There are mainly two kinds of beer brewhouse system, single brewhouse system and combined brewhouse system.
Single brewhouse system: mainly includes a rice cooking tun, a mashing tun, a lautering tank, a kettle tun, and a whirlpool tank. This system is so-called 'three tuns and two tanks'. This kind of system is generally used in major universities, breweries and major scientific research units.











Combined brewhouse system: using the time difference of the mashing process, the mashing tun and the kettle tun are combined and integrated, and the lautering tank and the whirlpool tank are superimposed together. Self-brewed and craft beer generally use whole malt without adding auxiliary materials, so it is considered from the perspective of saving floor area and investment funds. (Commonly designed and assembled in the form of one, two, and three vessels on the market)

Traditional brewhouse equipment (American style)
The traditional brewhouse device refers to the integration of mashing tun and lautering tank, combined with kettle tun and whirlpool tank.
Equipment features:
1) Only suction filtration can be used for wort filtration. Because the operation and control of the pump is not particularly easy, the effect will be different for the filtration of brewing different styles of beer. For example, when brewing wheat beer, almost half of the wheat malt is used, so the viscosity is relatively large and the filtration is slow. Once the pump speed is not well controlled, it will cause a vacuum state, and the spent grain layer will be overly compacted, filtering will be more difficult, and even the sieve plate will be deformed.
2) Because it will be carried out in the mashing tun during the whirlpool stage, and there is a built-in stirrer, the existence of the stirrer will influence the effect of the whirlpool.
3) The wort needs to be prepared in advance when washing the spent grains. Prepare other feasible containers to hold the spent grains water. It is best to have the effect of heat preservation. More manual works.
4) If you like this equipment, you can make a modification. Make the lautering tank higher than the mashing tank, to form a level difference, which can realize natural filtration. The wort pump adopts frequency conversion control to adjust the flow rate. The raker motor adopts a frequency conversion motor to adjust the rotation speed. Now many manufacturers directly remove the liquid level in order to save costs. This is not good. It is recommended to install the liquid level, and to add a drain board at the drain outlet of lautering tank.






Classical brewhouse equipment (German style)
Generally, mashing tun and kettle tun are integrated, and the lautering tank + the whirlpool tank is a whole. The whole tank are divided into upper and lower layers. The upper layer is a lautering tank, and the lower layer is a whirlpool tank. At present, craft beer equipment more uses this kind of style.
The advantages are relatively more:
1. Save the floor area, and it can also reach the area of traditional two-vessel brewhouse;
2. The whirlpool tank can be used as a collection and temporary storage tank for wort filtration, providing space and time for the mashing/kettle vessel to prepare the spent grains washing water.
3. When the wort is filtered, using gravity filtration will not have the phenomenon of compaction of the grains layer and deformation of the filter sieve, and it can also be filtered through a variable frequency pump.
4. Because there is a separate whirlpool tank, it adopts a vertical cylindrical design. Therefore, after the wort is boiled, it passes through the pump and enters the whirlpool tank in a tangential direction, which can effectively sink the whirling coagulum and hop residues.
The disadvantages are:
1. The equipment has requirements on the height of the site.
2. The cleaning of equipment is a bit tiring.






Three-vessel brewhouse system:
Common combinations:
Mashing / lautering tank + kettle tank + whirlpool tank
Mashing tank + lautering tank + kettle / whirlpool tank
Mashing / kettle tank + lautering tank + whirlpool tank
Its main advantages are:
1. The daily brewing batch is similar to the combined three-vessel equipment.
2. The height of the equipment is relatively short.
3. A variety of combinations can be selected, and it can be transformed into four-vessel brewhouse system
The main disadvantages are:
1. Only suction filtration can be used for filtration. (If natural filtering is used, a high level difference must be formed)
2. The equipment covers a large area and requires more investment.





Four-vessel brewhouse system: Composed of mashing tank, lautering tank, kettle tank, and whirlpool tank. Such equipment is commonly found in small or medium-sized breweries. In addition to these, a hot water tank is also equipped, which can greatly improve production efficiency.
Its main advantages are:
This configuration significantly reduces the production time and improves production efficiency. The maximum number of brewing batches per day can be 5 batches.
The main disadvantages are:
1. The equipment has a relatively large volume and area, and typically on-site construction is required.
2. Large equipment investment

When selecting equipment, in addition to considering the above-mentioned combination form, we should also pay attention to the following points
1. The material must be good food grade stainless steel. The minimum is 304.
2. Consider energy consumption (thickness of the insulation layer of the brewhouse system, the heating system uses steam heating or heating tube heating.)
3. If the structure design of the brewhouse system is unreasonable, the pipeline design is unreasonable, or the beer brewing process is not well matched, the efficiency will be relatively low.
4. If you use pipe fittings, valves and various accessories with low quality and low price on the market, they will rust or be damaged in a short time.

Some optional accessories and systems commonly used in brewhouse systems can be requested according to your own situation
1. Heating method (steam heating, electric heating tube heating, direct fire heating)
2. The grain washing ring pipe / the exit door / the glass manhole on top / the material and water mixer / the raker lifting device / hop filter tank / steam condensing device / wort collection device / back wash device / automatic draining device / LED sight light, etc.