PUMP FOR COPPER TO FERMENTER

[Easy Peasie]

Afternoon all.

Have been pretty quiet lately as we have just moved and gutted the house, just the painting to go now so should be free to fill up the empty stocks in two or three weeks.
Before we moved (about 8 weeks ago) i had taken delivery of of 2 x 100l pots and a 70l thermo which have not yet seen the light of day. I intend to use a 3 tier system to start off with and pump wort from the copper to the fermenter. I usually lift my 25l brew but of course this will be much heavier. Am I stuck with the March May 809(expensive)?, I have seen a s/s drill pump with the capacity for 100 deg c and could possibly couple a variable speed motor to, has any body done this?
Reading other threads it is better to recirculate the wort while chilling to speed it up, to sterilise the pump it will have to be done while boiling so the pump will have to cope with boiling liquids.

Comments welcome please. :thumb:

 

[Mark1964]

try a little solar pump www.solarproject.co.uk

 

[Easy Peasie]

Cheers Mark
:

 

[Kev888]

Yes, the little solar pumps are the only cheap ones I know of that can officially handle boiling wort, although I had a couple fail on me whilst pumping hot liquids this summer, so I have a suspicion (no more) that perhaps they don't like it much.

But otherwise AFAIK its a massive leap in price to things like the march pump. So originally I used a cheaper totton pump, or march may do one too, that can't take boiling water, so I just sanitised it chemically. Its not too bad if its only for pumping out the boiler as you can clean/strip/sanitise beforehand; its more annoying if you use the same pump to drain the MT, as you have to do all that after the mash instead, whilst the boil is on.

Also if you want to recirculate, I've had big problems with the hop stopper getting clogged. Its okay for pumping out post-boil if I let the hops settle on it, as they form a filter bed for the fine stuff, but if I run the pump whilst its boiling and the hops are in suspension, fine break/trub blocks my filter. I'm going to try one of those big stainless mesh envelopes you people make.

Cheers
Kev

 

[Mark1964]

did you ever contact solar projects to ask why the pump failed? Ours failed a couple of weeks ago and i sent it back. He told me it was due to the rotor or something and was happy to replace it

 

[Kev888]

I knew the electronics had gone - only some of the poles would try to drive the shaft on one, and the other only worked properly when it was cool. Yes, I could probably have tried returning them, the chap certainly seems very helpful so I'm sure he would have at least considered it.

But instead I decided to satisfy my curiosity and destructively pull one apart to see how it was constructed:

It seemed decent enough, but the parts were (of course) pretty tiny and there were a couple of tiny bits of grain still lodged in the shaft/magnet even after many hours of flushing warm cleaner before it failed. So whilst i think they're worth the money, I just decided to go for something beefier and easier to disassemble for proper cleaning.

Cheers
kev

 

[Mark1964]

we may go down the same route if ours fails again. Will find out this weekend when we brew again

 

[31bb3]

I have a totton pump its really good tbh I use it for my herms and for pumping into the boiler a little more than a solar but I would defiantly get another

 

[Easy Peasie]

Found this one on Brouwland, which is the same as the one on hop and grape website, The pump is£100.00 plus another £15.00 for the Viton seal which should mean its good for 100 deg c.

Which totton pump do you have? 31bb3



http://www.brouwland.com/shop/product.a ... =502&dt=24

 

[31bb3]

Totton gp20/12

 

[Northern Brewer]

I've got both the Totton 20/12 and solar pumps. I find the totton a pig to prime and istops at the merest bubble - I have bleed valves on the input and output but its still painful

I'm going to make a pair of those peristaltic pumps when I get a mo - seems to solve all my problems.

Cheers
NB

 

[Kev888]

Just be sure to check out the flow rates of any peristaltic pump you consider; they're a fantastic design for sanitising, but most are pretty slow and some are designed for dosing extremely gradually..

I almost bought that one from Hop and grape, here (in the pic it looks similar yet slightly different to the Brouland version), and they were kind enough to give me some specs if its of interest (very helpful people):

the flow/height curve...5l/min @ 27m - 28litres/min@ 1m head.
pipe-fitting sizes 20mm
reversing switch.
noise levels within the permitted limits.
375 watt 0.5hp.
It is capable of drawing from 4metres providing the pump is primed initially but will not draw dry.
Max liquid temperature 100degC
Protection IPx4

In the end I decided that the magnetic drive won out for my applications, so I went for a march-may 815-PL (imported from tescopumps on international ebay); it was more expensive than the Brouland price though.

Cheers
Kev

 

[Easy Peasie]

Thanks for the input guys

Need a good think before spending some brass :wha:

 

[Northern Brewer]

Just be sure to check out the flow rates of any peristaltic pump you consider; they're a fantastic design for sanitising, but most are pretty slow and some are designed for dosing extremely gradually..

i'm going to custom make them so if I get my head around the engineering then I should be able to make them do what I want, not a short term project though I have a tractor in bits that needs sorting first...... Then there's the decorating, the garden, the fecning........ :shock:

 

[Springer]

I've got both the Totton 20/12 and solar pumps. I find the totton a pig to prime and istops at the merest bubble - I have bleed valves on the input and output but its still painful

Thought it was just me :lol:

I'm going to make a pair of those peristaltic pumps when I get a mo - seems to solve all my problems.

Sounds interesting with the price of pumps and there suitability how fars the thinking got NB
S

 

[Northern Brewer]

Well Springer, Silverbrewer has done a lot already with a set of land rover brake drums :shock: So i'll probably take a look at that first very nice job - see some of the photos off of his photobucket album :ugeek:

A sample below - if I get anywhere near this I'll be happy :clap:

 

[Easy Peasie]

Is that a Kidney dialysis machine for an elephant?

Well impressive.