my basement brewroom build

Williams 728
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Got the ampmeter and converter in from Mike yesterday and everything is working fine. Ordered my elements and remaining items needed for the element boxes as well as all the fittings needed for the new pots. Hope to be able to do a leak test next week someday. Still have to run my 240 to the basement and hook up my exhaust fan before I can do an actual trial run through the system.
Tom
ps.- took a dark shot of the panel just for kicks!

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Actually got the stuff yesterday,just didn't get around to posting the picture.

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Who did you end up using for your fittings/parts? I have been driving myself crazy cross comparing each and every part over 5 or 6 different vendors and supply companies trying to get the best price. I have a supply company by my house that has "some" stainless parts, but can get everything on my list. Still waiting on my quote from them. What I am finding is that it's hard to beat bargainfittings.com for their weldless bulkheads. I have been using Kal's materials list and cross comparing all of the vendors and cannot come close to the $11 ea. for the weldless bukhead kits. By the time you part out the 1/2" ss closed nipple thread, the ss lock washer, the ss washer/shim, the O rings, and the coupling (or whatever other fixture you choose), the cost greatly exceeds the BF kits. Is this what you found? It looks like I'm just going to use BF.com for the weldless kits and the majority of the fittings if the supply company by my house isn't competetive. Any suggestions from your end?

Another questions: How many hours do you have into the control panel assembly? Just planning ahead. BTW....great work so far, can't wait to see everything come together. :mug:
 
I went with bargain fittings. Honestly, I didn't even compare prices with anyone. I have in the past and bargain fittings is always the best deal. Plus, Wayne is great to work with. I needed a custom diptube made up for the system and he didn't charge extra or anything like that. I will always use him for fittings as long as he is around. As for the control panel, it took me a week and a half from the time I got it to the time to turn it on. One weekend was a lot of work gettingball the holes done and painting. After that, maybe an hour or two each night wiring it up. Thanks foe tbw compliments!
Tom

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The control panel came out great and that is a pretty nice early christmas present... Out of curiousity, what is the large diptube for?
 
I got some 20 gallon aluminum pots that are 19 1/2" wide. Needed a longer tube then he offered to fit centered in the pot.
Tom
 
The kettle conversions look great, despite the Miller Lt. and Bud Lt. in the background....;) Nice work my man! Can't wait 'til I'm at the point that you are with my build. Cheers! :mug:
 
Well obviously all the plumbing is done on the kettles except for the elements. They should hopefully be arriving Wednesday or so. In the mean time I leak tested the mash tun (no element in there) and calibrated the sight glass. Couple drips from the plumbing here and there, but nothing I couldn't fix. When I hit 18 gallons in the pot, I had a bad leak. Turns out one of the rivets for the handle was leaking. I don't really ever plan to hit 18 gallons, even with grains, in the mash tun so I just added a little food grade silicone to the rivets inside the kettle. Conditioned the pot on my burner (once again, not element to boil it in the mash tun) and didn't get so much as a drip out of it. When the elements arrive, I plan to fire up the control panel and perform the boil in the other two kettles.
Tom
 
Sweet! I already got my elements and just ordered my 3 piece ball valves at a fantastic price.....$14.99 through Austin Homebrew Supply. I too am working off of Kal's design. Just need to order my weldless fitting/bulkheads through BargainFittings and my site glasses through Bobby at Brewhardware. I have a patient with a full set of Greenlee punches that he is going to let me burrow to punch all of the holes. Then it's just polishing my a$$ off to get the keggles to a mirror finish. Now the biggest obstacle will be talking my wife into Kal's control panel, which is going to be a big chore. :drunk: We need to get the carpeting installed in our basement and it's 100% finished. We also need to buy the boiler to heat the basement floors, which is a few thousand more. I at least want to get the keggles finished and converted, the tables polished up, and start the build on the brewery. The control panel may be a while, but I'll get there eventually. Nice work.....very inspiring! :mug:
 
Got my elements today. Hoping to get them wired up, leak tested/sight glass calibrated, and boiling tonight. We'll see how that goes though...
 
Well I actually "used" my control panel for the first time tonight! I have to condition the aluminum kettles, so I used one element to bring the boil kettle to a boil. Everything worked great! The PID is off a bit, but that can wait until I run an actual water test on the whole system in the basement. Getting chilly here in southeast PA, so I didn't want to mess with it too much having the laundry door open and all. Makes me remember why I wanted to go electric in the first place!
Tom
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Ha! Yeah, the steamer basket worked perfect for this! When everything is done I have no idea what I'm going to do with them, especially three of them!
Tom
 
Since I have the same pots as you (and in turn same strainers), let me know if you figure out something useful for them in the future. I'll stare at them from time to time and just wonder what the heck I might actually use them for... I have yet to figure anything out.
 
those pots are pretty wide, i'd imagine you'll lose a lot of water to evaporation with so much surface area? What are you planning on doing for venting all that moisture out of the confined space? I saw pictures of the hood... what do you have to actually vent from that? an inline fan or something?
 
Yeah i'm planning to lose 2+ gallons with an hour boil. I am going to hook an inline fan to the hood. plan to do that as soon as I can due to the fan being in my garage and it starting to get cold.
tom
 
Maybe a bit forward, but what do you think the cost of that electric set up is without the kettles? We're getting a few kegs soon and I'm very interested in the e-brewing setup, but don't know how the cost compares to a typical single-tier propane system.

Looking like a great set up, I love what you did with the cabinets!
 
When your going the electric route I'm going, there is no doubt electric will be atleast double that of propane. That is unless your doing a fully automated propane rig. You can do an electric on the cheaper side, I just chose not to. I like kal's build do to the fact that the panel will probably outlast me! Also, the first day it is 10 degrees out with a 15mph wind, it will be well worth it to me. I spent too many days freezing my butt off out in the garage brewing, and I'm only in southeast PA. I can't imagine why anyone in the midwest wouldn't be using electric, low end or high end.
Tom

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Did I miss a parts list somewhere? What heating elements did you order? Any idea on costs? The control panel looks crazy awesome but how does that connect with your electric rig?

All of the pictures I saw showed three kettles sitting on a wood table. Where do you heat them up?

I have a space in the basement where it would be perfect to duplicate your project so I would really like to understand as much as possible. Thanks and keep up the progress!
 
TomRep said:
I spent too many days freezing my butt off out in the garage brewing, and I'm only in southeast PA. I can't imagine why anyone in the midwest wouldn't be using electric, low end or high end.
Click to expand...

Ya I hear that... we've been lucky without snow so far, but it's coming, and it's mean.
 
Happyloon- That's kind of ironic. I read and answered your post on my phone, so I had no clue where you lived! NewBrewB- Check out theelectricbrewery.com I am basically following his build exactly except for the fact that I went with a 50a panel (bigger enclosure and I have the ability to run two 4500w elements at one time). Right now I will only be running two 5500w elements individually. I figure it would be more difficult to resell my current kettles with two elements then it would one element when I upgrade. I didn't post every little detail of the electric build due to the fact a lot of people have seen it on Kal's site and I didn't want to beat a dead horse.
Tom
 
HappyLoon said:
Maybe a bit forward, but what do you think the cost of that electric set up is without the kettles? We're getting a few kegs soon and I'm very interested in the e-brewing setup, but don't know how the cost compares to a typical single-tier propane system.

Looking like a great set up, I love what you did with the cabinets!
Click to expand...

My cost for just the panel, no tools, kettles, etc was ~1200 and I ordered all the parts separately and built it my self. My whole rig, was around 3k.
 
TomRep said:
I didn't post every little detail of the electric build due to the fact a lot of people have seen it on Kal's site and I didn't want to beat a dead horse.
Tom
Click to expand...

Ahhhh that explains it. I have not read much about electric brewing so the horse was asking for it. Great project. Keep up the good work.
 
I finally got my ventilation done this weekend. Plans had to change on how/where I ran the ducting. Ended up having to go through the wall up into our kitchen and vent it that way. All in all I'm pretty happy with it. I ended up using a blower motor for one of those bounce house things that kids play on. I ended up getting it for free from my cousin. It is a bit loud which concerns me. May have to mess with that. However, it moves a ton of air and should work great. I had to actually use a dimmer switch to power it because 100% power was way overkill. Total invested is around $30-40 for everything.
Tom

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Nice. I saw the motor laying around your basement last time I was over there. Wondered what it was for.

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Cleaned up the mess from running the vent and hung the panel today. Starting to look like something now. Plan to order the plate chiller tonight. All I need is the pumps, more fittings, and my 240 line run and i can brew. Finishing touch on the whole room will be getting the ceiling finished.
Tom
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Not sure about those purple sleeves on the cables :)

Looks good tom

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lol Yeah, they do look purple in the picture. In person they are called "superhero" wrap and they are red and blue striped. Look cool in person but not so cool in the picture!
Tom
 
TomRep said:
Finishing touch on the whole room will be getting the ceiling finished.
Tom
Click to expand...

Im so jealous but there's just no room in the budget to start on this build yet.

Actually, ive been toying with the idea of adding an electric heating element to my existing brew kettle so I can keep brewing extract kits during the winter. How much of the "control panel" guts do I need, to fire up one kettle and hold it at boiling? (there is a thermometer already mounted on the kettle...hmm but not a digital one...)

Great thread. Thanks for the DIYPORN. :)
 
NewBrew- I'm honestly not the best person to talk to about this since I just built a kit that was shipped to my door. However, I would think you would need a PID to monitor and maintain your temperature, an SSR (solid state relay) that your PID would control to fire the element, and probably a switch and a main relay for the element. If you look in the electric section, there are a couple guys doing some stuff on the cheap and on a smaller scale. Thanks for the kind words all!
tom
 

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