Beer Transfer Options

[NigeltheBold]

I'm planning on opening a nanobrewery with a small tasting room. The building we are thinking about leasing has sort of a strange layout, and the cold room will be located about 30ft. from the fermenters. We'll probably have about eight serving tanks in the cold room (each about 2bbls in size).

I know many breweries use a portable pump and brewer's hose to transfer beer from tank to tank, but I'm wondering if would be better to run pipes from the fermenting room to the cold room. Does anyone have experience running un-carbonated beer through hard lines? What are the advantages/disadvantages of pipes vs. brewer's hose?

Any suggestions on beer transfer would be much appreciated.

[NigeltheBold]

Any opinions?

[wailingguitar]

I've done it both ways. I prefer the hard piping because it is less work (no need to drag hoses all over) and you can run the pipes where you want them and not have hoses out in the middle of the floor in a potentially trafficked area.

That being said, running that much hard pipe is not going to be a bit costly. You are going to want to run two identical sections side-by-side so that you can have a cleaning loop.

[NigeltheBold]

Thanks for the reply. What type(s) of pipe are best to use in this situation? Would flexible food-grade PVC or vinyl tubing work? Or does it have to be hard tubing?

[Fullcourt]

you should only use stainless. We ran about 20ft from brewhouse to cold room. Did not have a loop, but if you slant the pipe slightly it will drain after running cleaner through it.
We actually ran it under the ceiling through the women's bathroom. Worked like that for 16 years.

[CopperKettle]

If I were you I would get a motorcycle jack and move the storage tanks to the fermenters to fill them, then move them into the cold-room. I have done it that way with 3BBL BBT's no problem. 2BBLs is only about 500lbs.

Just make sure to get some good straps and don't lift the BBT more than an inch or two off the ground.

[NigeltheBold]

Interesting ideas. Keep em' coming!

Does anybody have any recommendations for a (relatively) inexpensive pump that is portable? I'm looking for something that could be used for both cleaning and transferring beer, and it doesn't have to be huge since we will be a pretty small operation. It would be nice to have one that is mounted on a small cart. Self-priming would be nice too.

[NigeltheBold]

Also, how important is diameter of the pipe? The narrower the pipe, the cheaper it is, so I was wondering if it would be okay to use a smaller diameter pipe than what our hoses will be (1.5"). I'm not sure how this would work with tri-clover fittings... any thoughts?

[Matt Dog]

1" lines would work. 1 1/2" hose is overkill for your size. I wouldnt mess with 1 1/2 till u hit 30 bbls. 1 1/2 is twice as hard to move around as 1".

[NigeltheBold]

1" lines would work. 1 1/2" hose is overkill for your size. I wouldnt mess with 1 1/2 till u hit 30 bbls. 1 1/2 is twice as hard to move around as 1".

All of the valves on our tanks will be 1.5" valves. Am I wrong to assume that we would we have to use 1.5" hoses if the valves are 1.5"?

Sorry for my ignorance... I'm still learning a lot about brewing on a professional level.

[Black Acre]

Assuming you are using tri-clamps, 1" and 1 1/2" are the same outside diameter and therefore work interchangeably throughout your brewery. Using 1" hose with 1.5 valves should not be a problem. See http://www.gvc.net/docs/gvc_doc_00004.pdf or many other places on the internet for more info.

Cheers,

Justin

[NigeltheBold]

Assuming you are using tri-clamps, 1" and 1 1/2" are the same outside diameter and therefore work interchangeably throughout your brewery. Using 1" hose with 1.5 valves should not be a problem. See http://www.gvc.net/docs/gvc_doc_00004.pdf or many other places on the internet for more info.

Cheers,

Justin

Thanks! That is helpful information. Sounds like I'll be going with 1" hoses then, and also 1" stainless steel pipes if we choose to use hard-line from the fermenters to the cold room.

Does anybody know what type of stainless would be best for this situation? I'm seeing two different types (on Grainger's website). 304 and 316. Which is better?

[Spurdie]

Why pump? I push with Co2. Less chance of oxidization if you ask me.

[Thirsty_Monk]

Why pump? I push with Co2. Less chance of oxidization if you ask me.

And how much beer you are transferring?

[NigeltheBold]

I'm trying to find a reasonably-sized pump for beer transfer AND cleaning purposes. Many of the brewery pumps I've found cost thousands of dollars and are too big for our application. I went to Grainger's website and found this pump. Would something like this work in the brewery setting?

As I said before, all of our tanks and equipment will have 1.5" tri-clamp fittings, but we'll probably use 1" ID hoses. Would this pump work if we used some NPT to Tri-clamp adapters on it?

Does anybody know of a better pump for my situation that doesn't cost thousands of dollars?