Thinking of All-Grain brewing...What do I need?

So right now I am brewing extract with my "Personal Home Brewery #5 - Kegging Super Deluxe BRKIT5" kit from more-beer.

I am interested in starting all-grain to see how it goes and was wondering what else I should get to start brewing all grain.

I have a camp chef burner and a 8 gal kettle with ball valve already.

I was wondering if I should buy a turkey fryer kit they have at target with a 30qt aluminum kettle and burner its on sale for $49 and build a cooler with a sparge arm, or should I purchase http://cgi.ebay.com/5-gal-Mash-Laut...ultDomain_0&hash=item45ebd01850#ht_2646wt_907 and use that set up with my current extract stuff.

Any info/help or pictures of your pieced together set up or any other usefull information would be great.

Thanks & Cheers!!

Whatever you buy first, make sure you go 10 gallon for any new purchases. You'll thank yourself later.

I just started out buying a propane burner and 15 gal kettle I saw on-sale, so I could play with new equipment as I bought it. I just picked up a 2nd kettle and a cooler. Next brew should be all grain and I didn't have to drop much money all at once. Kinda nice to dial in the burner before I add more complexity.

1 - your ebay link is already dead

2 - all you need is a cooler (10 gallon), some cpvc, a drill with a small drill bit, some tygon tubing (< 1/2 foot) and a plastic isolation valve.

3 - don't worry about a sparge arm and all that junk. Seriously. Unless you spend time here researching etc you will be wasting you money.

4 - the turkey fryer and burner will help shave time off with your sparge water but that is all. I use one to heat my sparge water while I am mashing.

5 Here; read this: Bobby_from_NJ all grain

Read it all but the last portion will help you plan out your brew day.

I will post pics of my MLT here in a min but seriously... There really isn't too much you need to buy. Anything you purchase beyond the cooler will only shave time off your brew day. With a cooler properly modified your looking at a 4 hour brew session all grain (once you have your technique nailed down).

Back in a minute. Gotta grab the camera.

Rob

Ok...grabbed some photos of my MLT.

Here is my 10 gal Coleman cooler modified



Here is the inside. I used a garden hose to 1/2" hose adapter to connect to the standard bucket valve



Here is my cpvc piping setup disconnected and laid out


Here is the cpvc connected


And the whole setup ready for strike water and grains


I just finished an American Pale Ale today with 83% efficiency across the board with this setup. I hope this gives you some ideas. All pieces parts were put together with eyeball measurements and feel.

Rob

p.s. yes it is all wet... just got done with a brew and these pics as of this posting are 10 minutes old

check out deathbrewer's stove top all grain tutorial. All I needed to buy was a 10 gal boil kettle for full boils. I mash in my 5 gal kettle (up to 12 lbs of grain), or in my 10 gal kettle (lots of grain).... oh, and a propane burner is really nice (likely necessary) for full boils.

RobBug said:

Ok...grabbed some photos of my MLT.

Here is my 10 gal Coleman cooler modified

Here is the inside. I used a garden hose to 1/2" hose adapter to connect to the standard bucket valve

Click to expand...

So does the bucket valve just sit on the outside? I was looking at a way of doing this.

Yeah, i think you are just about ready to start. For years, I mashed in my 20 qt kettle and lautered/sparged in a bucket in a bucket system (used an old bottling bucket for outside bucket, drilled holes in old fermenting bucket and then actually cut the bottom off so it would sit further down, lessening dead space). i am now to the point where i want a cooler based system (nice to only wash ONE large thing than two), but my old primitive set-up served me well and gave great efficiency over many batches, so if you have that crap lying around, go ahead and give it a whirl.
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In addition, I'd say you need a wort chiller, and I'd recommend a grain mill.

I have a immersion wort chiller, I need a grain mill though, what is a good mill for a fair price?

So I have a 8gal kettle with burner for a HLT and a 8 brew kettle with burner.

I plan on doing 5gal batches just because I want to make 5gal batches so I can have quicker turnover of brew. I would rather make a 5gal batch and not like it than make a 10gal batch and not like it.

With that being said, I have a 48qt coleman retangular cooler that I would be willling to convert into a mash tun is that to large for 5gal batches? I would build a manifold for the bottom (copper or cpvc?) and I would build a sparge manifold for under the lid (copper or cpvc?) any help would be great.

Thanks

or I can pick up a 5gal rubbermaid round cooler for $19 or a 10gal for $40 would round be better?

5 gal cooler can do most low to medium gravity beers that will end up with 5 gallon of brew. I recommend that if you want to try doing higher gravity beers later on or larger batches than just 5 gallons that you go with the larger size cooler from the start. I wish I had done this from the start as well as starting with a 10 gallon brew pot.

Craig's list might a a good place to find turkey fryers next week after the holiday. Be sure to check to see if there is a safety timer on thr fryer that shuts its off after 10-15 minutes of use. I prefer to use a turkey fryer w/o this feature.

Sounds good I'll probably go with a ten gallon round cooler. I have a camp chef burner and a turkey fryer burner already And 2 eight gallon kettles.

cinderbike said:

So does the bucket valve just sit on the outside? I was looking at a way of doing this.

Click to expand...

Yes, the hose adapter screws on the plastic isolation on the inside with the gasket sealing it - pulling the valve tight against the outside of the cooler.

I also recommend the larger cooler. Geometry of the cooler only becomes important if you fly sparge. Besides that, simple infusion with batch sparges is fairly geometry neutral.

As to cpvc vs copper it really comes down to what you want really. I like the fact that I can disassemble the whole thing for easy cleaning. Copper could get pricey.

RobBug said:

5 Here; read this: Bobby_from_NJ all grain

Rob

Click to expand...

This is very good

Is there any reason that you have already committed to fly sparging? For a 1st time AG I would recommend batch sparging, and then go to fly sparging if you feel it is important. But for your first batch it will only complicate things

RGingerelli said:

So right now I am brewing extract with my "Personal Home Brewery #5 - Kegging Super Deluxe BRKIT5" kit from more-beer.

Click to expand...

How do you like this kit? I am ready to upgrade from Mr. Beer and was looking at this one because it looks pretty complete (and I think kegging would be nice too). Were you happy with the quality of the items included? Did you find you needed anything additional? And if you could do it over would you go with the same kit or maybe peice it together separately?

brewdat said:

How do you like this kit? I am ready to upgrade from Mr. Beer and was looking at this one because it looks pretty complete (and I think kegging would be nice too). Were you happy with the quality of the items included? Did you find you needed anything additional? And if you could do it over would you go with the same kit or maybe peice it together separately?

Click to expand...

I would recommend this kit, great quality and it's nice to keg. I had the kit for a little less then a year and sold off all the equipment and bought a badass Brewstand.

Okay, great...thanks!