I am an outdoor gas brewer, but I have a mate who wants to get into BIAB. He wants to brew in an apartment with an urn.
As I have no idea on eBIAB, I can't give him any ideas on what's best for him to purchase and get started.
What is the best advice? ie.
concealed element v's open element?
40 litre, 60 litre, more or less?
Are any brands better than others?
Do they need an added temp controller?
These are just the questions that come to mind as I have no idea where to start, any help will be greatly appreciated.
Post #2 made 13 years ago
Hi hashie
I have a Crown 40 litre urn with concealed element and am very happy with it. Some people reported problems with the rolling boil but provided you keep the concealed element cover clean and give it a scrape with the paint scrapper before you start the boil should be no problems. I am in Tassie and get 3.3 l/hr evap in winter and 3.5 l/hr brewing in a garage.
Don't need temperature controllers (just run it flat out) though thinking of trying a STC-1000 controller to obtain my strike and mashout temps.
Basically the choice is between Crown and Birco urns, though there are cheaper ones on Ebay. I think 40 litres is the best size, reckon I could do 23 litres of 1.070 OG if I tried, depending how much the efficiency drops off. Not sure if they do 60 litre urns but would require 3600 watts heating.
Suggest get him to check this thread.
http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/i ... opic=60125
cheers
Ian
I have a Crown 40 litre urn with concealed element and am very happy with it. Some people reported problems with the rolling boil but provided you keep the concealed element cover clean and give it a scrape with the paint scrapper before you start the boil should be no problems. I am in Tassie and get 3.3 l/hr evap in winter and 3.5 l/hr brewing in a garage.
Don't need temperature controllers (just run it flat out) though thinking of trying a STC-1000 controller to obtain my strike and mashout temps.
Basically the choice is between Crown and Birco urns, though there are cheaper ones on Ebay. I think 40 litres is the best size, reckon I could do 23 litres of 1.070 OG if I tried, depending how much the efficiency drops off. Not sure if they do 60 litre urns but would require 3600 watts heating.
Suggest get him to check this thread.
http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/i ... opic=60125
cheers
Ian
Post #4 made 13 years ago
I am using a 30L urn and I get by with it but I think that 40L would be better as the minimum volume to recommend. I bought a cheapie of ebay that is still going after 40 batches or so. I do use a "power regulator" which acts to protect the element to some degree (it is a phase fired controller). It is not absolutely necessary but helps a lot. My urn has a concealed element and I use a scraper several times during the boil so I don't get material building up on the bottom of the urn.
