Electric element protection

CRUNK

CRUNK

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For those of you who run an electric Brewery which I am designing and getting ready to build my own I'm switching over from gas brings me to my question what are you guys using for water level sensors to protect your elements
 
I don't use one but many people do they are stainless steel float sensors, 1/2" npt
 
Ozarks Mountain Brew said:
this is a picture and this is not the one to get but be warned some are way over priced a good one should be below $30

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/ZSC...-Sensor-Stainless-Steel-Float/1684701150.html

so the signal will disrupt the ssr and be a dc voltage, the same as your signal in from the pid
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That looks like it would work perfectly.

I am custom ordering to kettles from stout tanks and kettles and my future plan is to have the system fully automated basically just like a professional Brewery so that I can log on remotely through my laptop and my cell phone and start the Brewing process while I'm at work so that I can Brew during the week and not just on the weekends
 
oh I agree you need one and it might work but that one is shipped from china and it could take 2 weeks to get here, the US versions are the same thing but faster delivery, I guess if your not in a hurry it doesn't matter
 
Not in too much of a hurry yet I'm still waiting on the quote for my kettles
 
also you probably know already but this will either screw into a welded fitting or use weldless with a couple of washers and gaskets
 
Yes I can get a 1.5 TC cap with a half inch npt thread on it because my entire system is going to be Tri clamp fitting
 
I decided to go with stout tanks and kettles to custom make my Brew Kettle and mash tun because they use rolled stainless steel everything is welded and it's polished inside and out as opposed to buying spikebrewing kettles or SS brewtech kettles for several the other popular kettles which are stamped discs which for sanitary reasons seem to always have a brushed finish stout tanks and kettles polishes there's inside and out and it's rolled steel it is smooth as a baby's bottom
 
Mark D Pirate said:
My kettle doesn't have any , all the brains running my lil brewhouse are stuck in my head
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Mark that is the greatest thing about this Hobby we can immerse ourselves as much as we want to before I thought about going fully automated I sat down and thought to myself is this going to take the fun out of brewing for me and it won't I still have the scientific side of compiling all the data points this is just going to allow me to brew more often but less on the weekends if I want my weekends free it's a challenge to see if I can build a totally automated system at The Homebrew scale.
 
I used an Omega LVE-951 optical sensor on the 3 barrel system I designed and built For a friend of mine who opened a micro-brewery. I used it because it has no moving parts and is rated for 250F. It's a little pricey but works well. The sensor comes with no supporting circuitry that may be scary for some, but it allows for a lot of flexibility from an engineering perspective.

It's actually pretty cool how it works, it has a prism is on the outside of the sensor and looks like a glass bulb. A beam of light is direct toward the prism from the inside and it is reflected back to a light sensor on the inside, as liquid comes in contact with the prism the beam of light is no longer reflected back to the sensor and the output is activated (active low). The way I designed it is that it interrupts the whetting voltage to the control relays shutting them off. It does have a couple of things to watch for, it needs to be cleaned after every brew and it's best to have it recessed from the pot to avoid falsing from steam.

It maybe overkill for some, but I plan on using it when I finishing designing the rest of my system. Right now I use a PID for my mash, but the rest is still old fashioned gas. Not having some safety controls for firing an element not only leads to damage elements, but also damaged pots if it get the dry pot hot enough to impinged the stainless. Plus dry firing smells bad.

Here's a link to my schematic, I designed it so it would turn on a green light when it was active and a red light when it was low or inactive. Since I had only one output from the sensor, I had to get creative to get the two lights to work with just one output.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-60w_IvRv3BeTBIZHozZ1E0R0k5UTlBNUhZcE4zb0x1ME53

Here's a link to the Omega LVE-951 manual.

https://www.omega.com/manuals/manualpdf/M5173.pdf

Good luck!
 
HighVoltageMan! said:
I used an Omega LVE-951 optical sensor on the 3 barrel system I designed and built For a friend of mine who opened a micro-brewery. I used it because it has no moving parts and is rated for 250F. It's a little pricey but works well. The sensor comes with no supporting circuitry that may be scary for some, but it allows for a lot of flexibility from an engineering perspective.

It's actually pretty cool how it works, it has a prism is on the outside of the sensor and looks like a glass bulb. A beam of light is direct toward the prism from the inside and it is reflected back to a light sensor on the inside, as liquid comes in contact with the prism the beam of light is no longer reflected back to the sensor and the output is activated (active low). The way I designed it is that it interrupts the whetting voltage to the control relays shutting them off. It does have a couple of things to watch for, it needs to be cleaned after every brew and it's best to have it recessed from the pot to avoid falsing from steam.

It maybe overkill for some, but I plan on using it when I finishing designing the rest of my system. Right now I use a PID for my mash, but the rest is still old fashioned gas. Not having some safety controls for firing an element not only leads to damage elements, but also damaged pots if it get the dry pot hot enough to impinged the stainless. Plus dry firing smells bad.

Here's a link to my schematic, I designed it so it would turn on a green light when it was active and a red light when it was low or inactive. Since I had only one output from the sensor, I had to get creative to get the two lights to work with just one output.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-60w_IvRv3BeTBIZHozZ1E0R0k5UTlBNUhZcE4zb0x1ME53

Here's a link to the Omega LVE-951 manual.

https://www.omega.com/manuals/manualpdf/M5173.pdf

Good luck!
Click to expand...

You very well be just the man I need to speak with I was going to use the blichmann boilcoil in my Brew Kettle I was going to have it shipped to stout tanks to put it in for me they asked if I would be interested in going with 21.5 TC ports and running do element which doesn't bother me except for the fact that I only have a 30 amp 120 circuit running to the shed which isn't bad because I can put a 40 amp breaker on that line and put 2:20 amp Breakers in the sub panel but now I need to know whether I can run two 1500 watt elements off of one PID or can I hook them up tie them into one single sensor in the same pot and run them both simultaneously through One controller and one piece of software so they act as one not 2
 
If anyone here is familiar with Arduino Brew control or anything similar to that that lives close to Pennsylvania or in Pennsylvania you might be my new best friend I need to build a control panel from scratch I'm familiar with electric but not familiar with Arduino it seems pretty simple but it would be much easier if somebody knew what they were doing cuz I sure would hate to fry a board
 
I think your electricity needs to be updated, I wouldn't spend the $ on stout if you don't have 240v power, your just not going to be happy
 
Ozarks Mountain Brew said:
I think your electricity needs to be updated, I wouldn't spend the $ on stout if you don't have 240v power, your just not going to be happy
Click to expand...

I was looking into a few things and I found a element 2000 Watt 120 volt I figured two of those elements should be plenty to handle 5 gallon batches I'm only using 10 gallon kettles

I could check and see if I can get ahold of the material to run a 240 line out strictly for the brewery and leave the 30 amp 120 line for everything else
 
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