Grain Mill Suggestions

I own an old Corona type mill, but I'm thinking of making the leap to a roller mill...here's my requirements...

 1. I want something easy to use right out of the box.
 2. Two roller crusher please.
 3. Must be easily driven by a 3/8" drill - I'm tired of hand cranking it
 4. Gap must be easily adjustable - preferrably with a knob that has detents on it.
 5. My needs are pretty low volume - I'm usually crushing less than 10 lb for a 5 gal batch.

I've been looking at the Crankenstein and the Barley Crusher -- any feedback on which might be better?  What about others like the Phil Mill?

I know some of you out there bought new grain mills recently...thoughts?

Brad

I own and highly recommend the Barley Crusher. It meets 4.5 of your 5 requirements.

• Comes to your door with a hopper and base attached. Simply set it on top of a 5-gallon bucket, and crush away.
• It's a two roller mill... 1.5" diameter rollers.
• Loosen one screw and remove the hand crank, and tighten on your drill chuck.
• The gap is adjustable, at both ends of the rollers for parallel adjustment, from 0.005 to 0.070. Loosen to screws slightly, and turn adjustment knobs, then retighten. There aren't detents, but a feeler guage lets you measure the gap without much difficulty.
• The base model comes with a 7# hopper... the 15# hopper is a slightly higher priced option.

I just got done crushing some grain, in fact... slick as can be. It's a great mill at a great price.... $104.

Though I don't have any experience with it, the Crankandstein appears to be a nice mill too. However, you have to order or fabricate a hopper and base. It meets most of your other criteria, if at a moderately higher price.

The only thing I know about the PhilMill is that my LHBS uses it, and it seems a little limited in its capabilities. It's not horrible by any means... just not as fleshed out as the other options you're exploring.

I have used the Automatic mill and the Schmindling Malt Mill. Automatic - okay, but I wouldn't recommend it as you have to buy it from St. Pat's   . The Malt Mill is very nice, but has a fairly small hopper. Not a big problem -- just mill and fill -- but some people really don't like that. If I was buying a new mill today, I'd probably go with the Crank & Stein, but I'd get the hopper and base options -- that might make it higher priced than others, but it looks like a solid mill. But, I don't think you could go wrong than the BarleyCrusher (or ValleyMill for that matter). Anything at this point will be better than your corona!  

Thanks for all of your suggestions!

I will probably look into the Barley Crusher versus the C&S since I'm not really interested in building my own hopper and base.  

The ValleyMill and St Pats mill also look very nice, but for a comparable price the Barley Crusher seems to have a bigger hopper.

Just my thoughts so far...I'm in no rush to purchase so let me know if there are alternatives I've overlooked.

Cheers!
Brad

I just use a rolling pin with the grain in a ziploc bag, if you're looking for alternatives.    Just joking...I know you guys are all-grain and using a rolling pin would take as long as actually making the beer!  Being extract/adjunct-only, the pin works for me.

I'll second the recommendation for the BarleyCrusher.  I did a lot of comparison shopping and asked for opinions of other users on another forum before buying.  My requirements were pretty much the same as yours.

During my research, here's what I gathered.

From other brewers:
There were a lot of happy JSP Maltmill, Valley Mill, Crankandstein, PhilMill, and BarleyCrusher users out there.  It was hard to find a bad comment on any of them and they have all stood the test of time pretty well.

A lot of users think that an adjustable mill is overrated.  Most are happy with the non-adjustables and a lot of people try to adjust for a while and then move back to the factory default setting.  Some people do adjust but they were in a minority of those who responded.

Pricepoint:

The BarleyCrusher won.  It comes with a base, 7lb hopper, is all metal, adjustable, you can hook up a drill to it without modification, and comes with a lifetime warranty.

I actually motorized my BarleyCrusher the other day by using a motor that I bought off of ebay and building a plywood base and adding some sheaves and a v-belt.  It works great and if anyone is interested, I can point you to the directions that I used and a parts list.

I'm happy with my BarleyCrusher, but from what I've gathered, you wouldn't go wrong with any of the mills mentioned above.  

Cheers!

Thanks!
 I've put the Barley Crusher on my Christmas list.  The others seem quite nice as well, but I like the large hopper, dual rollers and so on...

 I appreciate all of your inputs!

Brad

Brad,

Did you get the Mill for Christmas? If so, how do you like it?

Thanks

Well, Santa brought me some nice electronic gadgets, but no Barley Mill this year.

As I mentioned earlier I have decided on the Barley Crusher and will likely purchase it pretty soon on my own.  I've had my hands full just trying to brew a few batches here and there (Alt this weekend!), run the business and work on the next version of BeerSmith.

I believe several here, including the Barley Crusher salesman of the year "Colin" can comment on it in detail however.

Colin?...

Cheers!
Brad

Reference my post above regarding the Barley Crusher for more in-depth information about it, but IMHO, the Barley Crusher is the most complete mill package for the money. You get the mill, base, hopper, handle that can be removed so that it can be drill-driven, and a lifetime warranty for a little over a C-note. So far, I've had zero issues with the mill--I simply place it on top of a 5-gallon bucket and grind away. I like it, because it does the job, and needed no fabrication on part--not that I'm against building things (my whole AG setup is homemade), but it's nice to pull it out of the box and be ready to mill within moments. I've personally never used any other mill (my LHBS uses a PhilMill, and I've seen that one in action) so I can't offer any competing viewpoints. Frankly though, I won't ever be able to, because I can't see myself ever needing another mill for my purposes.

Check out the Barley Crusher homepage, if you're interested.

The more I use my BarleyCrusher, the more I like it!  I have had zero issues with it!  Here's a picture of my motorized BarleyCrusher....

http://home.earthlink.net/~rob.strebler/images/mill2.jpg

Streb,
 Very nice!  I was going to go with a simple 3/8" variable speed drill...do you need the motor or will a drill be OK?

Cheers!
Brad

Brad,

It's not necessary to motorize the mill like I did.  A drill works just fine.  However, I like to tinker with things and the motorized version is nicer than a drill since you can just feed grain into it while it runs.   That being said, a drill is about 4000% better than having to hand crank.  8)

It's a pretty low cost modification to completely motorize - I think I paid about $30 in parts.  

Drills keep you from having to hand crank which is a royal PITA and is the most important thing.  Motorizing just makes it a little easier.

Cheers!

Streb--

Could you post the parts (pulleys, belts, and whatever else) you used? I've been toying with doing something like this, and your design might have pushed me over the edge.

Colin,

I used a set of instructions from Mike Dixon as a guide for my mill.  It is located here...  http://hbd.org/carboy/motorizing_a_malt_mill.htm

The motor was one that I got off of ebay for $5.00 - just look around for a while and you'll find one really cheap.

The rest of the parts, I bought through Grainger.  If you don't have an account or know someone who does, you can open one.  Just use your name as the company name, something like "John Doe Company" and use your social security number when it asks for the business id.  

Parts List:
Motor: 1725RPM - ebay - $5.00
12" Sheave - Grainger # 3X938 $16.00 (Mill shaft)
3/8" id to 1/2" od sleeve - Grainger # 4x664 - $4.00
2" Sheave - Grainger # 3X895 - $3.00 (Motor shaft - make sure you get one that has the right diamater for your motor shaft)
40" V-belt - Grainger # 3L400 - $5.00

Total - $33.00

The rest of the parts were just things I had laying around.  I used some plywood for the base and used an old extension cord for the power cord.  My motor didn't need a capacitor so it was directly wired into the extension cord wire.

I didn't build a switch - I just turn it on and off by plugging in the power cable.  I may add a switch into it in the future, but really haven't seen a need for one.  The plywood base just sits on top of a bucket and I used the rubber nipples that came with the original base to set it on the bucket securely.  Eventually, I'll build some legs and make a table when I pick up some more lumber.

The hard part is finding the parts list.  Mike Dixon's article helped me immensely with that.  Once you get the parts, you can design some really cool mill stands.

Let me know if you need any help.

Cheers!

Anyone who owns one want to take a leap of faith and write a short review for the reviews page?

Cheers!
Brad

If no one else is interested, I'd give it a go. Seeing how I build versus buy most of my equipment, it's one of the few pieces of brewing hardware that I actually could review  :

Re-did the mill today and mounted it on an old end table that I picked up at a 2nd hand store really cheap.  Here's a pic...

Very nice!  8)

 I love innovative home-made projects!

Cheers!
Brad