Homebrew Beer Blog

Here's my gas manifold. Other than it looking like a weird club, it works great. If I ever feel motivated and looking for a project, I may add a gas line from the propane regulator to the manifold, and fix the manifold to the brew cart. It would be a little more elegant, but this works just fine.

Admittedly, this is a little weird since I'm going back and forth from 1/2 and 1/4. If it's not obvious, I kind of felt my way through this. Hopefully this will benefit someone with a little more foresight. ;) If I had to do it again, I might try to go all 1/4 and then just use a 30 psi regulator to compensate, if it even really matters. Anyway, it works, so here's the part list:

- 20 psi propane regulator w/ Type 1 connector/valve
- 1/4" NPT black pipe nipple (Mcmaster-Carr #7727K132)
- 1/2" X 1/2" X 1/4" NPT female pipe, reducing tee (Mcmaster-Carr #44605K512)
- 1/2" NPT black pipe nipple (Mcmaster-Carr #7727K192)
- 1/2" X 1/4" Pipe Size, Hex Bushing (Mcmaster-Carr 4513K344)
- 1/4" NPT Knurled Needle Valve
- 6 Foot Propane Hose (to the pilot)
- 1/2" NPT black pipe nipple (Mcmaster-Carr #7727K192)
- 1/2" ASCO Solenoid Valve (8210G002)
- 1/2" NPT black pipe nipple (Mcmaster-Carr #7727K19
- 1/2" NPT female Gas valve (Mcmaster-Carr #48915K61)
- 1/2" X 1/4" Pipe Size, Hex Bushing (Mcmaster-Carr 4513K344)
- 6 Foot Propane Hose (to the burner

And lots of gas leak tape!

So, how this works is the T fitting feeds both the main burner and pilot at equal pressure. A needed valve is key to control the pilot flame to a fine degree. So, one end of the T goes to 1/4 needle valve for the pilot light, and the other goes to the solenoid for the main burner. I open both the tank and propane regular wide open, then set the needle valve to where I want it. This makes it easy for the next brew session since I can just kill the tank valve and everything is stored preset.

The gas valve on the end is optional, but I find it pretty useful. Since the whole works is fired from a temperature probe on my wort flow, if the flow stops, the temp will drop causing the burner to fire. I might not want it to fire, so I can just close that valve and disable the heat. It's also a nice safety feature if you need to work on the pilot or temperature controllers if something goes haywire.

And the disclaimer... I'm just a dude on the Interweb, so if you don't know what you're doing, find someone who does. I so far have managed to not kill or seriously injure myself with this information, but that doesn't guarantee you will find similar mileage.