PVC in the mash tun, the horror!

So I DIYed a 10gallon round cooler mash tun with a (purchased) false bottom a few years back. Worked fine the first three times and then I started getting stuck mashes. Rice hulls didn’t help and eventually I tossed the thing and got a boil screen. That worked great for 40 batches then stuck mashes happened again. I decided to re-visit my false bottom. I realized that the high temp tubing that connected the elbow on the false bottom to the valve was soft. Very soft! So I went to the home store and got some appropriately sized braided PVC hose. This has worked great for three batches, including a step infusion schedule I did for a lager.

Am I going to die? The high temp hose I originally used was sold by our sponsor as the thing to use. Do I just need to buy a few feet of the temp rated stuff and replace it every few batches? Is there a reinforced food grade tubing out there? I’d go all copper but the elbow has a hose barb and was unable to find a “street elbow” locally that could be made to work, and getting the bottom in without gouging the plastic cooler is hard enough with the flexible hose.

What do you do/think/suggest?

Use a stainless braid instead of the false bottom. Check
http://www.dennybrew.com
for details on construction.

[quote=“Shadetree”]Use a stainless braid instead of the false bottom. Check
http://www.dennybrew.com
for details on construction.[/quote]

Right, I seriously do not know why you would use anything else.

You may die of cancer. Chinese use lead, etc etc etc in plastics. Good luck :cheers:

Completely uninterested in the braid. Already had a similar setup with the fine boil/mash screen. The false bottom, minus the stuck mash, is a superior device. Much clearer wort and faster than batch sparging in my experience.

Seems some suppliers make a reinforced silicone (food safe) tubing. Just looking for a good price at this point. Only downside is I don’t know if it’ll be stiff enough. I’ll let you guys know what I find.

I don’t understand how you had 40 successful mashes and then all of a sudden got all stuck sparges…

I have a cpvc manifold in my mash tun. I would go with a false bottom if I wanted to spend the money. If I didnt have the manifold I would go with the stainless braid.

5 or so brews with the false bottom and clear hose until the last two attempts just stuck so much that I took the false bottom out and replaced with a mash/boil screen I got from NB. Got 40 or so brews out of that until it started occaisonally getting stuck…blowing in didn’t help but disturbing the grain and scraping the top of the screen with the paddle would free it up, undoing my vorlauf :smiley:

Going back to the false bottom was a whim, didn’t want to spend money and the tubing was $1.27 a foot so I took a shot and was amazed at how much nicer the wort was. It was also awesome that I could fly sparge and not have to vorlauf twice.

sounds like maybe your pulling yout wort to fast. takes me about 30-45 min to drain a 10 gallon.

I used a false bottom for several years. When it worked, it was great. But, I just got tired of the stuck mashes every once in awhile. I mash in a round, 10 gallon cooler and I use copper tubing with SS braid. The copper tubing, full of holes, keeps the SS braid from collapsing and I believe the SS braid seems to keep grain particles out of my tubing…OK, maybe over kill there, but I was on a roll while walking through the hardware store. Anyway, I fly sparge (and sometimes batch sparge - depending on mood) and I’ve never looked back. To give credit where it’s properly due, I copied the whole thing from MuulerBrau. he has a great web site and offered good advice when I asked. What ever you do, good luck.

You use a lot of plastic don’t you.

Ya, but PVC is not food grade stuff, is it?

Plastic wrap and garden hose are examples of food grade PVC.

But I was really just implying that you act like you’ve had significant lead exposure. Hehe

right on. Stay cool tom

This made me laugh, it’s kind of like comparing a bud light to a pliny and saying “aside from the taste, bud light is the superior brew”

I suppose this means I’m going to be pulled over and ticketed in the near future?

I still need to get down to the Public House, are they doing a good business?

This made me laugh, it’s kind of like comparing a bud light to a pliny and saying “aside from the taste, bud light is the superior brew”[/quote]
Pliny is nothing but a boiled-down, dry-hopped Bud Light.

This made me laugh, it’s kind of like comparing a bud light to a pliny and saying “aside from the taste, bud light is the superior brew”[/quote]

Yeah that does sound pretty funny! I beat the stuck mash by getting stiffer tubing. I spent 2 years cursing the fancy false bottom sticking when it turns out I was an idiot who got the wrong tubing! I should have got the brownish thermoplastic stuff from NB, but I get some clear stuff with thinner walls and got soft and collapsed in the mash.

I’ve brewed my 6th batch with this PVC stuff and not a bit of a problem. You can’t just throw the valve wide open, but with a little finesse it’s worked out great. I’ve the thermoplastic tubing on order, just to be on the safe side :smiley:

Heck just soak the limp stuff in Viagra.

Sorry, too many ED commercials. My idea of low T is an American lager that needs more Tettnanger.