Bourbon on a Budget with IoT - Pinetop Distillery | RIoT NC
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This document discusses how Pinetop Distillery, a small craft distillery, used internet of things (IoT) technology to automate and optimize their manufacturing process. It describes their production process and how they simplified each step. It then outlines their system architecture which connects physical devices like temperature sensors to cloud services for data storage and logical control. It provides examples of how they used IoT to precisely control heating and cooling, as well as develop a custom fractional distillation interface to determine cuts. The document demonstrates how small manufacturers can leverage custom IoT solutions to enable automation and process optimization on a budget.
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Bourbon on a Budget with IoT - Pinetop Distillery | RIoT NC
- 1. Bourbon on a Budget with IoT GRADY KNIGHT @smashingboxes
- 2. SMASHING BOXES // WHO WE ARE Smashing Boxes is a digital product agency who collaborates with partners to design and build custom software and digital solutions for web, mobile, and connected devices WE DON’T JUST BUILD GREAT PRODUCTS, WE HELP BUILD GREAT COMPANIES.
- 3. GRADY KNIGHT // After completing an engineering degree at Tufts University and some graduate work in Organic Chemistry at Indiana University, Grady began his career as management consultant with Celerant Consulting. In his years there, he consulted in sectors spanning retail, energy, manufacturing, supply chain and pharmaceuticals. He then served in various leadership and project management roles at Diosynth Biologics and Novo Nordisk. During his time at Novo Nordisk, he co-founded Pinetop Distillery. Following the successful launch of this business, Grady took the opportunity to pursue his passion and executed a career switch, joining Smashing Boxes where he is working as Software Engineer.
- 4. PURPOSE OF TALK ▸ Discuss how internet connected devices can be used in small scale manufacturing ▸ Demonstrate the utility of custom, one-off IoT development to enable manufacturing (versus building IoT connected devices for widespread consumption)
- 5. • Pinetop’s Story • System Architecture • Engineering Problem OVERVIEW
- 6. MANUFACTURING PROCESS WHAT DOES A TYPICAL COMMERCIAL OPERATION LOOK LIKE? Brew System Three Tanks Motor Heat Source Chilling PLC Fermenters Chilling PLC Primary Still Heating Chilling Temperature Monitoring Visual reading of ABV Secondary Still Heating Chilling Temperature Monitoring Visual reading of ABV Label / Fill Physical Control
- 7. WHY YOU SHOULDN’T OPEN A DISTILLERY ▸ Low profit margin at micro to medium scale ▸ High initial buildout costs with no chance of revenue for two years ▸ High cost of regulation ▸ Complex production process ▸ Competitors will sell pre-made NGS and depress the market ▸ Virtually non-existent labor pool of experienced (legal) distillers ▸ Endless supply of “experts” who can explain why you’re doing it wrong Source: Craft of Whiskey Distilling by American Distilling Institu
- 8. WHO WE ARE ▸ Partners’ contributions ▸ Ability to raise capital ▸ Connections to real estate market ▸ Willingness to handle regulatory aspects ▸ My Background ▸ Dual major in Biochemistry and Chemical Engineering ▸ Graduate work in Organic Chemistry ▸ 15+ years experience in pharmaceutical manufacturing ▸ Connections with stainless steel fabricators ▸ Ability to write enough automation to make this work WHY WE IGNORED ALL THIS
- 9. OVERVIEW • Pinetop’s Story • System Architecture • Engineering Problem
- 10. WHAT IS OUR APPROACH? ▸ Simplify production at all steps ▸ Test everything ▸ Build optimal process then automate ▸ Fabricate where possible ▸ Retrofit and Reuse ▸ Purchase as a last resort PINETOP DISTILLERY
- 11. MANUFACTURING PROCESS Brew System Three Tanks Motor Heat Source Chilling PLC Fermenters Chilling PLC Primary Still Heating Chilling Temperature Monitoring Visual reading of ABV Secondary Still Heating Chilling Temperature Monitoring Visual reading of ABV Label / Fill Physical Control WHAT DOES A TYPICAL COMMERCIAL OPERATION LOOK LIKE?
- 12. MANUFACTURING PROCESS Brew System Two Tanks Motor Heat Source Chilling Node Control System Fermenters Chilling PLC Primary Still Heating Chilling Temperature Monitoring and Control Node Control System Visual reading of ABV Secondary Still Heating Chilling Recipe Driven Process Node Control System Temperature Monitoring Visual reading of ABV Label / Fill Physical Control WHAT DOES PINETOP'S OPERATION LOOK LIKE?
- 13. CONNECTIVITY MODEL AWS RDS AWS EC2 Long-Term Data Transient Data Production Initiation Logical control of operation Production Data HOW ARE WE RUNNING OUR PROCESS?
- 14. HOW DOES MASHING WORK? ▸ Heat water to boiling ▸ Mix with 300lb ground corn for > 1hr ▸ Cool to 150-152°F ▸ Mix 112 lb barley/wheat/rye for > 1hr ▸ Cool to 80°F and drain
- 15. PHYSICAL CONNECTIONS Cool In Warm Out HOW ARE WE RUNNING OUR PROCESS?
- 16. EVALUATION OF THIS APPROACH BENEFITS ▸ Historic data resides off-site ▸ Catastrophic equipment failure costs ~$80 to replace ▸ Prototyping is very inexpensive ▸ Isolated systems allow for rapid changes DISADVANTAGES ▸ Logical control of production resides on RaspPi…allows for bad behavior ▸ Currently running a less than optimal security scheme for run initiation* ▸ Locked in to Phidget ecosystem Note: This was by design to speed development but is not my recommendation
- 17. OVERVIEW • Pinetop’s Story • System Architecture • Engineering Problem
- 19. WHAT IS THE BEST SCHEME FOR SECONDARY DISTILLATION? THE HEART OF THE DISTILLERY Source; StillDragon Community Forum
- 20. Custom fabricated forced reflux still Reflux rate is proportional to the total amount of ethanol in the system. Source; StillDragon Community Forum
- 21. MINIMIZE EQUIPMENT COSTS ▸ By running a duty cycle on a solenoid valve, costs were reduced by >10x with greater precision and accuracy $ CALL $150 ▸ Quoted prices for hazard rated proportional valves were higher than the cost to source and fabricate the still
- 22. HOW TO MAKE CUTS CUSTOM FRACTIONATION TABLE ▸ Problem: We needed a repeatable way to determine where to make the cuts for the fractional still Source; StillDragon Community Forum
- 23. WHAT DOES THE INTERFACE LOOK LIKE?
- 24. FOR MORE EXAMPLES OF SB AND IOT, CHECK OUT THESE CASE STUDIES HTTPS://SMASHINGBOXES.COM/WORK/