The WilliamsWarn Nanobrewery http://www.williamswarn.com is the most elegant solution to home brewing out there.
The control system (which was done by a company related to me), had to be complex enough to cope with everything going on, simple enough to operate by anyone and flexible enough to allow the brewer to create. I'm obviously biased - but the nanobrewery is getting great reviews.
I'd be more inclined to mix the hobby of building the machine into the hobby of brewing the beer than I would be to spend $6,000 on something off the shelf. But I realize that's just me.
At first glance it also looks like it's very limited compared to a low-tech brewery.
For example, I've got four different styles of beer in the fridge right now, plus a batch of honey weizen and a batch of mead both in primary fermenters following a couple brew sessions this past weekend. Whereas with this all-in-one system it looks like you're stuck with one beer at a time. Can't start the second batch until you've finished drinking the first one.
NI had a section of demos like this at their technical conference this August. They were all hobby projects. Things that engineers just thought "were cool" and were stupidly easy to make with this hardware. There was a crane game, a 6-foot-tall aluminum slingshot controller for Angry Birds, and a compactRIO-powered guitar amp.
It's startling to think of how much money/time engineers save with prototyping and graphical system design software like this, and even though NI stuff powers telescopes and water filtration systems and loads of other important stuff, things like this come out and remind everyone that there's fun to be had.
I really like "The Electric Brewery". The plans are easily available and you can buy all the parts from them and build it yourself (or, if that's not your thing, you can buy the panel pre-built):
http://theelectricbrewery.com/
It's a good combination of automation-where-it-hurts and still-hands-on-where-it's-fun - some of the other ones seem too automated and take all the fun out of it (we're homebrewers, not looking to start the next Budweiser).
An interesting approach. I wonder how much regularity he gets out of his brews, given that everything's so tightly controlled.
Personally, I think part of the fun of homebrewing is coming up with your own unique take on a recipe. The mishaps that create something weird in your beer make for a good story.
Anyone brewing any kind of volume would want successful variances (mishaps or otherwise) to be replicable. Thus they would need to have a highly consistent baseline (or at least be able to see and measure the variances) in order to experiment with single variables.
Same here. Part of the joy for me is the insanity that comes on a brew day. At one point I was brewing about twice a month and seriously considered setting up my own automation system. Now I brew less frequently (maybe 4-6 times a year) and its become more enjoyable to just gave the semi-organized chaos on an early weekend morning. Plus I usually give most of my beer away and my friends enjoy the free, decen beer
I know I'll probably never be able to recreat most beers I make now, but who cares. There are so many styles, ingredients, and wacky concepts out there that I never brew the same thing twice. Plus, when I get that magical batch every so I often it usually wins me some new brew toys at the local competitions.
The one thing I would like to automate is fermentation temperature, but it's been difficult to convince the wife that I need another fridge next to the kegerator.
