Sunday, April 3, 2011

Time to try out the new equipment

My new brew system, while not very sexy, is a big upgrade from where I started. I can hardly wait to brew beer. But before I do that I want to test it with water. After plumbing the system I will first test it with unheated water. This is done to make sure fluid can be moved as intended. You don’t want a mishap with 5 gallons of boiling water, or wort, you are transferring from the kettle. It is also a good time to check that there is no crud in the chiller that may have been left from fabrication. The siphon worked as planned. There were just a couple of connections that needed tightening to eliminate drips. The next thing to do is a full test with boiling water. I will also test the chiller operation. I brought 5 gallons of water to a boil and ran a little through the chiller to sterilize it. Now just open the valve from the cooling water and boiling water from the kettle goes in the chiller with 70 degree water coming out. The test is a success. A thermometer is needed to measure the wort out flow temperature. I am using Blichmann Engineering’s ThruMometer. It is reasonably priced and easy to incorporate into the brewery.




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