5 gal. boils

I currently use a 4 gal pot for my boils, and Im thinking about upgrading. (Boilovers suck!). I know lots of kits and other recipes don't call for 5 gal. boils. I was thinking about buying a 7.5 gal kettle.

Anyways, my main question, is this....Will the recipes need to be adjusted when boiling a full boil for extact brews, compared to a partial boil. Mostly thinking of the hops and such.

The answer is "YES", but you'll need to get more accurate feedback from the experts.

If you need a deal on a bigger kettle, check out http://pivo.northernbrewer.com/nbstore/action/search-do?searchTerm=40080

These look like a great deal!

Yes, you will just use less hops. Thats the only difference. You can get a program like BeerSmith to adjust the levels. Just change the boil volume, then adjust the hop quanity to get the same IBU's.

And for pots, bigger is always better. I'm doing full boils in a 9gal pot. A 10gal wouldn't be overkill either. I end up going with about 6.25gallons to start, and after steeping grains and the boil, I'm pretty much ending up with 5gal in the carboy.

Do you use the beersmith program....and if you do how do you like it. I was just looking at their website and it looks like it could be pretty handy.

Wally world has stainless steel 30qt pots for 37$. I just bought one last week. That is by far the best price i have seen and its a great quality also. Just go back to where they keep all the grills and turkey fryers. Its actually a turkey fryer accesories kit. Comes with a basket pot and i think a thermometer.

Tophe96 said:

Do you use the beersmith program....and if you do how do you like it. I was just looking at their website and it looks like it could be pretty handy.

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Yeap, Promash adjusts for different size boils too. It's pretty easy. I do 3gl boils for 5gl batches.

Easily one of my favorite tools. I did the free trial, then had to buy it. Now I always have all my old recipes, and I can make notes on them.

Plus, making recipes from scratch is super easy with it.

I need help on the full extract boils....when you do this, how much start off volume do you need to account for evaporation. I just read that freyguy starts off with 6.25 gallons and ends up with 5 for the primary. Is that about a good rule of thumb? Or just start off with 5 gallons and make up the rest when racking into the primary????

anyone????

Grog, I think your question got lost in this thread. You have probably done some Google searching on this topic already. I didn't know the answer but was curious myself so I did.

It depends on your equipment, what you are boiling, your environment, etc. to really answer that question. You have to do the math yourself the next time you brew. The general rule is around 9-10% evaporation rate per hour it appears.

How you determine your own is the next time you brew is to take the Starting volume measurement and divide it by the ending volume measurement and that is your evaporation rate. So, if you are doing a full 5 gallon boil (which I don't do, just do the whole 2-3 gallon and top off method) boil that 6.3 or whatever and see what you have at the end. Your volume will be affected by what you add to the recipe etc.

I do the 3 gallon method in 5gallon pot ,when it reaches the hot break,I turn down the heat just enough to keep it from boiling over but still maintain about a 200degree rolling boilyou have to stir alot never had a problem..

The good news is when doing full boils everything goes in you favour.

Most online recipes are done for full boils, You can use the same recipes the the "Experts" use, You will have the facility to steep, mini mash and go all grain with the same pot, your hop utilisation will be better so you can use less hops. You have less chance of malt caramilsation, you can make lighter beers.

Any way the answer to you question is that you do not need to scale up your recipes. The only thing to take not of is that you don't need to reduce the volume of the wort as AG brewers do. We need to collect all the sugar from the grain and often end up with a thinner larger volume of wort.

All you need to consider is that to get goo hop utilisation and the correct bittering you'll need to boil for 60 minutes so you'll need 5 gallons plus what ever evaporates. You don't need to worry about a vigorous boil because the extract will already of achieved an hot break. So were as AG brewers may need to reduce 7 gallon to 5 gallon for the previously stated reasons you may well be able to get away with 6 gallons to 5 gallons.

I don't do extract full boils so maybe some one who does can give you details of thier volumes and procedures.