Grain Mills In General

Systems, Gear, & DIY
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I read the thread from a few months ago about “Best 3 Roller Mill”, and it pretty much reads like every other grain mill discussion I have seen.  Some folks are “ok” with what they have, others are looking to replace something that quite frankly, shouldnt ever need replaced.

Years ago, I considered making grain mills (to sell), just because I think the ones on the market stink.  But I have no time for that and no desire, and I’m not out to change the world.  I made 2 mills, kept the first and gave one to my brother.  I’ve been to Brew days with brew club folks and not even one time have I seen a mill I would keep.  And 3 of these guys started a small brewery, (which is quite nice I have to say, but their mill stinks).

Recently, I talked with a couple of those guys and mentioned I would be willing to build another for them, but they are ok with what they’ve got.  I see the prices online are such that they’re just a throw-away item.  They might be junk, but at least they’re cheap junk now. Used to be, they were not only junk, but quite expensive.

Big commercial mills, as far as I know, are smooth roller mills.  I’ve been told something like 6" diameter rollers.  They supposedly make dramatically less dust compared to the knurled versions most home brewers use.  Home versions have knurling so deep I don’t even know how they make the things.  Wow, that has to be a high-pressure operation.  The grains can almost get lost in those deep grooves.  I can’t even discuss gap settings with anyone because mine are not even close to what those things are set to.

I used a straight knurl on mine that didn’t run more than about .010" deep, and did so on 3" rollers.  It isn’t geared, though if I’d had gears at the time I made it, it would be. Initial tests of it before it was finished showed I didn’t even need the knurling, but I did it anyway. The second roller pretty well follows with minimal ‘slip’. I’ve put tape on the shafts to see them run and it’s almost as good as being geared. It NEVER sticks or fails to feed, which I hear many people complain about with the 1.25" and 1.5" rollers. The cost of the larger rollers is insignificant. Might even be less using Schedule 40 tubing I used.

Why haven’t one of the manufacturers simply made a mill with bigger rollers?  From a size standpoint, mine isn’t any bigger than the ones I see online.  Might be a bit taller since the sides need to be 3" (well, don’t really have to be, but they are). I used roller bearings in an eccentric for adjustment and consistency, and 1" shafts.  The 3" tubing sits upon 2 supports; somewhat like washers at each end of the shafts, connecting the shafts to the tubes (welded).  I drive mine with a motor and gearbox that’s a bit overkill, but it’s what I had laying around.  The motor is far too heavy and needs to be changed at some point, but I do like the way it works.

There’s not even a shadow of doubt, mine will run for-ev-or, without failure.  I would think someone in the HB industry would have decided to make the once and forever mill by now.  Other equipment is lifetime stuff, why not the mills?

PS. Mine will mill a 20# batch in ~2 minutes without any intervention. With a different gearbox, it could probably go 5x as fast.

2

I have a JSP Malt Mill. You can’t buy them anymore but that’s OK because it’s a lifetime buy IMO.

I don’t set a mill by gap between rollers. I set it by the size of the grits/flour and their ratio after milling.

One day, you’ll wake up and there won’t be anymore time to do the things you’ve always wanted to do. Don’t wait. Do it now.

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With the prices I see online, it’s no surprise sellers come and go.  Mills can be had for under $100, and there’s choices.  I used a Corona mill for probably almost 20 years before I decided to make something nicer.  And I would have bought one if I hadn’t seen them in action at club brew days.  Guys messing around to get grain to go through. :D  I understand, folks are happy to use what they’ve got and that makes sense.  But lots of folks spent good money for mills that were more trouble than they were worth.

I saw an article about milling grain and they used a sieve for testing.  Omg are they expensive.  The markup is absolutely insane. The screens in them are $86 each! 8" diameter.  It’s just wire mesh cut into a circle. So for the test they showed, 3 screens @86ea, 3 tin stack rings at $25 ea, and 1 base pan (8" cake pan) is $38, a lid is $32. Lol.  Just wow… $402 for what amounts to a cake pan, 3 cake rings, a lid and 3 pieces of SS mesh.  And if you want those pans in stainless, Its MORE!  Even if they’d have been $50 for the set, I would have considered buying just to play with it, and I sell wire mesh for a living!  lol.  The gouging is simply unprecedented.

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No 14 Seive $18.50

…I should also add the ease of lauter and quality outcome of the beer matters most of all.  I found on my system 60/40 grits/flour works best and produces the beer I want. I could care less what the gap between rollers is.

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Agreed on both

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I also use a JSP. I have no need for a bigger, faster mill. Makes no difference to me if milling takes 2 minutes or 10 minutes. I’m a hobbyist, I’ve got time for my hobby. The reason you don’t see bigger mills is because most homebrewers are like me.

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That’s better!
I also use brewhouse efficiency the sparge as my guide.  This test I saw showed a 14, a 30 and 60 (on Morebeer), and while scientific, I’m glad they did it because I’m not interested in paying for those sieves to play with, even at $20 each. (the #30 is $22.xx)

I do set a gap and track it with the batches, but it’s just for my own notes on each lot of grain.  Not to attempt to predict outcomes from it.  Other than to say it’s larger or smaller than it was before. Each bag of grain will vary. I had a batch last year that totally changed my settings due to being so varied and smaller.  Efficiency dropped like a rock on that bag.  A finer crush fixed it on the next batch. They were out of Briess 2 row and I used grain from another maltster. It was way different.

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20+ years ago I set my JSP as tight as it would go. I have never changed it.

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I’m not saying bigger and faster is any better, other than to say that bigger rollers are most definitely better.  I’ll never forget going to a brew club members brew day and watching while they used a board to try to force the grain through the mill.  It was hilarious.  At the time I was still using a corona mill, and seriously, I’d have been done already. Trouble with that thing was I could often get a stuck sparge if I didn’t use loads of rice hulls because it was really hard to set.  But I just figured rice hulls are cheap and kept going. But those mills are intended to “grind” instead of “crush”, so it’s no surprise they don’t work so well.

I hear guys say their rollers wear out, and it just seems impossible to me.  But I’ve seen them not feed.  Then there’s 3 roller mills, I don’t understand the third roller does, but whatever. I even got some 6" schedule 40 steel pipe given to me with the idea of making a smooth roller mill, but I agree, life is too short to re-invent the wheel when mine works fine.  I just find it interesting how many complaints there are about the various mills out there. Just look at that thread and appreciate, there’s guys looking to replace a mill because it’s such a headache.  How much do you have to hate it to consider that? :smiley:

Here’s mine and a pic showing the roller setup. Somebody should mass produce one like this with rollers like this.  3" dia x 6" long iirc.

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GrainMill3.jpg
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I was similar till recently when someone talked me into brewing a new style and the grain I bought didn’t crush.  Like, at all.  I ended up setting the mill way closer and it caused rather a big change.

Not sure why photos are not showing inline. I click on "open in a new window"and it shows it perfectly… Odd.

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It’s like anything else. They charge what they know people will pay.

I have a Crankandstein mill, and I see no reason why I won’t be handing it down to my boys someday. Been using it heavily for 12 years, and it’s still like new. I took it all apart recently and thoroughly cleaned it, just because.

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My assumption is the pictures aren’t displaying because the link to shared file is on a unsecure web address( http:// rather than https://). Security certificates are required by standards these days.

Now back to beer stuff…

Paul

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Interesting. I was almost sure I had https in the links. First time posting photos here. I’ll have to look into that. I just tried to switch it and then it gave me a security error, although it did have a box to check and say go ahead and open anyway. I put it back the way it was and I’ll consider fixing it later. But thanks for pointing it out.

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GEA mills have big rollers that are groved. The barley is wet milled, and the kernels are sheared to preserve the husks for lautering.

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I wasn’t trying to imply there are no decent commercial mills available. That thing is certainly not something a home brewer is going to buy. All I need to see is where it says on the page, request a quote, and I know it’s some ridiculous price. Not that it isn’t probably worth it, just it’s not a homebrew piece of kit. I’m not worried about explosions with 20 lb of grain so I don’t need to wet mill. I’m pretty sure I made a nicer mill than anything available at any of the online Homebrew shops, and it was neither a ton of work or money. It’s just a shame there aren’t ones similar available to buy at a reasonable price.

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I was showing that there are mills with big rollers. Yes it’s commercial, and used in breweries like Sierra Nevada, Bell’s, Firestone Walker and so on. German made, all the tech you could want.

Wet milling has applications for breweries with lauter tuns, as the husks aren’t broken up. The the water is stripped of O2, hot, and the full amount for the mash is used.

The

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IIRC, I think it was Ken ____ from Sierra Nevada I saw in an interview talking about a mill, and it may well have been one of them.  I don’t know.  It milled and added water on the fly, and it was a semi-major thing for them to acquire, or so he made it out to be. I think, again assuming it was his video I’m remembering, it came from Europe somewhere.  There were shots of it in the video, but not much to see really, other than to listen to him discuss it.

In any case, what I’d prefer to see is a mill in the $250 range that performs like mine and is virtually guaranteed to last a lifetime.  I’d bet serious money on mine being able to do that in the most demanding home-brewer scenario.  Not sure I wouldn’t bet a little money it would do it in a commercial setting.

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My first maltmill was a JSP. I even sold the JSP maltmills for a number of years. My JSP maltmill lasted for a number of years and then the milling got worse and worse. I understand this is a common problem with the JSP. Unfortunately, Jack Schmidling is no longer with us. Therefore, I purchased and motorized a 3 roller mill from MoreBeer. I’ve been happy. No more sweating while cranking the mill. I’ve gotten into the habit of milling the day before in a different room than my brewroom to mitigate any mill dust.

I still have the JSP maltmill if anyone know how I can fix it.

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What do you mean by the Milling got worse?

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Mashing efficiency decreased. Obvious when looking at the “crush”.

I’m definately in the market for an easily adjustable, reliable 3 roller maltmill.