PicoBrew Model S

[barneey]

I'm always searching around for a new brewing project , recently in the brewing news I noticed that the PicoBrew people had gone into administration. Normally when this happens the receiver will try to find a buyer or sell off the stock to raise some money.

Well the stock is being sold off at I presume auction in the USA, so there are quite a few machines around for sale, most of which will be the 110v type but there are a few 220/240v units about.

Anyway I found a seller in the US for the UK version of the machine, also with very reasonable postage to the UK

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PICOBREW-PIC ... 4244112704?

He is accepting offers of circ $100.00 + shipping (£76.28 + Shipping / import duty £33.70 = Total Unit price £109.98 all in).

I ordered a unit at the tail end of July and it arrived last Saturday. - NOTE this is the machine ONLY no accessories.

Now for the interesting bit, Picobrew have released a manual firmware for the machine, this enables a BIAB to be brewed. There are also various PicoBrew forums about / facebook pages that have started up with various hacks coming out for the machine.

All I have done so far is unbox the machine, downloaded some server software to a Raspberry Pi / updated to the latest firmware. I hope to brew a BIAB later this week.

So, overall a bit of cheap fun really and it should make a good project to work with /on.

Short video of what is included in the box that arrived.

https://youtu.be/JD_boHbwoUo

[bryanferry]

You ridiculous tease Barneey. Just when I think I'm done buying equipment you pull me back in.

I'll certainly have a scout about to see if there are any of the Pico C Keg's knocking around or any of the other gear too if they'll be bargains like that.

[barneey]

There has been quite a few items for sale on Ebay for the Pico stuff over the last month or so.

The trouble is most if not all the stuff is in the US. Most of the actual "complete kit" machines have been 110v for the US market.

There have been a few keg only deals such as https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PicoBrew-Tra ... 2318733224?

The trouble with the keg only deals + any other sellers from the US is the postage costs & import duties are £££££ so its cost prohibitive to buy anything.

PicoPaks are a like rocking horse s**t, near enough sold out everywhere. The last one I saw on Ebay https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Picobrew-PIC ... 3059347248? would have cost circ £100 by the time it got shipped.

Then you end up with auctions like these a complete kit https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PicoBrew-PIC ... 3059406798? £700.00 ????!!!!

So for a basic machine only device, the seller using the Global Ebay Shipping program the 220/240v machine only deals are somewhat of a bargain as long as you make the seller an offer.

You will need some sort of a vessel to brew, this could be a keg or something with a ball lock connectors, some way of connecting the Discos together/ outlet + a BIAB grain / hop bags, to brew in Manual Mode.

At the moment the Picobrew servers are still up, so the machine can be used. Should they be switched off, you will need a Raspberry Pi with the 3rd party server software installed for the machine to connect to. It is hoped that the server software will implement recipe storage / the ability to automate the machine in the future. Several people are also working on making a reusable PicoPak container.

So a nice little project to play around with, will it produce a beer / wort = yes. Will the beer / wort be as good as a 3V system = doubtful. The machines have always been expensive & IMHO not worth the price when you factor in they were tied to using the PicoPaks, things at the moment have changed more towards the tinkering brewers favour.

Final note, I have no association / financial link any of the sellers I have listed above, just the ability to search Ebay

[barneey]

Oh forgot to add, not all Pico Kegs are the same, some have the complete removable lid, others are more like a traditional corny keg.

For my experiments I bought a 9l corny keg from the MM https://www.themaltmiller.co.uk/?s=keg& ... pe=product other sellers are available.

[f00b4r]

I've been chatting with Barneey and a couple of others offline about this since he ordered one (okay I might have one but it is still in transit...).
A couple of things to add to what has been said by Barneey:

- You will want to ignore the official Picobrew instructions on how to brew as they essentially wont make good beer (e.g. it tells you to dry hop way to early so that the hops will just sit on the krausen and the fermentation schedule is way too optimistic), there is some quite good information out there on real experiences of dialling the machine in though, so as the machines turn up and we actually get to play with them then it will be worth posting up the best practices.

- Currently if you do not have any Picopaks (essentially pre-packed grain/hops/adjuncts) then you can only brew in manually mode, which defeats a lot of the usefulness of the machine. However there are people working on a local server piece of software and a reusable Picopaks (the real ones are biodegradable and made of sugar cane husk pulp) to free the machine to enable users to brew their own recipes in an automated fashion.

- The local server hack (this can be run on a RPi by copying a preconfigure image to a SD card or for those with a little more technical knowledge Windows/MacOS/Linux) basically performs a man in the middle attack (via DNS redirection) and pretends to by the official Picobrew server. It looks to actually provide more functionality than the official one as it will also enable you to brew any recipe automatically once an alternative empty Pikopak is available (caveat emptor but this looks to be a matter of weeks away).

- There is also someone who has created a PCB to connect the connectors from the Z series to a RPi to completely replace the entire controller, along with software that replaces the original functionality but completely offline. This doesn't apply to the Pico S but hopefully it will not take much work to adapt it.

- The main issue with the machines is that the company IP (and some other parts) are in limbo at the moment,it may be that new parts are never made so spares will potentially be an issue. There is a group of people on the Facebook group that have been collating what parts can be purchased off the shelf and what is proprietary (and would therefore need working around)

- The seller that Barneey linked to are literally just the machines with nothing but the main container and hoses with corny disconnects on the ends. Barneey has mentioned this but maybe its worth repeating

I have a 6.5L keg (and some 9/10/11L kegs) so am hoping that it will make a perfect little pilot machine but i guess that we will find out soon.

[LeeH]

110v is no issue, just factor in 80 quid for decent transformer.

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[UKtony]

Ordered one of these as always wanted automation. Looks like the hop baskets can be 3D printed and used either directly or as a mould and there is a 3D grain basket STL but it needs a larger printer than I currently have. Reading around the efficiency is low (~50%) and only a 'near' boil but I guess there is always the option to do a stove top boil given the small batch size.

[geogaga]

First post on JBK. So please be gentle

As many of you I also got two Picos to play with the intention to brew in auto mode. For that I planned to manufacture both hop and grain carriers out of laser-cut polypropylene plates. While the Picos were in transit I was gaining more and more knowledge and the design evolved from dead-conceived laser-cut model to a vacuum-formed ones.

I spoke with a local manufacturer who has a vacuum-forming machine and he said he wouldn't be able to achieve the quality I need. So the question is if anyone has experience or access to vacuum forming manufacturing process and can help in identifying what can be done in order to achieve the needed? Possibly also produce the parts.

Thanks!

[UKtony]

Hi and welcome

To do automatic you will need a local server (something like https://github.com/chiefwigms/picobrew_pico) and obviously containers for grain and hops. My order is over the Atlantic right now so still in theory mode but

- 4L Rubbermaid containers have been used for grain mash. The above software defaults to an initial heat cycle via the PassThru channel then doughs in via the Mash channel. It's not clear if it's RIMS but I guess in order to hold the mash temperature it is. The OEM grain holder has a series of holes at the top which would imply this is the exit path back to the heater. There is also a 3D printable model available but it needs a large bed to print and nylon is quite hard to print
- Having looked at photos of the hop pack it seems that it uses a series flow starting from the right most (#1) which has an exit path to the very right. So my starting point is going to be 4 28mm copper tubes connected together to hold hop pellets. The alternative is to use the 3D printable one either directly or as a form for a latex one.

Vacuum forming would require a food safe plastic which could cope with 100oC so probably polycarbonate if BPA-free. Grain container should be fairly easy but the dividers in the hop back might be more difficult.

From what I've read the PicoPak production equipment was not part of the auction so I'd guess there might be a plan to resume production although for the UK this probably is a moot point.

Delivery due next week so will know more soon

[barneey]

Since I have had mine, I have completed 1 semi auto brew & approx 20 auto partial brew tests. Have a play around with grain containers, Wilko also sell quite a nice container that fits, could be a little higher though. Try a traditional mash, upward or downward & let us know what efficiency you get. Only trouble with using pipe is that they need to overflow into the next compartment, I would expect that you would loose a lot of liquid using a pipe just flowing back into the salad draw. The guy in the US is reporting at least another 3 weeks until the baskets for the grain / hops are being made, so in the meantime ,I'm having fun designing / making things myself.

[UKtony]

Using copper tube I was going to seal the bottoms and connect together somehow to allow flow through. Having received mine I now see the 4 hop bins are 40mm centers so 28mm pipe is too small and needs 42mm which is expensive both for pipe and end caps. Ordered some lolly stick molds from Amazon - BPA free silicone plastic advertised as good to 240oF so will see if these work.

Wilko's 4L plastic storage box seems a good fit and I have punched a row of small holes along the top of one side to replicate what I've seen of the Picopak grain box.

Next problem is 9L Cornies are as rare as RHS and expensive. Might try a quick test with a 19L one otherwise it's another £70 for a recon keg

[barneey]

Tony, regarding the Lolly moulds, I'll be interested to see how you get on with them.

There is quite an active FB Pico group with a few designs for DIY hop baskets. I have made one but found using the published template I was suffering with backflow in the compartments, ie if you were say just using Hop compartment One on a brew the force of the jet of liquid into that compartment was too great & Hop2 would also get wet. The design I followed used an 8mm step height between the compartments I have since altered mine to a 16mm step height to prevent backflow.

There are numerous ways to mash, I have completed a few experiments with grainbags to containers, to using wort aerators & approaching it from more of a BM upward mash.

Most of the experiments have resulted in mid 50's on the efficiency, so not that great, the best I have achieved so far was the BM method & a grainbag in a container, this was circ 65%. I'll be interested to see how you get on with the figures. The trouble will always be the lack of an actual sparge with a lot of the sugars being left behind.

For the machine itself I know there is the manual brew approach & you could dunk the grainbag into water to release more sugars, for me though I am only interested in the automatic approach.

Cheers

[UKtony]

Lolly molds received from Amazon. Now to work out how to link them.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07 ... UTF8&psc=1

[geogaga]

That's a great idea. Some food-grade pipe between the adjacent molds threaded from both sides and counter-nuts?

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[f00b4r]

110v is no issue, just factor in 80 quid for decent transformer.

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They are EU voltage machines that everyone has been picking up so far NOT 110v, just in case anyone gets confused by Lee’s post and thinks a transformer is needed.