Electric All in ones

[BOB357]

In a nutshell what you describe is what I am doing. I use the calculator to guess mash water with 4gal. Space under pipe then have sparge water at strike temp to adjust mash to a recirculatable soup.
A big beer is coming up for me, and I plan on just omitting the pipe and doing a BIAB with recirculation.
The point I would like to make is the manufacturers made these all in 1's in general and without much fore thought. Do they work well? Yes pretty much. Could they be excellently well designed with a little effort before hitting the market? IMO yes.
Glad I bought 2 of different sizes too. Will enjoy brewing with them. I guess I just can't get past the idea of making a "better mousetrap ."

I liken these systems to pellet grills. They won't do everything you want, but what they do, they do well.

 

[Craigerrr]

I have my deadspace set at 6.75L (1.78USG) for my BZ35.

 

[BOB357]

I have my deadspace set at 6.75L (1.78USG) for my BZ35.

I think your malt pipe is about 1/2" longer than mine. I'm right at 2 gallons (7.57L) for dead space.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

In using my Digiboil with the mash kit for about 1 1/2 years now, I've done a lot of trying different things to get decent efficiency and consistency. A couple of things I've discovered that will, hopefully, help simplify your thought process:

The recoverable dead space, both under the malt pipe and around the parameter, only need to be part of the equations for calculating the strike water total and strike water temperature. If you recirculate during the mash the total strike water volume, including all dead space volume, becomes the water number in your water/grain ratio, virtually making the ratio moot. Once you begin recirculating, all of the water comes into contact with the grains.

After you factor in the dead space under the malt pipe, you need to find a water to grain ratio that allows you to recirculate at a reasonable rate, without using more water than needed. Some trial and error is needed here. Once you've found your sweet spot, the ratio is used only as a reference. (I need "x" water volume plus "y" qts/lb. of grain, x being the dead space under the malt pipe) Forget the parameter dead space it increases at the same rate regardless of the amount of grain you're applying the water/grain ratio to.

If you don't recirculate, the dead space is good insulation, but has little affect on the water/grain ratio, because any contact with the grain will be negligible. Your only concern here is mash thickness, and the same (I need "x" water volume plus "y" qts/lb. of grain) applies.

This negates the need to enter the parameter dead space into your equipment profile(s) and gives you a fixed water/grain ratio to use.
Hope this helps.

Hope this helps

Does the discharge valve have an internal down-leg that reaches to the bottom of the Digiboil, or do you need to tip it to extract some measure of the post boil Wort? Or do you sacrifice a set volume per batch?

 

[BOB357]

Does the discharge valve have an internal down-leg that reaches to the bottom of the Digiboil, or do you need to tip it to extract some measure of the post boil Wort? Or do you sacrifice a set volume per batch?

I currently just sacrifice 2 quarts, but will tilt and drain a bit more if I come up short on volume.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I have my 2 roller grain mill set at 0.032". If I do BIAB in a Digiboil with circulation, will it get stuck with this fine of a crush? Can I maintain this crush by adding a few cups of Rice Hulls?

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I currently just sacrifice 2 quarts, but will tilt and drain a bit more if I come up short on volume.

I wonder what the sacrifice would be for the 65L Digiboil?

 

[BOB357]

@Head First Should be able to better answer that. He has both sized mapped out.

 

[BOB357]

I have my 2 roller grain mill set at 0.032". If I do BIAB in a Digiboil with circulation, will it get stuck with this fine of a crush? Can I maintain this crush by adding a few cups of Rice Hulls?

I often had flow problems using the malt pipe with my mill set to .035", and can't imagine better results with the finer mesh size of a brew bag. When I went to .042", I was able to double the flow rater without any problems. I never used rice hulls, but they should definitely help. I think the biggest problem is the relatively small diameter of the malt pipe, compared to that of an average kettle, limits the drainage surface area. Using a brew bag without the malt pipe would gain some area which would help too. I'd think between that and some rice hulls you'd be able to use that crush.

 

[Head First]

@Head First Should be able to better answer that. He has both sized mapped out.

I lose about 2 or 3 qts with the 65L. Actually about a qt of that is break caught on the bk screen. I slowly gravity transfer to ferm vessel so with some whirlfloc it really sticks to the screen. The drain valve is mounted pretty low so as @BOB357 if I need a qt or 2 I can get that with a little tip , but not much more. The recoverable dead space if more what I am working with but it is what it is.
Today Janet's Brown is going to be brewed and a 10gal batch calls for 32# of grain. I will use a bag to utilize all the Digiboil65L space (that much grain won't fit in mash pipe) but I mill at .042in. so I don't anticipate any trouble with mash. I don't worry about efficiency to much as consistency of batches is more important to me at this point. With my 3 vessel system with 1.050 wort I stayed at 70% brewhouse all the time with this crush.

 

[Mark Farrall]

I often had flow problems using the malt pipe with my mill set to .035", and can't imagine better results with the finer mesh size of a brew bag. When I went to .042", I was able to double the flow rater without any problems. I never used rice hulls, but they should definitely help. I think the biggest problem is the relatively small diameter of the malt pipe, compared to that of an average kettle, limits the drainage surface area. Using a brew bag without the malt pipe would gain some area which would help too. I'd think between that and some rice hulls you'd be able to use that crush.

I've given up on the malt pipe, it's now just a shiny storage container for the chiller and other parts. I just use a brew bag and a fine crush and the flow for recirculation is much less finnicky and the extract numbers higher and more reliable (though the numbers improving may just be coincidence, possibly more to do with just working out the kinks of the system).

And my losses are the same, hardly surprising as I guess the Brewzillas are using pretty much the same tooling for the manufacture.

 

[BOB357]

I've given up on the malt pipe, it's now just a shiny storage container for the chiller and other parts. I just use a brew bag and a fine crush and the flow for recirculation is much less finnicky and the extract numbers higher and more reliable (though the numbers improving may just be coincidence, possibly more to do with just working out the kinks of the system).

And my losses are the same, hardly surprising as I guess the Brewzillas are using pretty much the same tooling for the manufacture.

Do you use a Digiboil, or another all in one?

 

[Mark Farrall]

Do you use a Digiboil, or another all in one?

Brewzilla 35 litre. I'd assumed that as they're both available via Kegland they must be manufacturing both brands, so they may be very similar.

 

[BOB357]

They are pretty much the same except the Dogiboil/Digimash doesn't have an internal pump or programmable controller. If you're getting good flow with a fine crush, sounds like the drainage surface area gained by eliminating the malt pipe is making a big difference.

 

[GFHomebrew]

Interesting reading comments here of increased flow rate by not using the malt pipe and using the Baib bag instead. Pretty much what ive rigged up.
I've been thinking of making a malt pipe type contraption but after reading this wont bother as could be more of a hindrance.

Ah the Kiss method never fails.

 

[thunderwagn]

Interesting reading comments here of increased flow rate by not using the malt pipe and using the Baib bag instead. Pretty much what ive rigged up.
I've been thinking of making a malt pipe type contraption but after reading this wont bother as could be more of a hindrance.

Ah the Kiss method never fails.

Interesting, I don't have a problem at all with the malt pipe. I'm using Grainfathers and I actually really like using the malt pipe and would take it any day over messing with a bag, but that's just me. I have my crush set where I'm happy, my water and left overs are basically consistent. My brewhouse efficiency is 82-83% unless I start getting into higher gravity/larger malt bills. Then I'm about 78%. My numbers and consistency are basically spot on.

 

[BOB357]

Interesting reading comments here of increased flow rate by not using the malt pipe and using the Baib bag instead. Pretty much what ive rigged up.
I've been thinking of making a malt pipe type contraption but after reading this wont bother as could be more of a hindrance.

Ah the Kiss method never fails.

I agree with @thunderwagn . If you have the patience to figure out what works well for you, the malt pipe is a good thing. Preference does fit into the picture, so it's not right for everybody.

 

[Over The Cliff Brewing]

I thought about using a bag in the brewzilla but backed off from it. For one thing, the malt pipe is way easier to handle and clean. I'm still working on water volumes and grain size but I prefer the malt pipe versus a bag. It's just me.

 

[west1m]

I use the Anvil and think the malt pipe is great. My grain bills are usually around 10 pounds and I do add a pound of rice hulls. Start with 5 and a half gallons water when done lift the basket (use a rope hoist thing) let drain and sparge to 6.75 gallons.

 

[Over The Cliff Brewing]

This past weekend, I brewed using 10 lbs of white wheat. It would seem that wheat sucks up more water than barley. Thinking that I had my Brewzilla dialed in, I missed on the amount of total water l needed based on using barley. Sorry for the ramble here. Point is I have no idea what I'm doing with the Brewzilla yet.