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nicksteck · 12-06-2007, 02:12 AM

hey looking at the midwest all grain cooler kit, watched the video an it looks cool, is this a good kit to buy, with my company i dont have a lot of time to built my own, would it work?

thanks again for all the info you give me

Nick

abracadabra · 12-06-2007, 12:11 PM

My personnal opinion is that sparge arms are a waste of money. When a heavy duty piece of aluminum foil with holes pierced in it will do the same thing for a coupe of pennys.

McCall St. Brewer · 12-08-2007, 02:07 AM

I bought the deluxe all-grain system from Norther Brewer:

http://www.northernbrewer.com/allgrain.html

I have been very impressed by it. The false bottom works perfectly. The Rubbermaid coolers keep the temps steady throughout the process.

The only thing I would do different if I were ordering it again would be to get the 10 gallon system. The 5 gallon system is not big enough for "big" beers.

I am apparently in the minority here as one who is not really very interested in building my own equipment. For those who enjoy doing that, I have nothing but respect. I was very happy, though, to get my kit in the mail and to be able to assemble it and have it work flawlessy right from the start.

RICLARK · 12-08-2007, 02:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by McCall St. Brewer

I bought the deluxe all-grain system from Norther Brewer:

http://www.northernbrewer.com/allgrain.html

I have been very impressed by it. The false bottom works perfectly. The Rubbermaid coolers keep the temps steady throughout the process.

The only thing I would do different if I were ordering it again would be to get the 10 gallon system. The 5 gallon system is not big enough for "big" beers.

I am apparently in the minority here as one who is not really very interested in building my own equipment. For those who enjoy doing that, I have nothing but respect. I was very happy, though, to get my kit in the mail and to be able to assemble it and have it work flawlessy right from the start.

I prefer the Northern Brewer kits as well I have made 4 of them.

nicksteck · 12-08-2007, 08:45 PM

I eneded up buying the midwest 10 gallon cooler kit with the sparge arm, i live about 30 mins away from midwest and picked it up the other day. going to try it out for the first time next weekend. trying a 5 gallon batch in it. any suggestions for a first time user would be great.

Nick

finchlake · 12-08-2007, 09:07 PM

I read that about the heavy duty piece of aluminum foil instead of a sparge arm. I tried that last time and it worked well. I made the holes too small and it pluged up before I was finished, but I can fix that will bigger holes next time.

SuperiorBrew · 12-08-2007, 09:49 PM

I am going to try this one tomorrow. I had a simple copper ring but just had to try one of these.

**budbo** · 12-08-2007, 10:29 PM

I have a Phil Sparger, Aluminum foil works fine, but if you have the bucks the sparge arms are way better

nicksteck · 12-09-2007, 01:26 AM

just did a test run with the sparge arm 1st do you lower the arm over the grain as low as you can, and mid west put this together and both valves are leaking, were is the seal made there is no teflon tape on the ball valves. i turned the valve down until it woundn't turn is that the idea?

Nick