So your mash tun is responsible for holding your grains and your water at a certain temperature for a proper conversion, where the fermentable sugars are extracted from the grains. If you were to just leave it all in a pot, the temperature would drop too much rendering the conversion useless. There are two methodologies to address this in a Brutus 10 clone. The first would be to add a burner under your mash tun, and then simply heat the vessel when it drops below a certain temperature. The other is to insulate your mash tun. I decided to go with option B and insulate.

I did this for a few reasons. For one, I didn't want to use any more propane than I need to. Additionally, that would require another burner, more gas piping, another igniter, more burner mounts, another wind deflector/heat shield and so on, not to mention the pain the ass of having to have precise temperature control to turn the burner on and off automatically, or even worse, manually. Lastly, heating the bottom of a vessel means unequal heat distribution, which brings up another whole can of worms. Insulation on the other hand, is rather simple, just... add insulation to your vessel.

It seem like half the world heats their mash tun, and the other half insulates theirs, so there is endless information on the interwebs regarding insulation types, and what people have had success with. I chose to go with foam rubber insulation, 3/4" inch thick. It is closed cell so it is basically waterproof, and it is soft and flexible which means it would be easy to attach to my mash tun. It has a heat flow rate (or K factor) of 0.27 Btu/hr. Without getting too scientific on you, this just means that you will lose .27 BTU per hour at 1 inch of thickness. Mine is only 3/4" thick so I will lose slightly more. Needless to say, I think the temperature will only drop a negligible amount over the amount of time my grains are in it.

The foam came in 3 foot by 4 foot sheets, so I picked up three sheets. I then just cut them to the sizes I needed and applied them to the vessel using some real nasty glue. Amraflex contact adhesive looks like snot, and has the properties of snot, so getting it on there was a bit of a challenge. Also, the adhesive is very unforgiving, so you have exactly one chance to get it on there correctly. I did not. My pieces went on crooked, so it was a challenge to make it look 'right'.

Here are some photos of the process and the final result.











It aint the prettiest mash tun in the world, but I have seen far worse. In the long run, I am not sure how well the insulation will stand up to the elements, being handled, and moved around, but worst case scenario, I can just redo it later.

I can practically smell the beer breweing already

A couple of quick pointless anecdotes before I get on to the Brutus 10 clone update...

On my 16th birthday, I got my driver's license. I begged my mom to let me take the car for a spin, as I am sure a lot of teenagers do when they get their license. She reluctantly said yes. I went out to my friend's farm to meet up and look at horses and various farm things. Later, we left the farm and headed back to my place. I was following my friend, and of course, we were both mostly driving like jackasses. My friend, who had a relatively large lead, took a quick right down a dirt/rock road, and unbeknownst to me, immediately stopped and turned off his lights. So then I come barreling around the same corner as quickly as he did, and BAM, there he was. I slammed on my breaks, but alas, it was too late, and I slid right into the back of his truck with my mom's car. Needless to say she was unhappy. I did not drive her car again for quite some time, when ironically, the same car became mine. I later totaled the car 600 miles from home in St. Louis.

When I chew small pieces of gum, I usually chew two at a time, but rather than mix the two pieces together to create a larger piece, I keep them separated in my mouth, never allowing them to touch. I am not sure why I do this, it is subconscious. I tend to chew gum all the time, so sometimes these two separate pieces will be in my mouth for many hours, then moments before I am ready to part ways with the gum, I will smash them together to form a single piece, and then deposit them.

So back to the Brutus clone build. I have made two upgrades to the system. First I added some flame shields around the burners. I found this necessary because during recent testing, I found that the wind was causing inefficiencies. Additionally, I am hoping that the rings will direct the heat directly towards the bottom of the kegs, and deflect heat away from the frame, because I found that the frame of the contraption gets extraordinarily hot after the burners have been going for a while. I am sure this is just part of the process, but I don't like it, and if I can defeat it, its a win.

So I considered building the rings out of steel, but the size pieces I was going to need was going to be less than cost effective. Plus, I really have no way of making a perfectly round piece of steel. After scouring the interwebness for a while, I came across someone else facing the same challenge, so I decided to employ their method for achieving the same goal. The answer? Cake rings! They make cake rings out of relatively thin gauge stainless steel, and, they are adjustable. Awesome! The only issue was that I had to cut a notch in them to allow my igniters to still be in place. A few minutes with my trusty roto-tool and that issue was a thing of the past. Here are a few pics.






The next upgrade was not necessary, but I nice thing to have at a very low price point. How do you know how much liquid is in your vessels? Well, you really don't, so to solve this, I added vinyl numbering decals to my sight glasses. Here is how that looks.



Also, I scored some cheapo stainless steel lids for like 12 bucks each off amazon.com.



I am so close to being done now I can taste it.

A few quick updates with pictures.

1. I lowered the pump to under the cross member. This generates more drop between the liquid level in the keg and the bottom of the pump. I also added a dump valve on the output side. Between these two improvements, I should be able to prime the pump easier because of the increased pressure from the bigger drop, and being able to allow air to escape from the dump valve. I left the former mounting plate in place, because A. I didn't want to booger up the frame by chopping a part of it off, and B. I figure it is a good mount for potential future additions 8-)

2. Next I added a set of igniters to the system, for automated lighting of the burners. This way, I don't need to mess with flame lighters, I can just turn on the gas, push a button and go. This was the mystery button from the last post. Not installing an automagical lighting system is pussy.

I ran the wires for the igniters through this stuff I picked up at McMaster-Carr. It is made of fiberglass and able to withstand 1000 degrees of heat. It may be overkill, but I didn't want my wires to melt. Also, I failed to mention that the igniters are from a kit from Wal-Mart made as a replacement for grill igniters. Cheap and easy!

3. I finally painted the system. This is another stumbling block for many brutus 10 clone builders. The high heat from the burners typically will burn off normal, and even high temperature stove/grill paint. I didn't want to powder coat it, which would probably be for the best, because of the high cost involved. A lot of people go the paint route, and then just repaint as the paint burns off to avoid rusting. I have another plan to combat this, which I will address in a near future post.

It is Texas and it is summer, so the heat is around 100 and the humidity is ridiculous, so painting proved to be a challenge, but nonetheless after 5 days of sitting by a fan, the paint finally appears to have dried well enough for a test run. I think I should be able to do a full on test of the entire system using water inside of a week.

4. I built a "hop hopper" for lack of a better term. I did not invent this, I duplicated this from someone else's brilliant design. It is simply a 5 gallon paint strainer bag clamped onto a chunk of PVC pipe, with long threaded rods bolted to it. It allows the unit to sit on top of the brew kettle while the beer is brewing, with an open hole in the top, so that you can toss in whatever little tidbits you might need, such as hops, any extra grains, twigs, berries, fruit, nuts, coffee, gum, cereal, tacos, bacon, a hamburger, whatever you like. When you are done, you can simply remove it from the top, and all your junk remains in the strainer, and not in your beer.

So as you can see, once again, the system is looking nearly completed. I am stoked, and starting to plan out what style of beer to make on my maiden voyage.