

Clearly you have to trash the whole effort and start over...

Cheers!

 

[_BullDog_]

Suddenly purchasing the new Unibräu system seems less of an issue....

That is an impressive setup!

 

[AZCoolerBrewer]

For someone who can put together something like that it seems like the PLC program shouldn’t be unobtainable for you. I hope your vendor isn’t trying to say it’s their IP. Since you designed the system, you need to have direct access to the program to make the changes you will surely need to make when everything comes online. Then cut them loose when the program is solid enough to run your brewery “good enough” and you hone it down to run nice and smooth.

 

[ddibbern5]

System looks awesome! Can’t wait to see it in operation!
Who’s controls are you using? I don’t recognize the red brick PLC. Red lion maybe?

 

[ClaudiusB]

Great project!

The miniaturize grain silos are currently being manufactured and when they are done I'll share pictures of those with everyone.

How many silos will you have?
I can't wait for your silo pictures.
My system was designed for six silos but I never built more than four for the most common grains I use.

There is an auger that takes the grain from the silos to a weighing station and then to a mill. After the grain is Milled it is then augured to the lather mash tun.

How long is the run from the mill to the mash tun?
I transport all my grain with air conveyors. The longest run is 30ft.

 

[MintonHVAC]

System looks awesome! Can’t wait to see it in operation!
Who’s controls are you using? I don’t recognize the red brick PLC. Red lion maybe?

The PLC is made by AVG. The 15" HMI is also made by AVG.

 

[MintonHVAC]

Great project!

How many silos will you have?
I can't wait for your silo pictures.
My system was designed for six silos but I never built more than four for the most common grains I use.

How long is the run from the mill to the mash tun?
I transport all my grain with air conveyors. The longest run is 30ft.

Only about 20 feet!

 

[stosh]

Holy **** (can I say that here?).

I used to work on Lamborghinis and believe you me this is well beyond anything they ever built (and a lot cheaper).

Can anyone say "group buy"...

 

[TANSTAAFB]

Holy sh!tsnacks! That's amazing! I guarantee you that I can't think of anything you haven't spent hours considering, so the feedback aspect is going to be less than useful from my end. But THAT my friend is truly an engineering work of art! [emoji482]

 

[MintonHVAC]

Holy sh!tsnacks! That's amazing! I guarantee you that I can't think of anything you haven't spent hours considering, so the feedback aspect is going to be less than useful from my end. But THAT my friend is truly an engineering work of art! [emoji482]

Thank you for your input, there has been many months of contemplation on different features and sensors. I think one of the coolest aspects of the system is the inline refractometer that has temperature compensation. The refractometer made by Atago offers really nice advantages to the Brewing process. The particular refractometer that we used was the atago CMA 800 Alpha.

If anyone knows where to get a dissolved oxygen meter that can be installed in line and have an operating temperature up to 100 c please share your findings.

 

[TANSTAAFB]

So can you walk us through the process, start to finish, with pics? What do you anticipate the price range to be?

 

[MintonHVAC]

Only about 20 feet!

So there are 3 grain silos that will hold 150 lb of grain each.

There is an auger attached to the bottom of each Silo that carries the grain inside my Brewing facility. Once inside it is metered and wait and then sent to the mill for processing.

This run is only about 8 feet or so.

From the mill to the mash tun is about 20 feet away with a Screw Auger and the grain goes into a hydrator before enters the LMT.

I have not designed the Hop distribution system yet but plan to do that in the future.

The first handful of batches will probably be a lot of manual Edition of grain and hops.

The auger system is still being design for both grain and hop management.

This also requires the implementation of another plc as all 96 IO on the current AVG PLC are utilized.

 

[jekeane]

Is the end idea to market this as a picobrew for brew pubs and bars?

 

[MintonHVAC]

So can you walk us through the process, start to finish, with pics? What do you anticipate the price range to be?

This is still in the beta stage and I haven't even got to brew on the system yet.

It's been in development for around 2 years and is finally coming to fruition.

Once the system is fully up and running an operational many documentaries will be posted on YouTube.

To date I have not been able to find a truly fully automated Brewing System.

We went with the AVG PLC because it's iiot ready and I can already control the system from an Android based tablet sitting in my living room.

I'm hoping in the end I can manufacture and sell this product for around $35,000.
The current build has cost $72,000 from testing out different equipment and changing pumps and mixers...

The production model will probably not have a 15in HMI. The screen Alone cast$2,000 and I'm hoping to find a cheaper refractometer as the one we purchased was around $6,000. The mixer is manufactured by MDX processes and was $4,200. And the only reason it cost so much was we opted in for stainless steel everything including the internals and externals of the motor and gearbox.

You can give galvanized and powder-coated finishes on a lot of this equipment for a lot less.

We didn't want to spare any expense as this is going to be the flagship.

 

[MintonHVAC]

Is the end idea to market this as a picobrew for brew pubs and bars?

The target market for this particular product is vast.

From schools to homebrewers and Commercial implementations.

In the next 10 years I plan to open a brewery that is automated on a much larger scale then half a barrel.

For a large company that already Brews beer, adjusting a recipe or to create a new one is really difficult to do if you don't have exact times and temperatures. Definitely you can get a general idea but by taking out the Human error you can get an exact recipe.

 

[TANSTAAFB]

Is the end idea to market this as a picobrew for brew pubs and bars?

Sort of what I was thinking. If the retail was $15-20k but was completely automated (plus biofuel as a biproduct!) thus eliminating labor costs it is VERY viable on the brewpub/ nano scale. Even at a half barrel capacity, it could be run on (mostly) autopilot to keep up with demand AND allow for significant variety AND with 99% reproducibility.

 

[MintonHVAC]

Holy poopy (can I say that here?).

I used to work on Lamborghinis and believe you me this is well beyond anything they ever built (and a lot cheaper).

Can anyone say "group buy"...

In all fairness they have made something that actually works quite well, and I'm just in the prototyping stage yet.

My fingers are crossed though!

 

[Metalchef1]

I'm not convinced it takes the "art" out of brewing..... Unless people are using the word "art" to mean error.
You would still need to build the recipe and set all of the parameters just less fear of infecting your batches from improper handling. And this is significantly more exciting than a Pico brew... Look at all that stainless!
Maybe I missed it in the pictures.... Do you have oxygen tanks set up to inject into the wort during pitching?

 

[MintonHVAC]

I'm not convinced it takes the "art" out of brewing..... Unless people are using the word "art" to mean error.
You would still need to build the recipe and set all of the parameters just less fear of infecting your batches from improper handling. And this is significantly more exciting than a Pico brew... Look at all that stainless!
Maybe I missed it in the pictures.... Do you have oxygen tanks set up to inject into the wort during pitching?

Yes we do have oxygen going through CO2 diffusers in the fermenters. But before wort ever sees oxygen it is cooled to 40 degrees first and then brought back up to our pitching temperature which varies from strain to strain. We found by doing this are beer is incredibly clear with no need to add any fining agents. The fermentation control is currently a manual operation set by set points on PID controllers with a glycol chiller. This one day will have its own plc and be integrated into one ubiquitous system.

 

[Metalchef1]

Awesome...

 

[Cyclman]

More like a Bugatti than Lamborghini. Wowza.

 

[DU99]

i am a home brewer like everyone here and the bling looks good but if you go to a function or whatever how do you take a beer that you have made with this BLING..

 

[Metalchef1]

I'd have to assume a Blichmann beer gun?

I'm curious about the output quantity of biodiesel from a standard 5 gallon batch. I understand that it would be based on the grain build but do you have any estimated figures?

 

[Wolfairious]

What about water adjustments? Can it handle that? Awesome set up.

Sent from my VS988 using Home Brew mobile app

 

[MintonHVAC]

i am a home brewer like everyone here and the bling looks good but if you go to a function or whatever how do you take a beer that you have made with this BLING..

LOL I just bring the keg.

 

[MintonHVAC]

I'd have to assume a Blichmann beer gun?

I'm curious about the output quantity of biodiesel from a standard 5 gallon batch. I understand that it would be based on the grain build but do you have any estimated figures?

On the biodigester, no not yet.
That is something that will be investigated in the future and will definitely take some experimentation on its own.
Considering that the by product of the biodigester would need to be separated from its non-volatile counterpart I am slightly hesitant until I have proper licensing to do such an endeavor.

 

[Metalchef1]

I love the idea....

 

[MintonHVAC]

What about water adjustments? Can it handle that? Awesome set up.

Sent from my VS988 using Home Brew mobile app

Currently for water adjustments it cannot.
Most of the beer I brew I don't adjust the water profile. I'm located in the mountains of Northern California and have some pretty darn good water right out of the tap. Before it sees any Brewing ingredients it does pass through a filtration system that strips sodium hypochlorite and other undesirable chemicals from the water.
If I was in a location that didn't have a deal water I would definitely Implement something and I'm sure it would not be hard to do with some peristaltic pump Magic.
This is a very interesting point that I have not thought about as it's not something that I would have even considered due to the quality of the water I currently use and the beer Styles I brew.

I'm definitely going to take a note of this for future implementation.

Thank you very much for your help!