The V1.0 kettle was a 10 gallon aluminum pot with a 5500W element installed in it. 

After exploring options, the best option to save some money and to get a larger boil volume was to purchase a second pot and weld the sides to the first pot essentially making it twice the height. This decision was largely influenced by the original pot already ready to go with element, filter, sensor. Also I happen to do a little TIG welding at work and the equipment was available.

Here are some photos of the build so far. Its not yet polished or anodized, but it holds 20 gallons and the filter area is pressed down so there is minimal loss.

The weld below is still in its post welding state and has not yet been cleaned or polished.

The bottom two photos are of my new 50' 1/2" immersion chiller built with a dual helix design. No fittings were used in the kettle, just a thoughtful bending process. brass quick disconnects from Rona are soldered to the 1/2" tube on the outlet and a whirlpool return line is plumbed in the middle. More pics to come :)

Upgrading to a 10 gallon system with potentiall about 130lbs of HLT on the top shelf required replacing the IKEA shelf with a custom 2x4 creation. Ironically it was actually about half the value of an IKEA shelf since a 2x4x8 is only like 2 bucks :)

The brewery is still located in the same location as previous situated right next to the washer / dryer, but the control panel is now much more accessible and it has a much cleaner look.

Here's my brewpi.......... or beerpi 

or just raspberry pi brewing controller :)

Relocation of Micro-controller, manual switches, relay boards, power supplies, SSR's, heatsinks and all other electrical components into a water tight control box. This will allow me to better organize the "rats nest" of wires currently existing in my V1.0 control box. In addition I currently have to setup a fan to blow on my SSR heatsinks keeping them cool during the brew process. This upgrade will have a built in fan to keep the SSR's automatically cool.

Wiring......... lots of work. Easier to procrastinate by brewing beer on the old system than it is to layout a map of a controller. 

Turns out wiring a controller with 18, 5 pin connectors, 12, 4 pin connectors and 12, 3 pin connectors plus all the internal wiring between components, relays, switches and screens is a lot of work. Here's a photo of the current state of the beast. 

The lower part is a bit of a mess, will be cleaned up before the final bit is finished.

Old LCD on the right............. new 10" touchscreen Raspberry Pi on the left :)

more to come 

This is the layout of the inside of the control box that I've decided upon. After some consultation with an electrical engineer at work and modifying the separation distances between high power, low power and sensors, this was finalized.

Click on the image for a larger view.

Hopefully I will have a comparison photo of the actual assembly early in the new year :)

Ordered and Shipped :)

Was relatively expensive at $180 shipped, especially compared to the cost of the Pi. But it will provide a good looking interface that will hopefully be used for years and many projects

Going to install this screen into the front panel of the new control box

Will hopefully recieve in January 2013 so come back for updates :)
http://www.chalk-elec.com/?page_id=1280#!/~/product/category=3094861&id=14647624

Nov 2012 - Connectors installed into control Box

May seem like a simple achievement, but going from control box, wires and mini-XLR connectors to having connector cords, and matching ends installed into the box is quite a lot of work. Each connector has between 3 to 5 connections pending whether its a temperature sensor, pressure sensor, AC or DC motor etc..... These 3 to 5 connections has to be soldered on both sides of the connector  then individually and communally heatshrinked.  The holes being drilled in the box at this controlled spacing required a CAD printout and were punched prior to drilling. A step drill was used to make the holes and then the time consuming process of deburring the holes needed to be done. All in all, 39 holes were drilled and cle

Currently in the Brewbot V1.0 system, my mash recirculation pump (which is also my mash tun fill pump) runs at a full 12V all the time. In order to vary the output of the pump, I have two valves installed in parallel, one a ball valve which is usually 1/2 closed and the second a motorized ball valve which acts as a bypass to run fully open. This essentially means I can run the recirculation / mash tun fill system at two speeds. When the bypass valve is open the system is run at full speed, useful for when filling the mash tun at mash in, and when the bypass valve is closed the pump moves liquid slower, useful for recirculating the mash. 

With a motor controller which varies the supply voltage, I can eliminate both valves from my system. This will allow me to run the motor at any speed I wish. At times I have had problems with stuck mashes as my recirculation pump sucks too hard on the bottom of the mash tun. This controller will help me avoid this problem.

The Arduino will use two of its pwm outputs to communicate with this controller, telling it to vary its ouput voltage from 0V to the supply voltage of this controller.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140741651941&ssPageName=ADME:L:OC:CA:3160

Nov 2012 - Relocation of 240V elements, SSR's and GFIC to Control Box
Using some clever CAD locating, I was able to move both high power SSR's, the 40A ground fault interrupting switch, all three locking connectors and the cooling fan into the lower third of this control box. I plan on creating a partition just above these components, essentially making a cooling tunnel moving air from one side of the box to the other. This will ensure none of these devices will overheat :)

In this case, my old hop filter was a crazy and quite time consuming build with the theory that the bigger the surface area, the better the filter will perform. Since I run a counter-flow chiller right back into my kettle, I designed the first filter to catch all the cold break and hop mass without clogging. Well it turns out that the filter was larger than required as I never even came close to clogging the beast. This might be because I run a H.E.R.M.S.(heat exchange recirculating mash system) system which makes my wort essentially clear when it leaves the mash tun, minimizing the break material during the boil.

Design Requirements:

1. So the first design requirement for this second filter was to be as convenient to disassemble as the first filter, but be lower in profile. My old filter would leave at least a liter or two of wort behind in the kettle because the filter was so tall (it was easier to suck air down into the filter than it was to pull the last inch or two of wort from the sides of the filter). 
2. So the second requirement was the filter had to be pretty low profile (as flat as possible) to minimize losses. 
3. Third; it had to be all stainless steel. Below is what I came up with. 
   

The frames are 1/4" high pressure SS tubing (lots in the scrap bins at work), the mesh was a #30 x 0.013" sizing and I pulled and sewed the edges as can be seen in the first photo below. The Inlet tube was a 1/2" SS tube which I threaded with a 1/2"-18 thread onto a SS plate on the inside to hold the tube into the filter. This SS plate is bent slightly to keep the bottom of the filter off of the inlet tube. I also bent some SS welding wire into some clamps to hold the filter together. The whole filter assembly is 1/2" tall when it is laying flat on the kettle bottom and cost $12.58 for the SS mesh (all other parts and tube I had laying around in the scrap bin @ work :)