- It is no secret that the RoboBrew
has been very popular
here in the United States.
It's also not a secret
that the early versions
of the version two had some issues.
The version three just
recently hit the United States.
In this video we're gonna take a look
at what improvements they've made,
how it's affected it, coming up next.
How's it going? My name's Brian.
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Full disclosure on this,
I do want to let you know
that I did not purchase this.
The folks at KegLand were gracious enough
to actually send a unit
over to the United States
with a shipment to give
for me for a review.
I also want to thank MoreBeer
for actually shipping the unit
to me when they received it.
So full disclosure, I
wanted to let you guys know
that I did not purchase it.
For those of you that
are not 100% familiar
with the RoboBrew, I'll go
through real quickly what it is.
It is a single vessel brewing system,
much like Brew in a Bag, and
it has a nine gallon capacity.
It has a malt pipe that goes
down inside of the vessel,
and that holds your grains.
There's a false bottom
that is part of that.
In the US here, there is
two different elements
for a total of 1500 watts.
There's a 1000 watt element,
and then there's a 500 watt element.
There's also a pump
built into the base of it
and that has a recirculation tube
that comes back up over the top
and allows you to recirculate
while you're mashing.
That is the basic gist of the RoboBrew.
First I wanted to talk about packaging,
as far as an improvement
goes with the RoboBrew.
The previous version came with
very little packaging at all.
It rattled around in there.
I saw a lot of photos online of people
getting dented units, damaged units.
Some of 'em were so badly damaged
that they even had to go back.
Now the newest version, the
version two the second shipment
to the United States is shipped
the same way as the V3 is,
and they send it with some styrofoam
that's actually wrapped around the unit
and then there's also two
different pieces of styrofoam
that are on the top, and
one that's on the bottom.
I am pleased to say that
when I got this version
of the RoboBrew it had no damage at all.
Okay, the second part of the upgrades
that I find with this unit
is that the mash screen
at the bottom is actually
a two part unit now.
It has a fine screen as
well as the coarse screen
that was in the bottom previously.
What that is gonna do
according to the manufacturer,
and I believe it to be true as well,
is it's gonna keep the bottom screen
from getting clogged as
much by un-crushed grain.
The size of the holes in
the bottom were small enough
or large enough that the
grain could get stuck in there
and cause some issues with
your mash recirculation.
I saw a lot of people that
had stuck sparges and whatnot.
This new screen on the bottom
looks to improve that drastically.
There is a little bit of assembly
whenever you get the unit out of the box.
You do have to put the
spigot on the front of it,
and you also have to put the handles
on the actual lid itself, other than that
there's not a lot of
assembly required at all.
The only other thing you need to do
is put the silicone o-ring
around the top of the mash screen
and some people are not even using that
because ever since the first unit,
the two successions after
that, the second V2 shipment
into the United States as well as the V3,
the silicone ring is just
a little bit too thick
and does not fit down in the malt pipe.
It's the same issue with
the V3, I tested it already.
It doesn't fit quite snugly down in there,
but you know Key says that
you don't even need it.
I tend to agree with that.
I mean it's just made for keeping
the grain from channeling,
into being channeled all
the way down to the bottom,
and probably wouldn't have
an issue with that either,
but I would recommend you don't
really even have to use it.
The other improvement to
it is the dog bone piece,
or whatever you wanna call it.
That's what I called
it in the first video,
and that is the lifting arm.
They put a little ridge in
that so that you can hook it up
to a winch and be able to
pull it up out of there.
Pull it up out of the unit itself
and not have the rope slide around
and have the thing tilt around.
So that's a nice improvement.
I know the question on everyone's mind is,
what about the gallon
markings on the inside?
Well, I'm pleased to tell you
that I measured the water by weight.
I filled it all the
way up to eight gallons
and the markings are accurate.
So kudos to them for getting
that straightened out.
That was one of the big issues
that I had with the first unit that I got
and subsequently I did a
slight glass modification
on the one that I had, and
I'll leave the card up here
so you can see that.
This unit would be able to be modified
in the same fashion as
that without any problem.
The other improvement that they made
that was also a modification
that I did to the first unit
is they put a camlock on the sparge arm,
which makes it so much easier
and so much more reliable.
I'd had a tendency of
tightening it down too much
and crushing the little
silicone o-ring in there,
so kudos to them for
listening to the community,
and really stepping it
up and including that
automatically out of the gate with this.
So that's a wonderful feature as well.
The other thing that they
improved on was the malt pipe,
and this is true for the
second shipment of the V2s
to the United States as well as the V3,
they thickened up the malt pipe.
It was a lot thinner on the first shipment
that came to the United States,
and I'll show you a
little bit of video there
of the differences between the two,
but this is a much more solid unit now.
It's not as sharp.
The first one was a little bit sharp
and some people had reported
getting cut with it,
so that's a great improvement as well.
One of the other things that they included
with the new design
is a ring for the bottom screen.
Now I really never, I didn't find a need
for anything of that sort on
the first version that I had.
I just you know tip, just
push on one side of the screen
after it's drained and it flips right up.
The only issue with this if you do use it,
I have noticed that it will touch
the bottom of the malt pipe screen
and you might have to squish
this down a little bit.
It's one of those things where
I don't know if I would even use it,
but it is there if somebody
should want to use it.
The other thing that they did improve on
is the way that the top
collar sits on the top
of the drainpipe for the malt pipe.
The first shipment had a really hard time
with this actually going on.
The machining was a little bit tight
and I had a really hard time
with the first one, getting that on.
The new one I'm pleased to
report is very easy to get on.
It comes right on, you know
comes off and goes right on.
They did redesign the bottom
of the second pipe that goes in there.
There was a little bit
of a different design
on the first shipment
of the V2s that came.
They included a new design
on the V3 with that.
One of the other nice
additions that they included
with the upgrade is they
included a piece of hose
that will attach to the sparge arm
so that you don't have
to purchase one of those.
The previous or first shipment
came without any hose in it,
and so people were having to buy some hose
in order to get the mash
water or the recirculation
to go down into the malt pipe.
So it's nice that they included
a little piece of silicone
hose for you on that.
And then probably one of
the biggest improvements
that they've made is the controller.
Now the new controller has some
of the same characteristics
as the old controller did,
but there's a few key features
that are new on the V3
that I think are really important.
One of those is the ability
to calibrate the sensor.
Now a lot of people reported an issue
of having a different temperature
from the bottom to the top of the mash.
I have not had too many issues with that.
It was usually a degree or two off,
and I think some of that has
to do with how the grain crush
as well as how you operate the device.
The other thing that it does have
is it also has the pre-start timer,
so you can start it ahead
of time before your brew day
so that you can actually
have your water ready
before you start brewing.
And then it also has
the step mash feature,
which can be used for there's six steps
and you can use it for step mashing.
You could use it for hop additions.
There's a lot of different
things you could do with it,
and I did watch the video
that KegLand put out
on how to program it and
I'll be going over that,
my own version of that as well.
I'm gonna be brewing on this unit here
in the very near future and
I'll be doing a step mash,
and showing how all that
works and testing it
and see how quickly it ramps up
between the different temperatures,
and we'll be covering
that stuff coming up.
All in all, I think they
really did a great job.
The nice thing about it is
they really listened to
the community I think,
and did a lot of things
that we had asked 'em for.
I personally had a few
conversations with Key
and discussed some of the issues
that I was seeing on the
RoboBrew forums on Facebook.
RoboBrew Users Group USA and then also
the Australian or the European version.
They really addressed a
lot of those concerns.
One of the other things that
I did notice on this unit
over the first shipment
that came from the company
is the collar on the bottom
is a little bit taller now,
and it has a rolled ring around the bottom
which gives a little bit
more structural integrity.
The first one had not
quite as much of a lip
around the bottom, a
little bit more flimsy
and I think that this
additional height on the collar
provides a little bit more
room in there for some airflow
because a few people had
some issues with the pumps
and also with the controller
having some issues.
Hopefully that additional
height will help that issue.
It should give you hopefully
a little bit more longevity.
All in all, I think the version three,
they've done a really great job
with addressing those concerns,
and oh lastly, I didn't mention this
but it does come with a immersion chiller
and some people have talked about this
not being the greatest performance at all.
I do want to try and use it myself again.
I used it on the original version
and didn't have a lot of success.
I mean it took a while to chill down.
I do want to try one of their
methods that they recommend,
and that is running the
pump and running the water
through this chiller submerged
in a bucket of ice water.
So I'll try that out
and see how that works
and report back to you
guys on that as well.
That is my wrap up of the
initial thoughts on the V3.
I think that it came out really nice.
I think that the
improvements were much needed
and I look forward to
brewing on this thing
and letting you guys know what I think,
and what I find out about it.
I appreciate all the support.
If you like the video,
give us a thumbs up.
We appreciate that.
T-shirt is always for sale in our store.
I'll leave a link down below on that.
This unit is currently
out of stock at MoreBeer
the last time I checked
and you know hopefully
there'll be another shipment coming soon.
I haven't heard anything more about that,
so hopefully there'll be some more coming
'cause they're being
grabbed up really quickly.
Again, I appreciate it.
This has been Brian for
Short Circuited Brewers,
we will see you on the next video.
