Dual Path Recirculation Upgrade KIT for Spike SOLO (TC) System

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Our Price: $79.99

Product Code: SPIKESOLODUALTC

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Description

Any single vessel system with a sizable deadspace below or to the sides of the bag or basket will greatly benefit from constant stirring of that area during the mash for a few reasons (a more robust explanation can be found at this link):

Specifically in electric heated systems, the heat source is a relatively small area that heats up quickly while the temperature probe is sufficiently far away that it never quite senses the average temp of the entire dead space if it is allowed to sit still.
These systems typically have a whirlpool port for stirring (whirlpooling) the wort post boil, but can easily be leveraged for stirring to keep the temperature homogeneous in the entire dead space.
The recirculation flow over the top of the mash must be carefully throttled to avoid over-pumping faster than the mash/basket/bag can flow. If not, you can fully expose the element to air and cause a scorching dry fire. That flow rate is approximately 1.5 liters per minute but it is quite difficult to accurately set a valve to deliver that slow flow with a typical powerful brewing pump.

Our solution to all these situations is to split the output of the pump to deliver the flow to both the whirlpool port as well as the upper recirculation port. Both of those flows can be fully open, fully closed or any mix you wish. Our recommendation during the mash is to open the whirlpool valve fully and then throttle the recirculation valve to deliver about 1.5 liters per minute to the recirculation. Allowing a majority of the pump's flow to bypass to the whirlpool makes it very easy to fine tune the recirculation flow as the pressure is greatly diminished.

This specific kit is designed for systems that use 1.5" TC ports and accessories (e.g. Spike Solo TC) that ship with a TC ball valve on the pump output (which will be reused). The kit can be installed on the whirlpool port butterfly valve or the pump output as shown in the pictures below. Generally the smaller kettle sizes benefit from mounting to the pump output because it adds quite a bit of bulk to the valve system on the pot but it is completely up to your preference.

The kit includes:
(1) TC TEE with 1.5" TC flanges on all ports and a reduced 3/4" piping section to reduce liquid volumes trapped in the system.
(1) TC x Male Quick Disconnect
(2) TC clamps
(2 TC silicone gaskets
(1) 3ft length of silicone tubing
(2) Female QD x 5/8 barb fittings (crimp clamped into the tubing above)

This kit is everything you need to make this conversion happen. The list of parts and retail cost is shown below.

To be very clear, the TEE included with the kit goes in between the pump output and your existing ball valve. The tubing that leaves the existing valve continues to connect to the basket port. The newly created output on the TEE gets a TC x MQD adapter and you will use the included new hose to connect to your whirlpool QD port. The open/close of the whirlpool valve controls whether the kettle is being stirred or not.

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