- 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.