Modifications to a 14G More beer conical

[svensson.lu]

So what do you do with a brand new More beer conical?
I punched new holes in my lid and welded more ferules on to it!
One for the blow off and one for the thermowell. I also had a CO2 connection welded onto the 3" lid and a CIP spraying ball onto another







The gas connection will be used for purging but also for connecting a cask breather during cold crashing.
This will ensure that no air will be sucked back into the fermenter when the temperature drops.



My first plan was to weld a water jacked to the fermenter, but for now a simple tube wrapping will have to do. It actually works really good for cooling.



The temperature is then controlled with an external thermostat, controlling the beer cooler and the valve.
At first I was only controlling the valve, but after having something stuck in the valve seat when testing the cooler, I needed a more secure regulation. The temperature of 10 gallons of water in the fermenter droped to 2C over night!





There is one thing I would have done differently if doing it again, and that is to have three ferrules welded onto the lid.
One for gas in, one blow off and one thermo well, leaving the main lid as it is.

[brewinhard]

Never ceases to amaze me what crazy stuff some people will do to make great beer! Looks like you should be selling these in an updated version... nice job!

[chopper]

what was the room temp when you brought the conical down to 2C? How much temperature diff do you think you will be able to pull?

A glycol chiller is my next build and I've debating whether to do a wrap of my fermenting kegs like yours or to do an insulated box and transmission cooler setup (basic cold box, but to also have the glycol handy for wort chilling). I like the individual control of the wrap when I have multiple batches fermenting, but am concerned about condensation around the kegs. any problems with that yet?

Cheers

[Stinkfist]

Sweet! Very nice!

[cdburg]

Awesome work! Where did you get the cask breather? I've been trying to figure out something to keep my own conical from sucking air back into it when I crash cool also. The breather is a great idea.

[Kbar]

Awesome work! Where did you get the cask breather? I've been trying to figure out something to keep my own conical from sucking air back into it when I crash cool also. The breather is a great idea.

Here maybe...Looks like his. But the date says 2014 and not 2010 on the "retest tag"

http://www.micromatic.com/draft-keg-bee ... ASK-B.html

Nice job - love the innovation.

[cdburg]

Awesome work! Where did you get the cask breather? I've been trying to figure out something to keep my own conical from sucking air back into it when I crash cool also. The breather is a great idea.

Here maybe...Looks like his. But the date says 2014 and not 2010 on the "retest tag"

http://www.micromatic.com/draft-keg-bee ... ASK-B.html

Nice job - love the innovation.

Thanks!

[svensson.lu]

Thanks for all your comments!
I have been lurking so much on the BN forum so I thought it would be nice to give some inspiration back.

what was the room temp when you brought the conical down to 2C? How much temperature diff do you think you will be able to pull?

A glycol chiller is my next build and I've debating whether to do a wrap of my fermenting kegs like yours or to do an insulated box and transmission cooler setup (basic cold box, but to also have the glycol handy for wort chilling). I like the individual control of the wrap when I have multiple batches fermenting, but am concerned about condensation around the kegs. any problems with that yet?

Cheers

The tank was more or less outside during my test and I cant really recall how cold it was, but I was really surpriced when it happened. But 2 degres C is just what the 0C ice bank cools down to without switching to glycol and changing the internal thermostat. The cooling capacity is probably a lot more than I need.

There were water condensing out on the unisolated parts of the fermenter and probably dripping. But since that is not a problem for me, I did not pay any attention on how much water that actually condensed.

Awesome work! Where did you get the cask breather? I've been trying to figure out something to keep my own conical from sucking air back into it when I crash cool also. The breather is a great idea.

Well I am living in Sweden so I had to order my cask supply from the UK, but UK brewing supply has them in the US
http://www.ukbrewing.com/Cask_Breather_p/40030.htm