Recent content by kenc_zymurgy

I've been breadboarding and testing my brew controller, and I'm not sure what is acceptable practice for the physical connection of the line-side wires to the SSR. The SSR has those plates that clamp down on the conductor, which I like better than the typical "wrap-the-wire-around-a screw"...

Old thread, I know, but I was doing some searches.... I'm wondering if hitting the element with a propane torch would be a good way to clean it? You'd be hitting the gunk directly, there would be less heating of the element shell, and much less heating of the heating element itself. I assume...

:) No, I'm just doing my usual over-thinking. And I do like to (in my mind) challenge the status quo, not so much that I think the established conventions are wrong, but it helps to fix in my mind *why* those are the conventions. And I probably got a bit scared from the reports of these fake...

What kind of hot plate? Induction or plain old simple hot plate? I kinda thought about doing my split boils (3.5 gallons each in two pots for 7 gallons preboil) with two cheap hot plates. I know those aren't as efficient at getting heat into the liquid as induction, so I wasn't sure that could...

They are 12V coils, so an Arduino would definitely need a transistor and you always need a clamp diode across a relay coil. That's pretty minor, and highly reliable, and I've got plenty of those parts in the bin, but it is one more thing. Oh, and then I'd also need a 7805 to drop the 12V to 5V...

I think I'm convinced. I guess I was thinking the SSR requirement was from the RIMS/HERMS cases where fast control is probably needed, and that *maybe* a relay could work for the boil. I didn't think about the heat build up on the contacts from each high current switch operation, I'll take a...

Thanks, but that's $80 plus another hole in the kettle. Not really what I was thinking of. Hmmm, interesting, but I can't really see the advantage over a switch with some spring loading.

I was just catching up on some of the threads about slow boils and low evaporation rates (5%), so I wonder. As long as you hit a target boil-off, would a pulsing boil even matter? Those threads seem to be saying that even a simmer gets the job done.

OK, I wasn't aware that the switching needed to be that fast. I was thinking that volume of liquid would have enough thermal mass to even out over a 10 second period, but I guess not. Switching a big honking relay once a second would probably drive me nuts (I do split boils, so there'd be two of...

OK, that's a much better price for a legit SSR than I was finding at the big distributors. But I'd still need to add a $10 heat sink, and assure I've got a good thermal transfer with the compound. That's probably larger than just the relay. I wouldn't think the rate of cycling would affect the...

Good point - the only catch is, my own personal CPU is not as reliable as an ATmega32U4! @Tobor_8thMan - I actually didn't find a whole lot of useful hits for "brewing liquid level sensor", but one suggestion was just a couple wires to test for conductivity (could feed an analog input of the...

Here's my 3rd, and last question on the subject (until I do more research!) on my Electric Brewing plans: I assumed I'd be using SSRS to control a 1650 ~2250W element, like most brewers. I have some experience with SSRs on other projects, and I know that heat-sinking is critical when you get up...

No problem, I understand and agree - a spring setting will be a little 'tweaky". I think this will be a pretty coarse go-no-go, and not require *much* tweaking, but we will see. I'll do some serahing for liquid sensors, I just thought maybe there were well known good/bad units when it comes to...

I'm planning an Electric Brewery. Here's my next question - from my reading so far, it sounds like a 1650 watt element should be able to bring 3.5 Gallons of wort from mash temperatures to a boil in 20~30 minutes. Does that sound right? 1650 means I can run from a 15 Amp 120V outlet (North...

What kind of sensor would that be? This will also have wort in it, so that has to be considered. And phase of the moon, local gravitational fields, ambient temperature affecting spring constants, etc :) But seriously, I'm really trying to protect against a brain fart and turning it on when it...