HERMS brewing: planning my rig
In my previous post, I talked about a few options for heating up your mash tun when doing brewing all-grain. And with the homework that I've done, I've pretty much come to the conclusion that my next setup will be using the HERMS technique of recirculating my wort and indirectly heat it. If it really interests you, you can take a look at my rough diagram of what my HERMS brewing setup will probably look like.
In that diagram, the hot liquor tank (also referred to as the sparge/strike tank) will serve a few purposes. In addition to being used to heat up my initial strike water for the mash tun, it will be used to heat up water to provide ambient heat for maintaining (or increasing/decreasing) my mash temperature, and lastly to heat up sparge water to stop the mash process.
The five lines that run from the tanks and the two lines up from the pumps will have brass quick disconnects with ball valves, allowing me to use flexible tubing with quick disconnects to quickly change which lines to and from the pump.
Why such a complicated diagram?
Brewing beer doesn't have to be complicated, in fact you really don't need all the fancy shut off valves, the march pump, all the different lines. Remember that brewing beer is as complicated as you want it to be. The reason for my added complexity is that I would prefer to work with a brewing system that isn't gravity-fed. What that means is that the hot liquor tank would be at the top tier, followed by a line out the bottom to the top of the mash tun, and then with a line from the mash tun down to the boil pot. And depending upon the volume of beer you wish to brew, that could mean having a stack that's nearly seven or eight feet tall.
This diagram allows me to keep everything level and gives me the flexibility to brew bigger batches without requiring a ladder. But it also means that I need to be extra careful with my mash tun and use a pot with a quality false-bottom in it to help prevent stuck mashes as I recirculate the wort.
Two of the models that I'm basing my build upon had a few things that I really liked. The tres kegs single-tier system by Bobby M was one of the first models that really grabbed me --- having everything on one level and the lines using quick disconnects really took hold of my attention. The other system that I saw was a very impressive HERMS system contained in a really nice wood structure that the guy built. My setup will probably be a relative hybrid of those two systems.
My next steps
Considering how I am going to heat my rig is probably the bigger question at hand --- how am I going to heat between five and ten gallons in both a reasonably controlled and timely fashion. And while I haven't completely ruled out propane for heating the hot liquor tank, I'm considering electric heating as well.
My next entry or two will review a few options for electric heating elements and perhaps some benchmarks to measure their effectiveness.