Why not start and finish in a single vessel?

Hi

I've been trying to write this email so that anyone who has brewed a beer (just 1!) wont think I am taking the mick!

This is a genuine question to which I haven't been able to find an answer on the net (although this may be because I haven't got any of the correct terminology to facilitate a search) and is a question which brewers will probably laugh at .... so it is best I explain why I am asking

Firstly, I have never brewed! My company manufactures large amounts of stainless steel catering equipment (don't worry, I'm not selling anything here!) and I was looking at alternative products that I could put into manufacture - This is where I came across the conical fermenting vessels

I was interested, so I started to read a bit about the process and soon discovered fermenting and racking to a secondary to help clear the beer and then kegging or bottling with priming sugars to allow CO2 to build up and give the effervescence etc

My question is, why can't this all be done in one stainless steel vessel?

With primary fermentation over and numerous people on forums saying it's best to leave the beer in the vessel for several weeks to let most of the yeast fall out of suspension to clear the beer and not to do any secondary fermentation (re risk of contamination and introducing O2), why not draw the yeast off at the bottom of the conical fermenting vessel, leaving mostly clear beer and add the priming sugars to the beer then, in the same vessel - Put the whole thing in a fridge after a few days and let it clear down again and use the secondary tap higher up the conical vessel to draw off clear pressurised beer with a little CO2
Isn't this essentially the same as racking from the primary fermentation vessel to a keg, thereby removing the yeast that settles out in the primary fermentation vessel from the equation and later letting the small amount left after priming in the keg settle to the bottom of the keg and drawing off from a tap 50mm from the base??? all without the contamination and O2 risk???

I know I will get slated for this, but as someone who has never brewed, this is simply about the process and understanding why not, whilst my mind is designing a glycol jacketed heating and cooling all in one wonder fermenter (hell - why not boil up your wort in the same one .... I'll add an element in the bottom cone)  ! - Please don't be rude or patronising with answers : we all have our fields of excellence (and ignorance) and mine is engineering and business (and not brewing)

Noroc!

this is more or less how many commercial operations handle the process. if you have a conical that can be pressurized to ~15 psi you can ferment at that level, dump yeast/trub out the bottom port, and either rack to another serving vessel or even serve right out of the conical (although this is not as common because generally the brewer wants the conical to be available again as soon as possible).

It's called a uni-tank. There are a few products on the homebrew market that can do this and they are pretty, shiny, and spendy.

Jon.shine said:

This is a genuine question

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And a cool one. It is a difficult engineering challenge to deal with the various dynamics of the brewing process. The best solution has been specialized containers designed for each step of the process.

My question is, why can't this all be done in one stainless steel vessel?

Click to expand...

It can. There are some products that do very small scale versions of what you're conceptualizing. The Mr. Beer kit comes to mind as one.

However, beer is a very dynamic, living product. And brewers on the homebrew scale like to experiment with lots of ingredients and production methods. This tends to limit the usefulness and market size of single vessel products. So, they have to compete on price and novelty by significantly limiting their size. Plus, they're plastic and you're talking steel.

That's the direct answer to your question, the rest of this post is me contemplating steel production scaling and ROI. This is your business specialty, I'm just going by the seat of my pants....

morticaixavier gave you a very good thumbnail sketch of choices that brewers have in the process. He also said "spendy."

The main cost in steel unitank manufacturing is the cone. For it to be useful at removing yeast, a minimum slope of 60 degrees is the industry standard. This also significantly elongates the tank, making your "move to the 'fridge" idea much more challenging. Forming a smooth cone makes the cost per gallon quite high for small scale steel tanks.

A pro sized 15 barrel tank for a pub would be about $12,000 with fittings. That's just shy of $26 per gallon. A look at the cheapest conical options for homebrewing shows a range from $31 per gallon on up to $126/gal. Bigger is cheaper because it's mostly air.

http://morebeer.com/category/blichmann-fermenators-accessories.html
http://morebeer.com/category/morebeer-conical-fermenters-options.html

Amortized costs make a conical an interesting investment.

At full production capacity, a commercial unitank is 2 to 3 years to get to $0.50/gallon. Assuming a homebrewer stays within the 200 gallon annual limit, amortization to $0.50/gal can take up to a decade. 

I'm considering one of the new Brew Buckets: http://morebeer.com/products/brew-bucket-stainless-fermenter.html

Quite a bit cheaper than most of the other conical options out there, and even pretty respectable in comparison to the plastic varieties. I don't know if I'd want to serve out of it--maybe if I win the lotto and can have enough of them

Keep in mind that you'd be using the same vessel for the entire life of the brew. So if you want to do another beer,  you need another vessel. You can see where that is going.

This is something I have thought about at times. The hardest part of brewing is always moving the beer around at various stages.

I think the heating/ cooling jacket would be a great option. I know we're starting to see smaller homebrew boiling pots with jackets, but nothing conical shaped.

The addition of co2 gas, serving port could also be used to draw samples.

Cold and hot break and spent hops could be dropped out before adding yeast.

It would get fairly dirty and would need small access port only to handle 30 psi which would necessitate a clean in place spray-ball system.

I imagine the retail cost of a 7-8 gallon setup would be at least $800 which would make sales fairly dismal considering how cheap conicals are getting.