Grain mills

[Martin Bridges]

I'm in the market for a grain mill. I've looked back through the threads on here and there are a few recommendations but I thought I'd see if there was any up to date info. I've borrowed a Barley Crusher MaltMill before (thanks Barry!) and it has worked well. With the current exchange rate this is looking like NZ$315 including shipping.

The MillMaster from Craftbrewer in Aussie is about NZ$330 plus shipping (including the hopper and handle). I expect shipping will be fairly pricey given it is a heavy item. Is this mill worth the extra bucks?

Are there any other options? The mill that Hauraki Homebrew list on their site looks more like a coffee grinder!

Cheers,

Martin

[jt]

Forget the coffee mill & marga (I may hear howls of disgust with the marga comment but I hear that they take hours to mill a batch worth)
Stu posted a link the other day, that looked comparable to the barleycrusher, pricewise in the link I followed, schmindling ?

Valley Mill is another that I've heard recommended.

Nothing wrong with the barleycrusher, reckon the ones around NZ have done a fair few batches and with the exception of Dan's seem to be pumping it through with out any trouble.

There were some crankensteins in a bulk buy on the old forum .. interesting to see what comments there are about them ??

Go the barley crusher & get a big hopper made locally .. maybe ? The 7lb one is too small

[denimglen]

Barley Crusher user here, stoked as with it. Well made.

The crankensteins and millmaster look good too but have never used or seen one up close.

Bigger hopper is on my to-do list, usually 1.5 - 2 fills for my average batch. Would be easy to knock one up your self, just a folded sheet of ali with a few rivets, smack with a hammer in the vice to bend it.

[Glynn Foster]

I'd not recommend the Hauraki Homebrew one. I bought one while on a trip to Aus a while back, and very hard to adjust to get the right grind (even when you think you have it, plenty of grains pass through without being cracked).

[JoKing]

I got a monster mil 2 roller carbon steel 6" long and 2" round. I bought 2 across and paid shipping for only 1. At the time they were $99 and the shipping was $25. I think in the end it cost around $160 each unit - I was pretty happy with that. I made my own base and hopper - pretty easy realy: keeps the costs down anyway!

The crankandstein 2A is pretty cheap - and comparable to my mill. There is even a cheaper one on their website. A mate of mine uses a crankandstein, and he is happy with it and his beer tastes great!

[Stu McKinlay]

The Schmidling malt mill is excellent quality. I'm a long term borrower of Brendon's because he purchased a barley crusher (I guess some illogical part of him thought he needed an adjustable mill - you don't). He's always on the verge of taking it back but I've got it in hiding...

[Barry]

Ditto not needing an adjustable one. I've never altered my Barley Crusher from the factory setting.
If I were to buy again, after seeing the hopper and base construction for myself, and with the exchange rate how it is right now, I'd buy an absolute bare bones unit and make what I needed to here once it landed - hopper and base, even a handle would be fairly easy to construct, or just get a drill with a large enough chuck.
I reckon all the "brands" are much the much. I can't see any particular brand or model that looks exceptionally better than any other. Go for the most cost-effective, e.g. don't need to pay for a 3-roller mill when 2 rollers works just fine. Why the Millmaster works out slightly more when it's being shipped a quarter of the distance is a mystery to me, Frances could have been a bit sharper on price I reckon to compete with the American mills.

[James P]

I have been in contact with Crank and Stein, and they will ship 3 x 2 roller (1.5 inch dia. 2S without hopper or crank) for a flat box rate of $38.95 USD.

So if you are interested in just the mill without handle or hopper, then this could be a much cheaper option.

Some of us in CHCH were organising a bulk order for them early this year, and making the hopper and powering with a drill or similar.

[Rusty Chch]

That's a sharp delivery price, what's the unit price? (actually flag that, I'll JFGI)

[James P]

Here let me google that for you....

One caveat, the weight restriction is 20lbs.

[MrC]

I purchased a Barley Crusher Malt Mill just prior to xmas. It worked great the one time that I've used it. From memory it cost me $320 delivered. I shopped around at the time and ended up getting it through Grain & Grape.

The hopper required assembly so I needed to buy a riveting tool to assemble the hopper ($13 for a cheapie from M10). I also had to buy a 'nice' peice of timber to mount the mill on (another $13). Had to cut the timber, drill some holes for the mounting screws and cut a hole with the jigsaw to allow the grain to fall through.

No regrets at this stage.

[Ian]

Did you rig your base to fit over a plastic bucket to collect the milled grain? Seems like the way to go - I've yet to do that but am about to.

[MrC]

I made it fit directly over my mash tun so that I can crush the night before, put the lid on the chilli-bin and mash in the morning.