I'm looking to switch from propane to natural gas, I have done a little research but wanted to get opinions from other members who have a 10 point jet burner or who have used one before. Is a 10 jet burner large enough to do 10'gallon batches? Also I will be running the gas line from my hot water heater, that being said can I run two lines from the gas line for two different burners to run at the same time? What type of hoses should I use to run the line? Do you guys have a favorite regulator to control the flame? Thanks in advance.
Do not necessarily need a regulator for natural gas, your whole house one at the meter should work if your line is large enough and short enough. I have a 3/4" 15' flexline I bought so I can move my stand around a bit. http://www.cpapc.com/23-Tip-Round-Nozzle-Jet-Burner-natural-gas-P469C0.aspx http://www.ebay.com/itm/12-Natural-...322?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item20d4327a1a You might want to go 3/4" from your meter if you are running multiple burners for 10 gal batches. The safety QD is a real necessity
A tee fitting will work. http://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt...+image&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&fr=yfp-t-900
So I run two lines from the t fitting, I'm guessing there is another fitting along the way of each line with a ball valve so I can open and close the gas?
A ball valve for each burner will work. You can hard pipe it ( regular black iron pipe ) from the tee fitting both ways, then get 2 couplings to which you will attach pipe to flare fittings. From there you can get two flex gas lines to your burners. Each burner will need a pipe to flare fitting also.
Thanks Ventura. So is a 10 tip jet burner enough to boil 10 plus gallons or should I get a larger one?
I've never used natural gas to brew beer. I just work in the HVACR business. But I would recommend a larger than 10 tip burner. I would go with something like this for extra horsepower. http://www.amazon.com/Tip-Round-Nozzle-Burner-natural/dp/B00ADPCSMA
My 23-tip burner is waaaaaaay overkill for 10 gallon batches. I use the QD that I installed on the back of my house for the gas grill. This line tees off the 3/4" line at the furnace/water heater through about 40 feet of 1/2" straight pipe with one elbow. I use 10 feet of 1/2" ID air hose from the QD to the burner. While I can't say whether or not the 10-tip burner is adequate for 10 gallon batches, this 23-tip burner is a monster, so I suspect 10 may be adequate. I'm considering reducing the number of tips to give me a little more control (very difficult to control boilovers without shutting it off altogether). I control the flame with a 1/2" ball valve. You'll need one for each burner. Assuming the jets on the 10-tip burner are the same as those on my 23-tip, you shouldn't have a problem running two at a time. You don't need a separate regulator. Just for kicks, here's a very non-scientific demo of the 23-tip burner:
This is a 23 tip in action for what it's worth, a 32 tip natural gas burner puts out 160000 btu's . When I brew, my biggest batch is 18 gallons. I use 2, 170,000 btu burners to get that batch up to boil. It takes about 25 min. to do that.
Just to chime in I have a 32 tip burner from a restaurant supply place for about $50. It is insane. Boils off about 2 gallons per hour when on full bore in my system. That said I would point. Out two things: 1 - Do not boil indoors without proper ventilation (worried b/c you mentioned coming off your water heater) 2 - You may not get enough gas to either burner depending on diameters of tubing incoming. I had an NG guy run numbers for me and we put in a whole new line (also for a stove & fireplace)
another forum I believe either morebeer or hbt, had helpful diagrams regarding on how & which nozzles to knock out to avoid redundancy that can kill the efficiency levels of those jet burners. I would do some searching around on that.
How far your burner is from your kettle is also critical. A lot of burners need to mix air by impinging on each other and the odd ones that appear to not impinge really do if the burner is not too close.
