Home Distiller

Hey there,

I ordered a really nice setup direct from a Chinese factory. The build quality and service have been top notch so far. My only concern is regarding the controller. Ultimately, I do plan to have everything inspected by an electrician as - full disclosure - I'm not an electrician or anything even close.

I'm in North America. The plan is to use an existing outlet for an electric stove. Also within close proximity is an existing outlet for an electric clothes dryer. Both of these have 4-wire connections.

See the following pictures of the internals of the electrical controller I received with my rig. It's is attached to 2 x 5500w electric heating elements and an agitator connected to the boiler.

Can anyone assist with how I can use this setup? Is it even possible to wire this up to my existing outlets?

Should. be fairly straight forward to wire up .green wire to the earth terminal . Black and a Red to the 220v input . Ignore the white Neutral wire as its not used .
Having said that , 10kw of elements will draw a huge current . Considering how much you probably paid for this still , I’d highly recommend you spend a few more bucks to get an electrician to do it properly . Under rated plugs , cables or poorly made connections can get very hot at this power . If your worried about an electrician seeing it , just hide the still bead and tell him its for beer making .

Your agitator is going to spin faster on 60hz
Are the 5500w heaters rated for 240v or 220v, it makes a difference on the current draw.
From what I see, you can turn the heaters on or off but not vary them.

Good suggestion on just getting an electrician to wire it up. Now that I know that it is possible to wire it with two hots, no neutral, I'll call in an electrician to set everything up.

I've asked the seller about the exact ratings on the elements but looking back on correspondence they said 5500W at 220V. I'll be sure to let the electrician know that. I can control the heat output on the controller, see attached.

I see the 3-phase motor starting relays:
Also, it looks like it uses 2 phases (of the 3-phase relay) for your 220/240 hot leads. It looks to me like a mechanical relay instead of a solid state relay. I hope it can hold up to the service requirements.

The third starter is for the agitator motor with lower current demands.

The specs look OK for your installation. Good luck.
ss

make sure that's a 50amp circuit you are connecting to, a 30 wont cut it with both elements on.

Stove outlet is 30Amp rated. For 2x5500Watt elements you need at least 45 Amp. Use only one element or you will need to install and wire a 50Amp outlet.

sambedded wrote:Stove outlet is 30Amp rated. For 2x5500Watt elements you need at least 45 Amp. Use only one element or you will need to install and wire a 50Amp outlet.

Another good reason to get an electrician to come out . Even if it cost $200 or so its a cheap insurance policy

I just had an electrician come out to install my brewing outlet. I have 2x 5500w elements running through a control panel and he cautioned me to use a 60Amp connection instead of a 50. stating the additional wiggle room for safety. He stated that if the voltage dropped to my house, the heating element will still pull the wattage, causing the amperage to go up above 50 possibly.

all that being said, i went with a 50amp because i didnt see a 60amp plug anywhere. and I didnt want to hardwire my control panel in.

60 Amp wiring is better, though more expensive, but

theskaz wrote:stating the additional wiggle room for safety. He stated that if the voltage dropped to my house, the heating element will still pull the wattage, causing the amperage to go up above 50 possibly.

is completely bullshit. If voltage dropped power pulled by heating elements will drop as well. Current through your heating element will drop proportionally a voltage drop. I.e. if voltage drop by 10% current through element will drop by 10 % as well and it will be around 41 Amp . It's a basic Ohm law. Consider to use another electrician.

sambedded wrote:60 Amp wiring is better, though more expensive, but

theskaz wrote:stating the additional wiggle room for safety. He stated that if the voltage dropped to my house, the heating element will still pull the wattage, causing the amperage to go up above 50 possibly.

is completely bullshit. If voltage dropped power pulled by heating elements will drop as well. Current through your heating element will drop proportionally a voltage drop. I.e. if voltage drop by 10% current through element will drop by 10 % as well and it will be around 41 Amp . It's a basic Ohm law. Consider to use another electrician.

+1 definitely find another sparky

theskaz wrote:He stated that if the voltage dropped to my house, the heating element will still pull the wattage, causing the amperage to go up above 50 possibly.
.

I also agree that this is bullshit as relevant to any elements or controllers that we might use However , it actually becoming a true fact . As more and more appliances use switch mode power supplies or have inverter technology built in ,they do actually use a higher current to maintain the required output as the supply voltage drops .

Look at most devices these days that say input voltage 90-270 Volts , the device will draw 3x as much current at 90v than it does at 270 v to supply the same output Power .....Ohms law

So perhaps the Sparkie wasn't stupid but just didn't bother to check his facts about what type of controller it was before commenting .

Yummyrum wrote: As more and more appliances use switch mode power supplies or have inverter technology built in ,they do actually use a higher current to maintain the required output as the supply voltage drops .

Look at most devices these days that say input voltage 90-270 Volts , the device will draw 3x as much current at 90v than it does at 270 v to supply the same output Power .....Ohms law

So perhaps the Sparkie wasn't stupid but just didn't bother to check his facts about what type of controller it was before commenting .

Yes, you are right, switching (or active) power supply does a power stabilization and consume more current in case of voltage drop. But nobody using them to control water heating element. 10 KW inverter is big, very expensive and senseless for heating applications. So that sparky guy still isn't smart.

ok, I believed him because of the statement "That heater element will pull 5500watts whether line voltage is 240, 230, or 220.

my math was this:

5500 x 2 = 11000 /240 = 45.883 Amps. that leaves ~4.2 amps left of "wiggle room" if there was a sudden voltage drop to say 220v, assuming he was correct, that would go to 50amps even. 219v and it's over. And something about "code" needing 20% headroom or something like that.

are you guys saying that the heater wattage will drop with line voltage? that changes things for me personally if that is the case.

Watts = volts * Amps

Given this, what would you expect?

Hint, amps are a fixed value for the elements in this case.

A heating element is just a resistor. Apply a voltage and current flows. Higher voltage causes a higher current and a lower voltage causes a lower current. The formula Expat gives is correct but the current is NOT fixed rather it is directly related to the applied voltage. Knowing (measured or calculated) the resistance you can also use:

P=I^2×R or P=V^2÷R

Your worst case current will occur at the highest supply voltage available when dealing with a resistive load.

Switch mode electronics are usually 'constant power' devices and current demands are different as has already been explained.

Im so sorry for hijacking this thread, but Im trying to learn me something.


if amps are fixed with a heating element, that means the heating element runs at ~23 amps regardless of the voltage applied to it?

for example, if I took one of my 5500w elements and applied a hot and neutral (instead of hot + hot) effectively making it 120v, then it would run at 2750 watts?

theskaz wrote: if amps are fixed with a heating element, that means the heating element runs at ~23 amps regardless of the voltage applied to it?

for example, if I took one of my 5500w elements and applied a hot and neutral (instead of hot + hot) effectively making it 120v, then it would run at 2750 watts?

No. Heating element has fixed resistance (mmmm kinda. Resistance is actually increased when element get hotter, but we can ignore it since difference is not too significant).
And we have an Ohm's law R=U/I or I= R*U Where R - resistance, I - current U - voltage. So when voltage drops 50% current will drops by half as well. So your heating element will generate only a quarter of original power. 5500/4 = 1375 Watt at 120Volt.

Right, so these elements are actually 4500W, not 5500W.
The controller I have gives me the ability to control the heat output by the elements.

Let's say the Voltage is (fairly) constant at 240V.

Full blast: 1/2 Blast (double the resistance using the controller): 3/4 Blast: Or thereabouts.

My stove circuit has a 40A breaker at the panel. Running a new circuit to the still location isn't a viable option. I'd need to pop a lot of holes in the walls (no go with wife that is already barely tolerant of my hobbies). So, I should be good to go with both elements & agitator as long as I keep things dialed down appropriately. I'll likely only use two elements during initial heat up. Am I wrong?