Heist Brewing in Charlotte NC putting the system to work

My homebrewing and mountain biking buddy here in Auburn graduated and moved off to Charlotte, North Carolina.  He got a job at Heist Brewing, and before long he and the owner convinced me to let them put the Bluto 555 to use. Eric is now Heist's small batch brewer in charge of brewing all kinds of styles for weekly releases at the brewery.  You can hear an interview with him at about 27 minutes into this Cheers Charlotte podcast: http://cheerscharlotte.com/?p=301

last backyard test batch

Here are some pics from the last time I brewed a test batch in my backyard. I can tell you from the last few test batches that RIMS circulation works perfectly when the water to grain ratio is at least 1.5q/lb. I didn't make note of the times, but steps and mash-outs were surprisingly fast. I don't doubt that I was getting the recommended rise of 1C per minute.

I've decided to move the system to storage. I feel like I've tested it as much as I need to in this environment. It was very risky for me to have had this at home, for some good reasons:

* We had an F1 come through a while back and blew a tree down in the backyard. I typically took the system apart and moved it into the garage between brewdays, but this tornado came through at a time when I had been lazy and left the system sitting in the backyard (although covered with a tarp) between two brewdays. Thankfully, the tree didn't hit the system, but it sure made me become paranoid about it getting damaged back there. I also started to worry about theft. 

* Brewing without a license is illegal in Alabama. A homebrewing bill is in the Alabama legislature this year for the 5th time. It'll certainly pass this year, but it's very restrictive, allowing only 15 gallons per quarter. It's hardly possible to even brew such a small batch on this system. Since homebrewing hasn't really been prosecuted in the past, I've typically been pretty open about my brewing. Alot of people are. But it would be easy for someone opposed to brewing to make a big fuss about me brewing on this thing in my backyard. It's not your typical 5 to 10 gallon system. It's designed to be a commercial brewing system producing anywhere from 90 to 450 gallons per brewday. (So uuummm... for the record, any pic you've seen of this... it's not really making anything that was ultimately fermented into beer...)

I'd love to take another step forward on getting a brewery up and running. For me that means purchasing some land and building a facility. Everything I've done so far has been out of pocket, and I intend to keep it that way because I'm not really interested in any of the pressures or stresses that come with doing it any other way. In the meanwhile, I'm just going to sit on this for awhile. I would potentially be interested in leasing it to a start-up (with deferred terms favorable to the start-up) located somewhere like Asheville, North Carolina. That's far enough away that I wouldn't need to be involved, and close enough that I could occasionally come enjoy the awesome mountain biking trails and the sight of the system being put to good use.

As I get time, I will post more of the lessons I learned testing the system out and some things I might do differently.  I still believe this is an awesome system that permits extreme versatility, a nice level of automation, and perhaps the ability to double-brewday into a 30bbl fermenter. I still think it would be a great system to use to fill wine barrels with a wide variety of beers. It would be great for a brewpub or small brewery with a taproom.

I will try to check back here for comments to answer questions, but these days I'm preferring to use Google+ for discussions.  I'm sharing this post via G+, so feel free to chat with me there if you'd like.

over a year since my last post

Time flies, and I just looked back here to see that it has been over a year since my last post.  A year ago, I switched from my regular Google account to a Google Apps account, and it has taken me this long to even start thinking about how to migrate all my picasa photos and blog posts.

The last picture on the blog (below) shows the system unfinished.  At that time the electrical conduit had not been installed, and the main control panel had not been connected to the 5 satellite electrical enclosures.  That was completed in June or so, and I brewed my first two test batches in August.

I tried to use the system to its full capabilities and brewing two batches simultaneously on that very first brew day, and I ran into all sorts of problems.  I didn't have the BCS-462 programmed properly, and even if I had, some of the flow and circulation dynamics didn't work the way I was expecting.  I was able to finish everything manually.

For the next two batches in October, I decided to just start with the very basics and wait until later to work my way up to greater capabilities a little at a time in subsequent batches.  Well, I guess they weren't the most basic brews, because they were both high gravity and potentially very sticky mashes: a Wheatwine and a Belgian Pumpkin Ale.  I batch sparged both, and thankfully, the runoffs didn't get stuck.

The next brewday was in early February, and I decided to focus on the RIMS functionality.  These were very big mashes with about 140 lbs of grain each, so I had to lower the water to grain ratio to 1 quart per pound.  Recirculation worked fine for about 5 or 10 minutes before I started having problems.  I think it was a combination of the mashes being too thick, the recirculation being too fast, and the grain bed compacting too much.  Next time, I think I'll use less grain, up the ratio to 2 quarts per pound and see what happens during recirculation.

Next brewday is in March, and more pictures to come as soon as I decide how I'm going to transfer all these photos and drawings and redo the links.

almost

How many times have I said "almost"? I've lost count. I think I've been saying "I'll be ready to brew my first test batch in about 2 months" for the last year now. Well, this time "almost" is taking on a new meaning because I'm really almost there. There's some electrical wiring connections to be made, immersion chillers and internal kettle arms to be formed, and tests on the controller programming. And then, it'll really be ready!!! And you better believe I've got my fingers crossed that it'll all work as hoped!!!

mash tun false bottom modifications

What's the first thing you do when you get your shiny new Blichmann Boilermakers? If you're like me, you start cutting new holes and welding things onto it. But most of my friends will tell you that you shouldn't be like me, so do this at your own risk. In my last post, I explained how I modified some rotating racking arms from St. Pats for the kettle main ports and return ports. Pictured below is the new mash tun pick up tube and how I handled modifying the Blichmann false bottom to accommodate the new pick up tube.  I added additional pictures of the false bottom work in the Bluto 555 kettles gallery, as well as some additional pics of work on the kettles.

The hole pictured above is plenty big enough to allow inserting and removing the pick up tube.  A couple of additional stainless washers are used to slide over the pick up tube before adjusting it into place, and then you slide them back down to rest on top of the welded-on washers, in order to prevent grain from flowing through around the pick up tube during recirculation.

main port and return port fittings

I've added some pics to the fittings gallery to show how I'm coming through the kettle wall at the main port and the return port. Originally, I thought I'd have a TC ferrule on both the inside and outside of the kettle at the main and return ports (similar to the way Stout Tanks and Kettles has designed their mash tun return port), but welding a TC ferrule into the inside of the kettle down near the bottom for the main port proved to be too difficult.  It took me a while to figure out another way, and I eventually settled on modifying some rotating racking arms from St. Pats. Unfortunately, it's just about impossible to link to specific pages on St. Pats's website, so you have to click on Rotating Arms in the left column and then scroll down about 2/3 of the way down (or I took some screen shots and uploaded them here and here).

For the mash tun main port pick up tube (not pictured below), I left the horizontal part of the tube (for lack of a better way to describe it) alone and simply cut off the vertical part so it could point straight down inside the kettle.  For the boil kettle main port dip tube (pictured below), I shortened both the horizontal part of the tube and the vertical part. The ability to rotate this pick up tube from the outside of the kettle should (if necessary if I don't get a good trub cone following the whirlpool) enable avoiding picking up junk off the bottom of the kettle.

boil kettle dip tube

boil kettle dip tube

I used the same St. Pats racking arms for the return port, except for these I basically cut off all but an inch or so of the arm and welded on a reducing tube stem fitting from McMaster-Carr (which was also slightly modified).  The pics below show how this is designed to work so that you can basically create any type of internal kettle fitting you want to attach to the inside of the return port (mash wort return, sparge arm, whirlpool wort return, etc.) The pumps used on the system have a 1/2" exit, and the tubing from the pump to the return port is 1/2" ID. The tube stem fittings allow for a 1/2" OD tube, and a stainless 1/2" OD tube has an ID of .46", so there's not too much further restriction coming in through the return port like this when using the stainless tubing.  With 1/2" OD copper tubing, the ID is 3/8" but I only plan to use copper tubing internally for sparging and mash wort return, so hopefully that additional restriction won't be a big deal.

return port fitting idea

return port fitting

return port fitting

idea for motorized mash mixer

Here's a few pics of the idea I have for a motorized mash mixer. I haven't started on this yet, but it's something I really want to add to the system at some point. It'll be an expensive addition, so it's something I don't care to screw up. I've made a few design mistakes on the system so far, but nothing that I haven't been able to solve or tolerate (I hope!). Alot of contemplation is in order before I move forward with this part. I'm really eager to test a few typical batches before getting into decoction mashing anyway.

The idea is to create an addition to the frame (that can be bolted on when needed and removed when not needed) on which can be mounted a gear driven motorized mixer. The picture below shows an example of such a mixer, although I'd need blades of a larger diameter. The motor would need to be variable speed and capable of around 35 rpms (at least, my understanding at this point is that the blade shouldn't turn faster than 35 rpms). Some of these electric gear driven motors have an rpm range of 0-350 rpms. I'll just need to figure out how much horsepower is needed to stir a typical mash for the size batch appropriate for this system. Theoretically, with 5 kettles, you could split a mash up into 3 parts, stepping up the temperature of each as necessary and then continuing with the mash that has the mixer to bring it up to a boil for a while.

Special thanks to Donald Put, who wrote an article years ago on motorized mash mixing for Brewing Techniques magazine.

I created a new gallery for work on the motorized mash mixer here. For now, there are only a few more pictures of the drawing in the gallery, but I hope to add more later when the work on it is actually being done.