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Hi Guys
A friend of my mates is setting up a micro brewery in a small industrial unit. The unit is fed by a 3 phase 100amp supply
the brewery plant is on order and the boiling part of the plant is fitted with 3 x 18kw (3 phase) immersions, then another piece of equipment has 1 x 18kw 3 phase immersion in it.
then he want a couple of small 3 phase pumps wired in ( only a couple of amps each), then there is the ring main in the unit, the flood lighting, 3kw 230v fridge plant (that sounds a bit big to me but that is what he said the size would be)for the cold room and a electric roller shutter door.
I dont think the supply is man enough you views pls

thx
Bigfoots
 
balance the loads across the 3 phases, should cope. don't forget that the heaters will be thermostat controlled so you can allow a bit of diversity.
 
18kW is 75A each. that's 100A /phase.. where's the 180A come from
 
Supply way too small, those immersions are going to pull 180 amp when first switched on!

That is one of my concerns also the boiling vat is quite big and he has told me the 3 x 18kw elements will not be thermostatically controlled(seems a bit strange to me), using all three to bring it up to boiling then switching 2 out leaving one to keep it boiling.
 
Supply way too small, those immersions are going to pull 180 amp when first switched on!

Are you saying that immersion heaters take significantly more power at switch on than when running?

Is this is due to change of resistance with temperature, and how big do you estimate the effect to be?
 
using an online kw to amps calculator I worked out the total amps for the boiling unit being 75 amps per phase plus the other 18kw = 25 amps per phase then the lighting and ring main plus fridge unit
 
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Depending on the vat size (liquid volume) you may have a mains loading hovering around 90% capacity for quite a duration when switched on you need to find out the duty of the machine... is it 24/7 with shutdown for maintenance and hols or is it powered once a day ...twice etc.

You may find a off peak warm up period to be the best all round option and rather than one element been left on to maintain temp i would look into fitting a 3ph 6kw heater and have this been the maintaining element this way your supply will be ample and you avoid expensive upgrade costs by spending a few hundred adapting the system to run on a daytime balance element of 6kw.

As we have sketchy details here this is all i can suggest ... how is the building heated?

Off peak ramp up will save a lot of money and will easily pay for any alterations to the heater that i have suggested and one altered will be very cost effective compared to its proposed set up now.
 
18kW is 75A each. that's 100A /phase.. where's the 180A come from

It is at 240V single phase. 18 KW at three phase is 26A per phase. He has proposed 4 which would be 104A per phase. Not knowing the cycling or startup regime I cannot comment on diversity. So may not be big enough.
 
Enquire about off peak ... score some brownie point ..work out the warm up time/duration then cost it at the present rates then calc for the off peak and see if there is a big difference ...this could recoup thousands in some cases and will pay for itself in no time....

If you don't look into this then maybe a few yrs down the line someone else might saving them a fortune and losing you a customer.

I do this all the time and ive too much on but yet i never advertise ...if you go that extra mile then you will be amazed about how many new contacts you can get by word of mouth.

So no heating if there is any office space then im sure you can add a few 2-3kw heaters on to the load in winter :rolleyes2:
 
Learn how to make beer, at no time will all three mash tuns be on line at the same time.

BTW the best way to heat the wort is with a spiralled hot water coil fed from a domestic gas boiler. Steady gentle heat doesn’t burn the solids in the wort.
The heat from an immersion heater is too intense. It will caramelise the wort around the elements. If you want a dark beer, this isn’t the way to do it

Not that I know anything about beer.
 
After winning two national awards for home brewing, I can’t drink beer now.

I drink Bloody Mary’s

Stupid world.

I’ll not go back in to competitive shows ever again. Transporting the pin was a nightmare. It had to settle for at least 24Hrs. You pull your guts out for nine gallons of ale to be drunk by f*&*ing beer anoraks!

I hate beer anoraks! They haven’t a clue what they are talking about!
 
went to a regular customer yesterday. a large pub. landlord always buys me a pint when i've been on a call-out. he'd got old dan in as a guest beer. 6.4%, bloody loverley.
 

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