I would LOVE to incorporate a couple of March pumps in my build, but budgetwise, I can’t do it right now. These are what I’m looking at for the time. Eventually I will up to the March, but just not right now.
I know I’m gonna get the whole “you get what you pay for” and “buy quality the first time and you’ll save money in the long run” lectures. I know that. I’m a salesman, I give them every day. Aside from that, do you see any reason this won’t work for the time?
Bad link
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These were discussed on one of the Homebrewing Facebook pages and there are mixed results from them. Some said they worked a few times and then quit never to work again and some had good success using them. So to respond to “you get what you pay for” I would add “you pay your money and you take your chances”
I remember these coming on the scene years ago. No personal experience.
I 'm gonna give them a crack. If it $h!ts the bed, I’m out $18. No big loss.
Also, what are these Facebook home brew pages you speak of? Can I find them on the interwebs?
What are you going to use it for? That is a really slow pump at 8l per minute. It will slow way down as it reaches its height limit of 10 feet.
It will mainly be used for strike water and spare water transfer. The one that I linked I thought said 2.1gpm. I know that’s not crazy fast, but I didn’t think 4-6 minutes was bad. And I’m only looming at 2-3 for of head. (Insert “that’s what she said” joke here)
Will I need to bump my water temperatures up a few degrees when using a pump?
Depending on the way you transferred before, you might find you need to increase a couple of degrees to account for heat lost in heating the lines, transferring, etc.
I recommend using a thermometer you trust and just measure the strike water in your mash tun before doughing in the first couple of times. If your setup allows it, you can then run water back out of the mash tun into the kettle if you need to continue heating a portion to nail your strike temp. After a couple of times you’ll have this dialed in and you’ll know any change to your strike target.
Sounds reasonable. I plan on hard piping it all, so I think I’ll insulate it all. In also toying with the idea of of putting a copper manifold in the bottom of my mash tun so I can circulate got water through it if I need a couple degree bump.
You’re wasting your money. And how will you cope with this…“The pump must be under water level”
I believe that means it must have head pressure above it to prime the pump. Basically the same as all brew pumps.
I’d go soft plumbing until you know those pumps are going to last and be what you want long term.
That’s no issue at. Even if I were using a March or Chugger I have it layer out for them to be below water level. And at 18 bucks a pop I can afford to waste that. I’ve been a sting that on BMC’s for a few years now since I’ve been out of the game.
As for the hard piping, I am going to put flex lines at each connection so when I finally do et my March pumps it’ll be no more work than hooking up a garden hose to the faucet on your house.
It is under Home Brew Network I think. You should be able to find the page but searching back for this discussion may be a bit of work, it was a few months ago.
That’s the way to go with hard plumbing. Downside is, more fittings = more places to collect crud.
And more places to leak.