Yesterday, after putting up the Christmas lights on the house in the freezing cold, I decided to punish myself more by brewing up a Carolina Brewing Company Nut Brown Ale clone. Everything went great. The main reason is because this is the second time I’ve used my new electric HLT (pot that heats the water) and I’m really getting the hang of it. It makes it SO much easier for mashing and sparging. It’s not much to look at, but man does it make effortless to hit the proper temps. It’s basically just a 4 gallon pot from my extract brewing days, a heatstick made out of a water heater element, and a Ranco Temperature Senso with the probe slid down a piece of copper tubing. Since this photo, I added some insulation to help hold the heat. With it, I can hold my water at a perfect 165° (or whatever) for when I’m ready to mash and then add more water, set the Ranco on 180° and walk away. When I come back to sparge, my water is perfectly heated. No noise, no propane, and no dangerous flames that I can’t walk away from.
As far as the rest of the brewday, it went pretty well also. I did miss my mash temps by about two degrees under so it might be a little thin for a brown ale. I left the grain in the garage all weekend and forgot to adjust BeerSmith for the colder grain so I think that’s the cause. Oh well, it’ll still be beer. I’m sure it will still be pretty good and this happens to be one of my wife’s favorites (at least in the commercial form) so I hope it turns out well. This morning, it was already bubbling away, probably because I used two packets of yeast (US-05) instead of the usual one. I did this because I’m brewing again on Friday and I want my fermentation cabinet (refrigerator with a heater in it) to be available by then. I figure if I make it through the majority of the fermentation by then, I can let it ‘age’ in the house while the next beer gets to bask in the perfect 68° warmth.
The sensor turns the heating element on and off? How long does it usually take to heat 4 gallons?
I like the new profile pic BTW
It depends and I don’t really measure it but if I start with warm water from the tap (roughly 90-100 degrees), it’s up to my sparging temperature of 180 by the time I need it about 45 minutes later. I used to use that heating element when I brewed extract on the stove. It drastically reduced my time to boil… from about an hour, to about 15-20 minutes. Yes, the temperature controller turns it on when the temp drops below a specified level and turns on when needed. I actually use this one to control my fermentation temperature in my fridge. Sometimes its hooked to a reptile heater in the fridge to heat and sometimes its hooked to the fridge itself to cool. I have another one that controls my converted chest freezer, they are great.
Thanks, I like that pic too. That’s my Amarillo SMaSH dryhopping.