Two years without brewing is two years too many!
My dad and I used to brew at least a half dozen batches a year. But
not anymore. Why? It's too much work.
We gather the ingredients, including propane, the day before. And
then on brew day we construct, deconstruct and reconstruct each piece
of the system for each stage of brewing. By the end of the day, we're
both exhausted.
If only we had a system that was already put together. One we could
just wheel out and just start connecting hoses to. One that ran off
of natural gas piped to the house instead of propane that has to be
procured five gallons at a time. One where the wort gets pumped to
the fermenter that's already sitting in the temperature controlled
fridge, instead of lugged about by yours truly.
Many Falcons are gifted system builders. Alas, I am not. Our system
is something of a Rube Goldberg (http://www.rubegoldberg.com) contraption:
http://profile.ak.fbcdn.net/hprofile-ak-snc4/373274_213272518742870_1698...
I am a clumsy brewer.
I don't think I need electronically programmable thermostat controlled
burners. I'm perfectly happy to sit there and watch the thermometer
from time to time and adjust the flame. But we have to make it easier
to brew, or we won't brew.
The time has come.
One problem, of course, is that fancy new systems are pricey. Here's
an example:
http://www.brewmagic.com/products/brew-magic-v350ms-system/
Notice how the guy is standing next to the system, just turning a
valve. That's the level of work I'm aiming for here. If you scroll
to the bottom of the page, you can see the bad news. Six thousand
clams.
Then it hit me. I don't need to build an all new system. I'm happy
with most of our system. We just need adapt the system so it's easier
to brew.
To that end, my dad, ever the engineer, has provided this list of
requirements for the new system. Here they are:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/S-S-Sciortino-Brew-System-Upgrade/21327251...
So I'm inviting comment. I already got some great input from Falcons
at last Sunday's meeting. I'll be interested to hear from you.
Sal Sciortino, the Younger, is a BJCP National Beer Judge and a
card-carrying member of the Maltose Falcons Homebrewing Society.
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Comments
Sals,
When I first put my sytem together, my budget was tighter than it is today. My solution was to upgrade portions of the system when funds became available. My initial goal was to get out of the kitchen for brewing and into the garage. Because I don't have welding skills or equipment, I needed a way to assemble a stout frame that would hold three good sized vessels. I chose to use riveted shelving for the frame. Use the double rivet kind. My frame is 6 feet long, 6 feet high and 18" wide. It is a three tier system, and the first iteration was all gravity fed (I couldn't afford a pump). I have burners under the HLT and the boil kettle, and use a Gott 10 gal cooler for the mash tun. Experience soon showed me that I needed either a way to heat the mash tun, or a bigger mash tun to allow enough hot water to be added to hit mash temperature steps. I added a pump and a recirculation coil inside the HLT so that I could adjust mash temperatures. That seems to work well for me. I can mash about 22-24 pounds of grain in my system, which is fine for 5 gallon batches of high gravity or 10 gallon batches of moderate gravity.
My system stays in my garage and is located against the back wall. I don't disassemble it when it is not in use. I clean in place by using the pump and the stored hot water in the HLT to recirculate PBW through the heat exchanger loop. I do remove the mash tun and the boil kettle to clean them. If I could easily improve any single thing in my system, it would be to find a way to pivot/tilt the mash tun like the one in the Falcons shop system, to make it easier to get the spent grain out.
Hope this helps.
Rich Schmittdiel
L you ike you, I struggled with buckets and the sort to brew a beer. From that I built a cheap gravity fed system by adding legs to three turkey burners so that one was taller than the other down to the boiler, which had no leg additions and was the lowest point. Although it worked, it didn't resolve my need to simplify a system that would allow me to walk in the houe for. an hour without worrying about my brew. That all changed when I decided to invest several thousand dollars into a brew system.
There are systems out there, but I wanted to build it myself. That is when I, like many others, found the published plans for the Brutus 10. I built the system with Blichman pots and devices. Now that I have my system dialed in, I hook up hoses add grains to my strike water and off it goes. The lautering is controlled by two pumps; one that is regulated and pumps only needed amounts of liquor to the wort. The wort flows to the boiler through a regulator and a few miinutes later its boiling. Most of the time I'm watching the game while my system chuggs away. And, with my direct fire mash tun, I'm getting an 82% efficiency!
I still have to clean, but in all, my investment has paid off. You can see my system by going to my profile and reading about the build.
David Lester