Mash Tun 2.0 - Sparge Arm
So now that I have a nice new false bottom for my mash tun, it's time to go ahead and make a sparge arm that works. No more shower heads, no more hoses with holes in them. It's time for the real deal.
After working with the copper on my false bottom, I decided to go ahead and make a sparge arm out of copper. It was pretty easy to work with and only took me an hour or so to get all put together. The supplies were actually quite reasonable as well. The copper was only like $3.99 and all the little parts were $.59 a piece. Total I would say it was about $10.
As you can see from the pictures above, it's a pretty simple design. There are 3 T's all in the middle and 4 corners. Everything is 1/2 inch again. the square is 6" x 6". This makes two 6" long pieces on the sides pictured and 6 2 3/4" pieces (something like that) that fit the T's together.
If you reference back to the picture at the top, you will notice that I put 1/2" rubber hose over the copper. I did this via bruit force and hot water. I am not all that confident in this aspect of the setup, but as I type this, I remembered that there is a chunk of garden hos I have been planning on using for something that might work AWESOME for this. We will see.
either way, I ran water through it, works fine. I did the vinegar thing I had reference in the previous post. Things should be pretty good. Here is the shopping list:
2' Copper 1/2" tube (should have gotten more, luckily I had some left over) $3.99
4 Corner pieces $2.20
3 T's $1.79
PVC 3 way $.20
3' 1/2" PVC (Had it, but it ain't expensive)
Total - Umm, ~$7
Feel free to shoot me a note if you have any questions.
4 comments:
Cool. I'd love to hear about how it works.
Saturday is the big day with my mash tun 2.0, I am pretty fired up.
That's a pretty elaborate contraption. Impressive craftmanship.
My understanding of the physics of fly sparging is that the outflow is equal to the inflow, and there is a 1-2" layer of wort/water above the level of grain.
As long as you have a slow rate of flow without a strong singular stream, then the 1-2" water layer instantaneously diffuses the inflow sparge water. So a great distribution of water isn't totally necessary. Perhaps a simple "T" shape with a few small holes along the bottom half of the tube.
You just don't want the grainbed to be exposed, nor a strong singular (waterfall) stream of sparge water.
I'd like to know how it works and how you like it.
Yea it's a bit elaborate, but when you start looking at the problem (creating a shower over your grain bed) with a blank slate, there are a whole bunch of issues. For example, for one of my little experiments I could not come up with a way to hang it over the mash tun.
Anyway, I have been chin-sing out on this for a while and decided 'if you're gunna be a bear be a grizzly' or perhaps a more appropriately a growler.
:-)
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