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BREWEASY-ELEC-AUTO - Blichmann Electric BrewEasy All-Grain Brewing System
« Return to productLove our Electric BrewEasy
Nov 16, 2016 | Posted By Melissa from PA United States
My husband and I purchased the Electric BrewEasy 5 gal/240V over a year ago from Great Fermentations. The staff at Great Fermentations are a great resource when assembling the system. Every beer we have brewed with the system has been great. With an addition of a batch sparge step using a cooler for the 170 degree water, we have increased our extraction efficiency to 90%. The clarity of our beer is great! Now that we have optimized the system we wished we would have bought the 10 gal system.
Pricey but great
Feb 16, 2016 | Posted By Kevin Woolf from OR United States
Finally pulled the trigger on the Blichmann BrewEasy. A few thoughts: First of all, excellent customer service from all of the crew at Great Fermentations, resolving two very minor (a clamp and a screw) omissions from the Blichmann drop-ship, and providing excellent advice as I decided how to proceed. I opted for the 10 gallon system. I brewed my first batch last week. I wanted flexibility to brew a 5-10 gallon batch, and actually brewed a 7.5 gallon batch last week. Blichmann states that this system can, with some care and attention (as well as a 9" rod on the AutoSparge) brew 5 gallon batches. I would say that brewing less than 6 would be difficult, primarily because of fear of the water level dropping below the heating element in the 20 gallon kettle during the mash stage. You can buy an auto-cut-off switch so the worry of ruining your coils goes away, but I'm not certain you could keep the water level high enough brewing 5 gallons. Brew day was fun and relatively easy. Highly recommend watching this video: http://www.greatfermentations.com/brew-day-tips-blichmann-breweasy/ Definitely agree with the fact that you should overshoot when increasing the temperature by a step, this will save a lot of time. It does take a fair amount of fiddling with the temperature to get it right, so definitely not "set it and forget it" but I didn't find this too annoying and will probably get better as I practice. Using this setup with a "Hop Stopper" and a counterflow chiller. Worked great. Overall "brewhouse efficiency" after my first batch was 67%. A lot of loss was from wort and trub in the kettle at the end of draining through the chiller - this is a side effect of brewing a smaller batch in a 20 gallon pot (higher % of the batch lost to the bottom of the kettle) but this did not worry me. Actually overshot my pre-boil SG by a lot so no problem with mash efficiency at all. This is my first upgrade to all-grain brewing from extract. I have to say, if you want a "turnkey" system (granted the setup is fairly involved but all the stuff is there) and can spring for the price this is probably a good option for you, as an upgrade over an electric BIAB setup, but not springing for an all-electric 3-vessel system. If you want to upgrade to a 3-vessel system later you have a head start, but I'm not sure I'll need to. Would have given 4.5 stars (if an option), Blichmann product quality is outstanding, setup relatively intuitive and fun, temperature controller requires a lot of fiddling to get the temperature moving quickly, high price point makes overall value a little lower. Cheers!
Best Customer Service Ever
May 19, 2015 | Posted By Dan from UT United States
I've wanted to get into all-grain brewing for years, and finally settled on the Blichmann BrewEasy as the system for me. I did a lot of online shopping and price comparing, and found little price difference from site to site. One comment I read in the reviews was the excellent customer service provided by Great Fermentations, and I decided that I'd purchase through them. My equipment arrived well within the 3 week timeframe estimated by Great Fermentations. Everything was well-packaged and arrived in excellent shape. It did take me a few hours to unbox everything and configure it to my liking, but I was really happy with the form factor of the equipment and am excited to get brewing. The Blichmann documentation is decent, but I didn't receive operating documentation for the Tower of Power LTE. I had a few other questions about the equipment and reached out to Great Fermenations via their website. I was highly impressed with the quick and thorough response to my questions. Wes clearly took time to understand what I was asking and wrote back with clear information and links to information and videos. Great Fermentations lived up to what I had previously read about their customer service, and I feel like I'll be a loyal customer for life. I'll likely post again once I've brewed a few batches with the BrewEasy system, but I wanted to at least post about the purchasing and support experience. The BrewEasy is a significant investment, and a little daunting for someone just getting into all-grain brewing. After watching the Great Fermentations videos and having Wes help me through some questions, I'm feeling more and more confident that I made the right decision on both equipment and seller.
Very Impressive
Apr 9, 2015 | Posted By Roger from OH United States
I've been home brewing for over 10 years, using a propane heater, an orange-colored cooler mash tun and an undersized boil kettle. For myself, electric brewing has always seemed like the way to go, but for me, the idea of using hot water heating elements in my wort was not appealing. When Blichmann released the BrewEasy it seemed to fit my needs. No need to constantly refill the propane tank or brew in the garage. When using the 240 VAC version, do not be concerned with the time to get to either step temperatures or to boiling temperature. It is very impressive. The amount of condensation when boiling is significant, and when indoors, an exhaust fan is helpful. I was lucky to have that available. This system has the top quality, American-made equipment you expect from Blichmann. I have not tried to work with Blichmann on the minor questions I had, instead relying on Bryan at Great Fermentations. Like others, I can without hesitation recommend Great Fermentations. When I happened to be in Indianapolis, and stopped in on a busy Saturday, was given a demo by their head brewer, Wes. I had a lot, lot of questions, and he patiently answered every one. The quality equipment from Blichmann and the outstanding customer service from GF has been an ideal combination for me. As others have commented, there are a few lessons to be learned. That is likely true if switching from propane to electric regardless of the specific system. I do recommend re-thinking the entire brewing process. I did make a couple of rookie mistakes on my first batch, mostly due to my impatience to brew with the BrewEasy. For example when preparing to cool the wort is not the time to discover your hose is just not long enough. (Don't ask how I know) But a little chill haze was not enough to dampen my enthusiasm for the BrewEasy. Now I have one last problem. How to dispose of that orange cooler?
Staying warm
Jan 18, 2015 | Posted By Sean E Durocher from MI United States
I brew every weekend and live in Michigan. Last winter was very cold. I brewed in my garage with the door open. It's not too bad but it was cold. I had read articles on electric brewing and I knew I wanted to go that way. When I say this setup, I knew I needed it. I'm staying warm now and my beer is tasting better than ever. I'm an HR systems manger in business and I am all about automation. I always thought it was a little weird that my hobby was so manual while my business life was automation. Now there both about automation.
The King
Nov 22, 2014 | Posted By Eric King from IN United States
All in all, I am pleased with the new system. I did email Blichmann with questions about mash times and recirculation. I got a helpful response within a couple of hours. So, I give the design, the engineer/manufacturer, and the GF customer service all 5 stars. For the money, I don't think you can find a better high end system for the avid home brewer! Read on for more details. I watched John Blichmann tout out this new system at NHC in Grand Rapids this year and was very impressed with the design. This is a great system that takes some learning and extra attention, in the beginning. I had the same problem as Reviewer-Dana with the thermometers being upside down, but I broke one of mine before reading how to adjust it the correct way. John, have your supplier correct this so that your customers don't have to deal with rotating the dial when installing the new system. There are enough parts to deal with that first day. Thanks to Bryan at GF for getting me a new one at no-charge! You guys rock all the time! I have been using a 10 gallon homemade all grain - natural gas - gravity system for the past 5 years. I had my process down pretty well and did batch sparges in my 15 gallon cooler. My efficiency was in the 78% range on average beers and around 70% on higher gravity beers. Down side was most brew sessions ran 6 to 7 hours and when it was above 60 outside, it made for a very hot day in the brewery. I have run 5 batches on this system since purchase (10 Gallon Electric Turnkey). The first 2 turned out not so good due to operator error, and grain crush. You may need to adjust your crush to get efficiency where you want it to be. My first couples of batches were light on OG - so I tightened down my gap to 0.050 in. from 0.055 in. I also watched my starting water volume to make sure it was a bit lower than recommended, then add top off water to the kettle during the boil. My efficiency for the last 3 brews was 73%, 83% (and these were both small gravity brews), and my latest, a robust porter with an OG of 1.060 and hit 73% efficiency. The boil coil is awesome at taking my mash out wort up to a boil in less then 15 minutes! Brew session times are down to about 4 hours from start to soak. Then about 15 minutes of clean up the next day. I used the cleaning method recommended by the reviewer Dana on my last run, and it was much easier to clean out all my equipment. The only thing that still needs some scrubbing attention is the Boil Coil. It starts to build up some grit that does not come off easily even after a PBW soak. I used a nylon scrubber to clean off the coil, which is a little tedious One thing that any system will require is proper ventilation, and this is very true with this system. I brew in a garage with the door open and several box fans set up. This system creates a lot of steam. I have added a small fan into the roof vent to help suck out some of the moist air, but I still am getting some condensation build up on the garage door when it is cold out.
Loving it so far
Oct 29, 2014 | Posted By Dana from FL United States
After 3 batches on the 10 gallon electric system, I am very impressed with the BrewEasy. For the money, I believe its your best bang for your buck for a system with automated temperature control and a pump. Once mastered, it really takes a lot of stress and running around out of a brew day. The BoilCoil on the electric model is very, very impressive. It is capable of bring 13 gallons of wort to a boil in about 15 minutes, and on its highest setting, will boil off about 2 gallons an hour. This is specifically helpful if you need to boil down to hit your calculated volume pre-hop addition. By the same token, you can use the digital controller to bring it down to a slow simmer if you're worried about boiling off too much. The tower of power in combination with the pump holds mash temps within a degree or less, and the autosparge takes care of the levels quite nicely. Though I bought the 10 gallon, I have successfully been able to brew a 5 gallon batch and a 15 gallon batch on the system. Being that these are not the intended values, I had to tweak the process a little, and it was not as "easy" as when used as designed, the system offers you this flexibility. The quality of all the components is top notch, with the usual blichmann pizazz, and assembly was not too tough. The system comes in about 6 different boxes, so unpacking everything is more of a chore than actually putting it together. Cleaning the system is also incredibly simple. Just fill with PBW, set controller to 200 degrees, and recirculate. After the pbw is up to temp, I usually let it soak overnight. Next morning i pump it all out into a keg or the sink, rinse with fresh water, and you're good to go... Have no needed to scrub yet. Cons, etc.: This is my first system of this caliber, so my rosy review may be taken with a grain of salt. A few things that I've noticed that hold the system from a 5-star rating (so far). The biggest is efficiency. My first brew I only ached 50% efficiency, and I followed the manual step by step. By the third go around, I've gotten it to 65%... close to the 70% factor that blichmann claims. I do believe this is possible to achieve and possible to achieve consistently, but it is a smidge disappointing that for a system of this level and price point requires some serious honing and precision of brew process just to squeak into the 70% efficiency range. I have also noticed that the controller always reads at a different temperature than the calibrated brewmometers on the kettles. This has caused me quite a bit of angst on brew day... when the mash tun says 140 or 145 degrees, and the controller says 153.... but I am told that this is by design and to trust the controller, so maybe this is much to do about nothing. Speaking of the brewmometers, mine came installed upside down in their housings, so that they would be upside down when oriented in a position to tilt them upward. Not a hard fix or a huge deal, but again, you expect more for this amount of money and from blichmann..... which brings me to my next point. Blichmann: Absolutely fantastic products. Absolutely horrific customer service and customer relations. The company is run as you would expect a company chaired by an engineer (John Blichmann) to be run.... terrible people skills, over-promised deadlines, and bad communication. This unit was announced in July of 2013, and promised by the holidays. Here we are at Halloween 2014 and I am just now writing my review of the unit as one of the first customers to receive one. Blichmann strung along his loyal customers, including myself who sold my old brew rig in anticipation of this unit and was without homebrew for 7 months. "We expect to be shipping BrewEasy's by the new year... by march... by early summer... by late summer..." and on and on. You can't call them on the phone, they often ignore emails, and even when they do respond are not very helpful at all. At this very moment, I'm not even sure the Electric Breweasy is on their website, believe it still says coming soon, you know from when they updated it last... about 9 months ago... thank god for Great Fermentations. I HIGHLY recommend purchasing from Great Fermentations. I ordered from them because they're always the first ones to get blichmann products, but was pleasantly surprised at how awesome Bryan over @ Great Ferm is. I had a faulty temp probe with my unit, he overnighted me a new one with no questions asked (after an email to Blichmann was completely unhelpful, go figure) . He's been quick to answer my countless "When will the brew easy be available?" and "when will my unit ship" questions, and has gone above and beyond with helping me correct my efficiency issues even after he made the sale. They will be my goto for ordering any homebrew stuff online from here on out. Cannot say enough positive things about Great Fermentations. In summary: Breweasy Good, Blichmann Bad, Great Fermentations Excellent.