So It Begins

This weekend I was able to officially start working on my brew stand. I am starting with the control panel build because I have all the parts and it takes the most time to complete. The control panel will be housed in a 20"x20"x8" box. The box is designed with a removable plate on the bottom of the box for cable hookups. However, the plate is not big enough for all of the cables that I will be attaching in the box. I will be sealing the plate to the box permanently with JB Weld and flipping the box to make the sealed plate be on the top of the box. Thursday night I sealed the plate with the help of my zombie dog.

I let the JB Weld cure for a couple days. On Saturday night I used my rotary tool to cut the ends off of the screws and grind them down to be flush with the box. Spraying sparks all over the garage is always fun. It looks rough now, but once it is primed and painted it will look a lot better.

Using a great layout from one of the users on the Electric Brewery forums, I then was able to start measuring and marking the locations for all of the cuts I will need to make. All of the circles on the picture below encompass the center point of the hole that needs to be punched. These holes will be for the various lights and switches that will be on the control panel. The two rectangles at the top of the panel are for the volt and amp meters. The four squares in the middle of the panel are for the PID controllers and a timer. The PID controllers will manage the temperature in the kettles by controlling the heating elements.

On what is now the bottom of the panel I marked the locations for the receptacles. You can see the two scribbled out marks where I caught a mistake thanks to the old "measure twice, cut once" adage. The circle on the left is for the main power feed coming into the box. The four staggered marks just to the right of that are for the heating elements. The two marks in the upper right are for the two pumps, and the three marks in the bottom right are for the temperature probes.

I will have more updates coming soon as I make my first cuts of the project. For more information on the plans I am following please visit The Electric Brewery. There are wonderful write ups detailing every step of the way.