Blichmann Hop Rocket

[Cliff]

[quote="dunleav1"]Can you show the top of that opened? How does it seal?[quote]
It seals with a rubber O ring and a triclover clamp
Of course

The pictures are the unit with no modifications by me at all. It was manufactured to be a Brominator for very large ocean cruisers.


The triclover opening



The two factory ports (the center one also has a NPT female inside so I can install a stand pipe)


The triclover



The bracket


The factory sketch


The base and bracket


A pix


With an inch scale tape measure



The factory label



No, I didn't pay $600.00 I paid $50.

And I am having a dickens of a time deciding whether I want to drill the cap and install a RIMS heater in it or use it as a hop back.

My brewery is a Two-Pot-Modified-Brutus electrical design. I'm using three ways valves instead of swapping covers.

[alanzo]

NB has these up for sale now : http://www.northernbrewer.com/default/b ... ocket.html $120.

I *ALMOST* bought one. But then I decided to save the $120 (+ extra money for fittings and tubing) and just do appropriate whirlpool additions and dry hopping. Fresh whole hops are somewhat difficult to acquire, anyway, and this will only work with fresh hops.

Whirlpool additions work as well as hop back additions if you're doing a JZ style whirlpool chiller (as I am). If you're just going to pump the hot wort back into the kettle, you'd get very similar results by removing the bittering hops (via a hop sack), throwing in your whirlpool hops at flame-out and then whirl-pooling for 10-15 mins.

I guess they're two different classic brewing methods, aren't they (hop back and whirpooling)? Both meant to remove gunk from the wort... whirl-pooling is definitely more popular these days.

[bobbytuck]

Just got the HopRocket in the mail today from RebelBrewer. Much smaller than I expected -- but it looks very solid.

I also ordered 10' of silicon tubing, and will use some quickconnects I have to connect it to my system.

First brew with it will be Saturday. Looks like I'm brewing a DIPA with 8oz of pellet hops in the BK and then around 4oz -- give or take -- of Willamette leaf hops in the HopRocket.

I'll report back ...

[bobbytuck]

Just got the HopRocket in the mail today from RebelBrewer. Much smaller than I expected -- but it looks very solid.



I'll report back ...

Well, I've used it for four 5-gallon batches now. I posted photos over at homebrewtalk, but my overall experience with this has been so-so. It's great and sturdy -- but even with a march pump pumping from my boil kettle into my hoprocket and then out the hoprocket into my therminator, the flow into my fermenter is only a thin little stream. And when I say thin, I mean thin -- as in it took my 65 minutes to fill a 6 gallon better bottle. (And I probably only got about 4 gallons due to the loss from the hops).

I'm not sure if this is the deal -- but with only 2oz of hops -- I can't seem to get more than a trickle into the fermenter.

I suspect my boil kettle should be higher (for gravity to work a bit better) but since I'm using a pump, should this be a problem? My pump is pumping like mad into the hop rocket, but there seems to be an issue with the output hose on the top of the hop rocket into my chiller. There's not much flow here. And then it has to go up again and into the fermenter.

I'm done brewing for the season (Chicago) -- so in April, I'll start back up, but I'm thinking I may move my fermenter down in my basement (about a five foot drop from my outside brewing sidewalk). I wonder if that drop will help the flow a bit.

I don't know. I don't think I'm assembling it wrong -- it's hard to assemble wrong -- and I'm using 2oz (out of a 4oz max) -- so I'm not sure what I can do to increase the flow. My pump is primed fine -- I have two valves on the output side -- and when I open one to prime it, wort shoots out -- hot wort -- so I know it's pumping like crazy. I use hop bags in my BK -- so there's no trub or hops blocking the BK output.

The main thing, I guess, will be to taste the batches I've done with this thing and see if the taste justifies the hour wait to fill the fermenter. Good news, of course, is that when it's a trickle like that -- the wort is very cool, so I can immediately pitch.

Anyway. I'm lukewarm on this thing. I know the hops expand when they're wet, but good grief, I didn't expect 60 minutes to fill only 4 gallons!

(How in the world can this thing work on gravity? I mean, if I didn't have a pump, there's no way this would work. My BK is about a foot above my pump -- so I'd probably have to lift the BK another three feet to get it high enough for gravity to do its thing.)

[breyton]

Couldn't hold off and just ordered a Hop Rocket from Austin Homebrew. They are offering free shipping for order over $100.

I am going to set my Hop Rocket up after the pump, so there will be no flow restrictions into the pump. I will be making Tasty's APA recipe when the Rocket arrives.

[TastyMcD]

Just got the HopRocket in the mail today from RebelBrewer. Much smaller than I expected -- but it looks very solid.



I'll report back ...

Well, I've used it for four 5-gallon batches now. I posted photos over at homebrewtalk, but my overall experience with this has been so-so. It's great and sturdy -- but even with a march pump pumping from my boil kettle into my hoprocket and then out the hoprocket into my therminator, the flow into my fermenter is only a thin little stream. And when I say thin, I mean thin -- as in it took my 65 minutes to fill a 6 gallon better bottle. (And I probably only got about 4 gallons due to the loss from the hops).

I'm not sure if this is the deal -- but with only 2oz of hops -- I can't seem to get more than a trickle into the fermenter.

I suspect my boil kettle should be higher (for gravity to work a bit better) but since I'm using a pump, should this be a problem? My pump is pumping like mad into the hop rocket, but there seems to be an issue with the output hose on the top of the hop rocket into my chiller. There's not much flow here. And then it has to go up again and into the fermenter.

I'm done brewing for the season (Chicago) -- so in April, I'll start back up, but I'm thinking I may move my fermenter down in my basement (about a five foot drop from my outside brewing sidewalk). I wonder if that drop will help the flow a bit.

I don't know. I don't think I'm assembling it wrong -- it's hard to assemble wrong -- and I'm using 2oz (out of a 4oz max) -- so I'm not sure what I can do to increase the flow. My pump is primed fine -- I have two valves on the output side -- and when I open one to prime it, wort shoots out -- hot wort -- so I know it's pumping like crazy. I use hop bags in my BK -- so there's no trub or hops blocking the BK output.

The main thing, I guess, will be to taste the batches I've done with this thing and see if the taste justifies the hour wait to fill the fermenter. Good news, of course, is that when it's a trickle like that -- the wort is very cool, so I can immediately pitch.

Anyway. I'm lukewarm on this thing. I know the hops expand when they're wet, but good grief, I didn't expect 60 minutes to fill only 4 gallons!

(How in the world can this thing work on gravity? I mean, if I didn't have a pump, there's no way this would work. My BK is about a foot above my pump -- so I'd probably have to lift the BK another three feet to get it high enough for gravity to do its thing.)

I've been using a hopback that I built myself for 8 years now and at 4 ounces of hops, I've never noticed any real increase in aroma or flavor that I don't better get from whirlpool and dryhop additions. I see it purely as a valuable trub filter. If the wort were to move easily through the hopback, I doubt if much trub would get held back. It's not like the hops are absorbing the trub. The hops need to compact and provide a filter bed that catches the trub but still let's the wort get through.

You're obviously getting compaction. Just too much. I'd throttle back on your pump, especially initially, so that you get less compaction and thus more throughput. Odd huh? Less is more.

For what it's worth, I have my pump on the cold (output) side of my plate chiller. I know that it goes against the cardinal rule of magnetic pumps since the hopback restricts the flow. If I chill too fast, it severely compacts the hops in the hopback to the point that wort won't move at all. After finding the balance point, I'm able to cool-in 11 gallons of trubless wort in 20 minutes.

I put my hopback hops in a hopsack to aid in hopbed compaction. When I remove the hops from the hopback, it's a solid plug with a thick layer of trub on top that is literally stuck to the metal screen (basically a false bottom) that holds them back.

When Spring comes, give slowing it down a try. Here on this forum, we don't let cold weather keep us from our passion. Less talk, more brewing.

Tasty

[bobbytuck]

When Spring comes, give slowing it down a try. Here on this forum, we don't let cold weather keep us from our passion. Less talk, more brewing.

Tasty

Awesome! Many thanks. I'll try that for sure. I may end up going back to the whirlpool in the spring -- or at least switching between the hopback and whirlpool and seeing if there's much of a difference.

Thanks again.

[breyton]

Tasty Wrote
I've never noticed any real increase in aroma or flavor that I don't better get from whirlpool and dryhop additions

Ouch....Wish I read Tasty's evaluation of Hop backs about 2 hours ago before I plunked down my 120 bucks....Oh well... a fancy trub filter is on its way to me.....