Eletric Heater for Boil Kettle

[gopher_brewmeister]

Quick question:

I’m looking to go electric for my brewing operations and upgrade to a 10 gallon batch system. I was wondering if anyone uses a eletric, circular SS immersion heater for boiling their wort. The idea would be for me to use this heater for boiling the wort and then removing the heater at the end of the boil so I can put my immersion chiller into the BK before draining into the fermenter. I’m thinking a 6KW immersion heater would get my batches to a boil MUCH quicker then an external unit.

The rest of my system will be a HERMS style system but I have other ideas for that part of the process.

Again, any info. on this concept would be appreciated.

Thanks.

[learningmore]

I’m not sure about the one you are talking about. I’ve seen some that look like a metal “hoop” at the bottom, with a vertical tube coming up from the side of the circle, ending in a power cord to the wall. Most of the ones I’ve seen are called a bucket heater- and most are only for de-icing.

You might be discussing a “barrel heater”, since you are mentioning a 6000W element. That would take a very large circuit, at least 240v. One thing that many people mention is getting a GFCI Breaker, which is very costly (about $120?). It seems it is less money to just purchase a Jacuzzi breaker box, then connect that to your existing box.

Could you post a link to the 6000w heater?

I use a 4500w electric heater element for water heaters, run at 120v, which means the element runs itself at 1125w. I also run a 1500w element on a different circuit in my home and they seem to heat it very quickly.