After delivering my brewery to snickerrby yesterday, I decided I'd better not hang onto the cash too long or it'll get sucked up in day-to-day life. So, I just ran out at lunch to B3 Riverside and picked up 2 of the new 26 gallon heavy duty kettles. These are much heavier duty than the Italian kettles and the lids fit a lot better too. I decided to just pop for the modified ones since they came with SS ball valves and I figured once I bought the fittings and valves and actually figured out how to weld thin SS the extra $ were worth it.
Now I need a pump, wort chiller and steel for a new stand.
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And so it begins
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backyard brewer
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I'm still contemplating the chiller right now. I don't know if I want to go plate chiller or large IC chiller. I'd hate to spend the bucks on copper to find out it's not enough, but I like being able to drop the temperature of all the wort together. I did find a copper tubing place online that sells a 100' length of 1/2" copper for under $100 plus shipping. I'm thinking of making a chiller with 2 coils, one larger diameter than the other, that are feed from a tee and discharge through a tee. Basically 2 X 50' chillers nested in one another and attached to the same inflow/outflow.Brew Captain wrote:Derrin,
I have been contemplating the upsizing of my brewery also. My sculpture will accommodate the larger diameter of the 26 gallon kettles.
What did those bad boys run you? What chiller is offered for that volume of wort?
Cheers!
The modified kettles, including SS ball valves were $277.95 each and I got our Brewcommune discount. Unmodified they are $207.95. The modified ones have a pretty cool fitting that looks to be custom machined. It's male threads on the outside so you don't have to use a nipple for your valve and female on the inside to attach a pickup tube or whatever.
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Good news again! Steve's X-bro-in-law works for a steel supply place and gets a cost deal on small quantities of material. Right now I'm thinking of copying the B3 2050 system out of 1X2 .065 wall 304 stainless. The tippy dump might be an issue though with the Boilermaker mashtun with its sight glass and sight glass support. I can make it so the band clamps over that area, but I'm not sure. If the kettle walls were thicker, I'd weld support plates and pivot bolts right to the kettle. I could so that to the B3 kettle no problem. I was thinking a U-shaped stirrup that supported under the kettle with blocks at the top to spread the load out and have the kettle hang from that. I wonder if that'll work.
Whoo Hoo!
For the price, I might just build a prototype stand out of mild first before I commit the welder to the $$
Whoo Hoo!
For the price, I might just build a prototype stand out of mild first before I commit the welder to the $$
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backyard brewer
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backyard brewer
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I got all my SS cut to size. Took about an hour and half and at least half of that time was trying to get an accurate 45* angle with the chop saw. still came out good though. I bought 3 20' sticks and had 1 cut in half and the other 2 cut 8'/12'. I made a spreadsheet showing which pieces needed to come out of each stick to make sure I didn't screw up and waste a bunch of material. That small pile next to the saw is the only scrap.
Here's the cut pieces:
I used some of the scrap to run a test weld. I need a lot of practice, but this was much more encouraging than the .040 wall SS I was trying to weld before. At first I was freaking out because I destroyed the tungsten about 4 times and the welds were burning. Not burning through, just plain burning. Turns out it works much better if you turn on the argon!!
Here's a test weld on some of the scrap (with the gas on
)
Here's the cut pieces:
I used some of the scrap to run a test weld. I need a lot of practice, but this was much more encouraging than the .040 wall SS I was trying to weld before. At first I was freaking out because I destroyed the tungsten about 4 times and the welds were burning. Not burning through, just plain burning. Turns out it works much better if you turn on the argon!!
Here's a test weld on some of the scrap (with the gas on
)
(aka GTAW Gas Tungsten Arc Welding).
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backyard brewer
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I guess I should have said "destroyed the tungsten point". It just sucks because you have to stop everthing and re-grind the thing. You also have to have a grinding wheel just for the tungsten, otherwise you can contaminate it with other metals. So if you were just grinding a weld, you have to take the grinder apart and put a different wheel on it too.jward wrote:Did you really ruin the tungsten? I have heard welders bitching that they had to keep re-grinding the tungsten rod. I think it was from dipping it in the SS pool. Anyhow, you might see if you can clean them up depending them what you meant by destroyed.
I had to buy a 7-pack of tungstens to get the 2% ceriated ones, so I'll just grind points on all of them and switch them as I F them up and then re-grind all 7.
I played around some more today. I need a lot of practice. I'm goint to weld all the scrap back together before I start on the stand. I wanted to play around a while longer but I have to start getting ready. I have to go to Vegas the next 3 days for the SEMA show.
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