Well duh.

Production methods from starch to sugars.

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Drunk-N-Smurf
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Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

I was sitting there staring at my fermentor asking myself "self," (I knew it was me cause I recognised my voice), "there has to be an easier way to cook these grains properly without having to deal with a stove full of pots, and without having to buy a B.O.P."

Then it hit me....I remembered reading a few posts about steam injection...

Why the hell didn't I pursue this before? I dunno, but my grains have been soaking for a couple days now, and are currently being fed raw steam from my still. I know it's nothing new, but I had to share my "a ha" moment with SOMEONE lol
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pfshine
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Re: Well duh.

Post by pfshine »

He'll ya it's the poo ain't it.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

pfshine wrote:He'll ya it's the poo ain't it.
Sure is. Definately going to build a proper steam head for the end of my Liebig tomorrow. Get some good surface area happening to speed it up a bit. For now it's just a chunk of pipe stuffed into the trash can sputtering steam.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

Just one problem....I should have started this when I got home from work, not at 11pm....

What would happen if I stopped and then started again tomorrow?
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Re: Well duh.

Post by pfshine »

Nothing your fine as long as you get to a boil tomorrow.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by pfshine »

Sorry you will have more water in the mash
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

pfshine wrote:Sorry you will have more water in the mash
That's fine. I can deal with a bit of extra water. I'm hoping to get her to mash temp before bed, but I don't think I'll get there. It's only at 150 now. And I've only got about 30 mins or so before the wife will be missing me. (She usually sends the cat down at about 1:30)
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

Also gonna grab some bubble foil tomorrow and wrap the fermentor a few times.....
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Brutal
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Brutal »

You were almost there!
Steam injection rig http://tinyurl.com/kxmz8hy
All grain corn mash with steam injection and enzymes http://tinyurl.com/mp6zdt5
Inner tube condenser http://tinyurl.com/zkp3ps6
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

Brutal wrote:You were almost there!
So close! And then I heard the call...I pushed it to 2:30..I think I was around 170 or so when I shut it down. I threw in my high temp enzymes at 150 so they could start working as I cooked up with luck they'll still be fine when I reheat.

Found a brand new mop pail for $40 so I'm snatching that up today for my first round spent grain sugar head.

(The wife is gonna love her power bill this month haha)
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Re: Well duh.

Post by still_stirrin »

Drunk-N-Smurf wrote:....The wife is gonna love her power bill this month....
:shock:
Her power bill? How do you manage that? Mine just leaves the bills on the counter...'till the electricity is shut off!
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Re: Well duh.

Post by likker liker »

For the the last week or so I've been thinking about the new ss barrel I have and how to apply heat to it. Still stuck in the old ways, thinking about using LP, not happy with that though.
Then stated reading this and a 2x4 hit me over the head :idea: yah steam, that's it steam, I can make lots of it.
Thanks for the hit over the head, I need it from time to time
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

still_stirrin wrote:
Drunk-N-Smurf wrote:....The wife is gonna love her power bill this month....
:shock:
Her power bill? How do you manage that? Mine just leaves the bills on the counter...'till the electricity is shut off!
She pays power and water, and I pay rent and natural gas. She's ocd, so it has to be structured or she panics lol.
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npstephe
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Re: Well duh.

Post by npstephe »

very nice. Any pictures of you apparatus? I've been throwing around the idea of steam around. I have about 8ft of 1/2" Copper laying around I can build it out of. how fast does it heat?
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

Heat up was substantially faster tonight. Started throwing steam at it at 8:12, already up to 175f and rising. Last night I only had my element cranked to 120v, today I'm feeding 165v, too nervous to go full 220 yet.

Still didn't build a proper steam injector, was too busy at work, and then my ex sent my kids over for dinner.

I'm thinking of a currigated stainless coil winding down, (maybe 4 wraps? Any more and the steam would condense too much before it hit the bottom) with a bunch of holes drilled through it, and pinched off mostly at the end. Support it somewhat with a couple keg spears I have laying around to maintain rigidity in the fermentor. That should offer lots of surface area throughout the fermentor and increase heat up time with less added water to the mash I would think.

Thoughts?
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Re: Well duh.

Post by chris_zx2 »

Be sure to watch for clogging. What container are you heating this in? Sorry if you mentioned this.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by thecroweater »

How you planning to regulate the temp of yard rests :econfused:
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

thecroweater wrote:How you planning to regulate the temp of yard rests :econfused:
Do you need rests with enzymes?
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

chris_zx2 wrote:Be sure to watch for clogging. What container are you heating this in? Sorry if you mentioned this.
For now right in my fermenter (trash can)

Clogging- plan on leaving the end only partially pinched so there is an escape route for the steam.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by chris_zx2 »

I'm using a 20 gallon brute and was considering steam injection but was worried the high temp might affect the food grade rating. Anybody have the temp range for these?
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Re: Well duh.

Post by thecroweater »

Drunk-N-Smurf wrote:
thecroweater wrote:How you planning to regulate the temp of yard rests :econfused:
Do you need rests with enzymes?
Yes, ever enzyme has its optimum and denaturing temp, mash needs to be held at temps to suit enzyme used
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

thecroweater wrote:
Drunk-N-Smurf wrote:
thecroweater wrote:How you planning to regulate the temp of yard rests :econfused:
Do you need rests with enzymes?
Yes, ever enzyme has its optimum and denaturing temp, mash needs to be held at temps to suit enzyme used
I've just been manually killing/adding steam as the temp rises/falls to keep it in range for as long as practical. Im not really planning on automating any kind of temp regulation (yet)

(It's my first time with the steam injection, so, there's a bit of a curve to the learning.)
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Re: Well duh.

Post by moosemilk »

I think I may have to get on this steam injection method very soon. Just about done my keg boiler with CCVM and it will be electric. I have some 1.5" copper pipe doing nothing, so put a 2" expander with an ez flange to fit my keg, and use that for steam injection stealing from (I think it was brutal) that used the ss washing machine hose with rubber removed. Been eyeing some nice ss pots in the scrap pile at the local yard that would be great for this...they even have legs and a drain....

Going back to school in fall so I'll be broke then (42 years old and decided time for change). Best get on it now lol

And my wife likes me up late. She gets the bed to herself to fall asleep (well, the dog too). Only problem is I have to try to fall asleep after, and she snores (I'm going to say the dog, because wife would kill me if she read this).
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Re: Well duh.

Post by yakattack »

Smurf. You are going to want the head to be at the bottom and the stem to the side to allow you to use a mixing drill to stir the grain bed. This will help with even heatup and faster cook.
HDNB wrote: The trick here is to learn what leads to a stalled mash....and quit doing that.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by BoomTown »

Started using steam injection last month. It turned out to be dirt simple. Simply made a wand that reached to the bottom of the (we use 30gal food-grade polypropylene barrel that had once been used to ship apple juice concentrate in from an earlier life) as the magic/mashing tun.

The steam wand is 1" copper from the top of the boiler to the bottom of the mash tun, leads to a 1/2"x1"x1/2" tee. made a loop of 1/2" soft tubing that was roughly the diameter of a dinner plate. Drilled about 24 - 1/32" holes in random places around the loop. Silver soldered the whole thing together, wrapped the barrel in a hot-water heater insulation jacket, used some foam pipe insulation on the exposed parts of the wand. Works like a charm. Heats the mash much faster than direct heat, guess the heat following along the copper tube may add a little, but the steam get's hotter than 212 going in. No scorching (yet!). I have a digital probe to keep track of the temperature rise.

I flash (if you can call 3 hours a flash) heat about 20 gallons of mash to a boil, stirring it with a long handled shovel about every half hour. I let it boil about 30 minutes, shut off the boiler pot and pull out the wand. Drop the wand into 5gal bucket of water, whisk round the loop with a brush to remove the clinging stuff, drain it, and hang it on the wall.

We made a chilling worm of 15' soft 1/2" copper tubing. It hangs on the wall, right next to the steam wand. It's fed by 1/2", 1/2 hsp pump from a 50 gallon cold water tank. We pump the cold water through plastic hoses through the copper chiller coil and back to the cold water tank in a loop. I simply grab the chiller coil, flip the switch on the pump, dunk the coil down into the boiling mash, and crash the temperature back to 180f but jigging the coil up and down. It's easy to gage how much heat is being sucked out because the side of the coil going back to the cold water tank gets too hot to hold very fast. I stir the mash to be sure it is at 180f rest, usually about 5 minutes, toss in some high temp enzyme, cover the mash tun, rinse of the chiller coil, flip off the pump and go to lunch.

About an hour later, the temp usually has dropped slightly, so I crash chill it on down to 150f, toss in the low temp enzyme, stir it a few times to mix the enzymes in then move the mash tun, (which just magically became the fermenter barrel) to the fermenting area and let it slowly drop to around 100f. Usually takes over night but sometimes longer. Check the SG and pH in the morning at strike temp, of 100f. The trick is to set the hot mash barrel on an insulated surface or the ground temperature will affect the fermentation temperature and slow down the fermenting process. At 100f, there is usually 4 or 5 inches of clear sugar water on top, and SG's around 1055 to 1065, depending on the grain bill.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by chris_zx2 »

Hey guys I think my question was missed but does anyone know the temp ratings of the brutes for this? I've read that food grade plastic looses it's food "gradeablity" if heated to over a certain amount?
I'm going to see if I can find the msds, if this has been covered I apologize.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Ferment_It »

Chris, I don't think lldpe - Brute trash can plastic- is good for high temps. HDPE is much more resilient. I think I remember reading 170F was max for lldpe and hdpe is good at temps above boiling water- can't seem to find that source again though.

Anyone have any solid info on this? I'd love to steam in my 32gal...
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Re: Well duh.

Post by humbledore »

From Wikipedia:
Polyethylene is a thermoplastic polymer consisting of long hydrocarbon chains. Depending on the crystallinity and molecular weight, a melting point and glass transition may or may not be observable. The temperature at which these occur varies strongly with the type of polyethylene. For common commercial grades of medium- and high-density polyethylene the melting point is typically in the range 120 to 180 °C (248 to 356 °F). The melting point for average, commercial, low-density polyethylene is typically 105 to 115 °C (221 to 239 °F).
I would say the melting point of LDPE is a little too close to that of boiling water for my tastes.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by carbohydratesn »

Correct, it is not safe to boil in LDPE. HDPE is fine, LDPE (Brute cans) will melt.
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Re: Well duh.

Post by Drunk-N-Smurf »

Well, great, now I gotta find a 40gallon stainless fermenter...
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