Farra Engineering nano brewery

[Hugh Grierson]

At the Beervana I took the time to check the very sexy looking Farra Engineering Nano Brewery, think it was 60 L batch size. Has anyone got one of these or even used one? I really want them to build me a shinny mash tun, with sprinklers...

[Reviled]

"Still, the main point is that every home brewer needs to be making full grain mash beers. So the more breweries there are to do it with the better."

Amen to that bro!!

[martin w]

am i the only one that isn't in love with the farra brewery? its looks good and is nice and shiny for sure but i remember the mash tun height being about 1600mm which is pretty high, just below chin height on me,therefore i need a step to see my thermometer as there is none installed, there is no pump so i must manually vorlauf,which i hate-i flick on my pump 15 minutes before the end of the mash and i have crystal clear wort.
i'll stick with my $700 2 tier with pump for now,may not look as flash but it works!
i'm not sold on alans 2 vessel either, it looks good for sure but it seems you still need a 3rd vessel to catch the first runnings anyway and i want to get the boil going as soon as possible-that is if i'm not misunderstanding his explanation?

[denimglen]

am i the only one that isn't in love with the farra brewery?...

I haven't seen it in person and only had a quick look at the pdf but it doesn't really do anything for me.

Agree with you on the pump/recirc issue. For the prices of pumps in relation to the whole rig I don't really see the appeal in a three tier system unless you're really tight on space. I also really don't like the idea of 70deg+ water above my head.

...you still need a 3rd vessel to catch the first runnings anyway...

Yup, during the sparge all three of my vessels have something in them, and again the price of one extra pot in relation to the whole thing isn't a massive difference.

Don't get me wrong, nothing against these guys and I don't wanna be pissing on the parade here. Good on you guys for building these and supplying them as there will always be people who don't have the time or skills to do it themselves. But for me I got a shitload of enjoyment out of building my rig and it was built exactly how I wanted it.

[Alan Knight]

Exactly. I have constructed all the breweries I've ever owned myself. But when the massive 100 lt 'Beast' was built, I had quite a few friends get over-excited by it and wanted something similar for their very own. So that's why I got into this. Not everyone has the time and inclination to build their own brewery.

[Stu McKinlay]

I could be wrong but I thought there was a thermometer built into both the HLT and the mash tun.
I thought the Farra one looked really good, fantastic workmanship and very good attention to detail (the wheels were a damn good idea). BUT it could do with a few improvements... I would -
- have a sparge arm in the mash/lauter, buggered if I'd spend $3-4k on a homebrewery and then stand there holding a hose as I sparged.
- be interested to see how good the stainless counterflow chiller is. I thought they'd have used copper in there (I guess stainless is their thing though)
- add a pump for recirculation (I know they were trying to make it a gravity based system but really, don't you want to make it as automated as possible?

[Doublehoppy]

"I could be wrong but I thought there was a thermometer built into both the HLT and the mash tun"

I checked with Farra last week - yes there is.

[Matt]

Would also much rather have a pump but pretty simple to add one, and nice to have gravity as a backup when impromptu situations arise and pump is needed elsewhere...

[Hugh Grierson]

The mash tun is the thing that I am most interested in, definitely needs a sparge arm spinkler and a pump though. Vince and I already have a really nice HLT (called fat boy). What we are thinking is get a flash 150 L mash tun made by Farra, and run three 50 L keggles per batch. That way we can shave some brewing time down, get really efficent conversion going and crate some different beers from each mash. Anyway I am asking for a quote on this so will keep you all posted.

[Rugbymonk]

Hi there, just reading this old thread with interest. Just wondering if you did ever get the mash tun from farra? How did it perform and was it costly? Thinking of upgrading myself and keen for advice. Cheers keith

[Hugh Grierson]

Nah mate, I ended up building a Lauter Tun out of an old agitator washing machine bowl (which is excellent) and being gifted a 110L stainless kettle. But, no one seems to have anything bad to say about farra, the gear seems to work pretty well for Emersons.

[Reviled]

Yeah im gonna play devils advocate and say that I quite like the idea of gravity feeding, pumps are cool n all, but the idea of gravity feeding seems quite simple to me... And as Brew Sci says adding a pump wouldnt be difficult..

[martin w]

i have no problem with gravity,its just a bitch having to do the vorlauf by hand especially when youv'e spent 3.5k.

i didn't see the thermometers on the pots-i was just going off the pics on trademe and didn't see them,

i'm not knocking it but i definitely think there are a few alterations i would want if were going to build/buy something similar, i do like the small footprint of a 3 tier though!