Ready to make the jump to all grain!

However, I need bigger equipment. Several home brewers I know have acquired used, 1/2 barrel kegs that they have converted for their specific brewing purposes. Unfortunately, my efforts in obtaining said used barrels has thus proved to be fruitless.
Does anyone have any success stories/suggestions for me as to how I can acquire my future kettle? At this point it feels more like I'm searching for the holy grail rather an empty beer keg.

It took me what seemed like forever.
Finally I downloaded an iPhone app for craigslist that sends me alerts when specific keywords appear in the listings.
Still took about three weeks and then I had to drive about an hour to get them.
Some people have luck putting wanted adds on craigslist.

Something that I hadn't yet tried, but will now. Thanks, Berniep.

There's several on ebay right now... I scored my soon to be mash keggle on Craigslist simply by checking it often and being ready to act. Check with the HBS in your area to see if they know of places to get them, or will sell you one. The LHBS I typically use converts kegs into keggles/mash tuns, so you can get them already done. Depending on how my pending conversion goes, I might get my next one from them.

Just be aware, converting a keg into a mash tun/keggle isn't cheap. Sure, it's less than buying a Blichmann, but not by much (when it's setup the same)... If the LHBS has kettles for sale, check out those too.

Another way you could go is find a restaurant supply store in your area. You can typically find aluminum stock pots there, in large sizes, for cheap money. It's stupid easy to drill and install a ball valve in those. It's at least a way to get a larger kettle on the cheap until you're ready for the bigger/more expensive ones...

I bought the 82 qt SS pot for my HLT from StainlessSteelStockPots then bought weldless bulkhead kits from bargainfitings.com. They are the same gauge SS as Blichmann and I am very happy with the stockpot. FYI - I didn't consider the pots with the valves as it didn't look like there was a way to connect tubing to the output