Ventilation Question

NattyBrew · Joined: 28 Jan 2011 Posts: 29

I just realized as I was working on my vent hood that my opening in my hood is located at the opposite end from Kal's and will be over the HLT instead of the boil kettle. Does anyone think that pulling air from the hood at the opposite end, about 3-4 feet away from the Boil Kettle, will be any less effective?

I only ask because if I were to reverse the order of the kettles by going from left to right, HLT, MLT, BK then I would need to extend the power cords for the March Pumps, as well as create a longer cord for the HLT and maybe even the MLT probe so that it can properly reach the "T" fittings on the kettle outputs.

I would just wait until my kettles are in and the elements are mounted to test, but I was planning on trying to keep the electrical on the side of the kettles towards the inside of the stand like Kal's and would obviously have to choose which side to mount the elements before I could test.

Anyone out their have their ventilation not directly above their BK and and still working just fine?

rosenjm · Joined: 21 Dec 2010 Posts: 249 Location: Ballston Spa, NY

You really don't need ventilation over your HLT. I guess it would depend on how powerful your vent fan is, but you really need it over the BK.

Castermmt · Posted: Sun May 01, 2011 12:10 pm Post subject:

You can also put the kettles in any order you like by putting the boil kettle under the hood and the HLT next to it. I just brewed yesterday and had the cover on my HLT for most of the day while heating water, while never using the cover on the boil kettle. Where yo brew is going to be the real question as to how much steam can your room dissipate with out creating mold and other bad things. While I have a very large garage and will only need to vent the boil kettle, Kal has a very small closed space and had to evacuate all the moisture he could with a larger hood over all three kettles. Extending the wiring would be easier then dealing with moisture problems in your home.

My 2 cents, Castermmt

NattyBrew · Joined: 28 Jan 2011 Posts: 29

Thanks for the input Caster. I actually came to that exact same conclusion myself and will be simply extending the wiring on one probe as well as the cords for both March Pumps. I am planning to use a 14 gauge extension cord as a simple and easy extension for my March Pumps and funny enough Auber Instruments just added RTD probe extension wire that you can buy by the foot.

It will end up costing me a few bucks to tear apart some of the work that I've already done but at this point it's stupid not to do a simple fix and get everything exactly the right way I need it.

Thanks for talking be down from the ledge Caster haha.

Matt

**kal** · Posted: Sun May 01, 2011 2:17 pm Post subject:

Most of the time when I'm brewing the lid's on my MLT and HLT. No need for the hood to go above them, it would work fine with only a smaller hood over the boil kettle. Sure, when you lift either lid steam escapes but it's minor since you should rarely be lifting the lid.

The main reason for the larger hood the same size as the table and to cover all 3 kettles is asthetics (how it looks). I find it would look funny to have one more or less square hood over the boil kettle and nothing over the the other two. Price difference between a smaller single kettle hood and the larger one wasn't much. Stainless sheets, generally speaking is pretty cheap. Most of the cost of a custom hood is in labour.

I put the boil kettle on the left as I wanted it to beside the sink for easy cleaning and in my small room the sink would only fit in the corner. So from left to right mine goes BK/MLT/HLT while most people would probably want HLT/MLT/BK since that's how the process flows and most of us read from left to right.

Kal

Castermmt · Posted: Mon May 02, 2011 2:30 am Post subject:

I too went with the BK/MLT/HLT so the boil kettle was as far away from my control panel as possible. I wanted to minimize the potential of a electrical hazard if I had a bad boil over anywhere near the control panel. My control panel is about 2.5 feet to the right of the HLT, Will be installing a hood in the fall. Castermmt

pola0502ds · Joined: 14 Mar 2011 Posts: 290 Location: poland, Ohio

What exactly would happen if water did get in one of your outlets? If you had a GFCI and not?

May be a stupid question but it has never happened to me with anything and I'm not to smart when it comes to electrical stuff.

Castermmt · Posted: Mon May 02, 2011 7:49 pm Post subject:

rmessick · Joined: 20 Feb 2011 Posts: 123 Location: Turners Falls, MA