I’m moving to a new apartment soon where boiling on the stove will no longer be possible so I’m looking to switch to an electric kettle with one of the new steam condenser accessories that people seem to be having some success with. (ie. here).
I’m considering various options: ranging from (1) a custom kettle from Spike brewing, with extra 1.5" TC ports for heating element and steam condenser, to (2) a Blichmaan Boilermaker w/ their element and an extra TC port for the condenser, to (3) an SS Brewtech eKettle, with an extra TC port for the condenser. Of the lot of these, the SS eKettle is actually surprisingly reasonably priced for coming with TC ports, a heating element and an integrated temp-probe (which is a PT100, more on that below)–probably because it doesn’t come with other fancy accessories like a sight glass and dial thermometer that I don’t really need…
Some questions:
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Is it possible to get some sort of PT100 to 1-wire micro-controller so the spark can use the integrated temp-probe in the e-kettle? I like the idea of an integrated temp probe.
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The heating element in the SS eKettle is advertised as being designed for solid state voltage regulation (SSVR) rather than SSR control. I’m guessing that it’s probably not an issue to use SSR though, right?
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If I do go with one of the pre-built options and need to add an extra TC port for the condenser, any advice on this? Better to order a custom kettle and get the sanitary welds from the factory or just drill a hole and use a through wall fitting . This would be above the water-line if that makes a difference.
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I was thinking of just using the Blichmann relay module, as an off-the-shelf solution rather than having to figure out a housing for my own module. Has anyone done this before? It looks to just be a standard 40A ~24-280 VAC / 4-32 VDC SSR with a housing and heatsink, so I can’t imagine why this wouldn’t work.
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Any other electric kettle advice? I generally brew 20-22L batches, so I don’t need anything huge, but it would be nice to get something that could be integrated into a future HERMs system.
Thanks!
Austin