Any chance five gallons will boil on apt electric stove?

..using a 40-quart pot like this one: http://www.instawares.com/stock-pot-aluminum-40.alsksp007.0.7.htm

I'm brand new to this and want the 40-quart to avoid boil overs but I'm not sure if the pot itself will be too big.

Advice is greatly appreciated - I'll be doing extract brews to start.

I know this kind of thing has been commented on frequently so my apologies for the repeat.

Yes, it will boil, but it will take a loooooooong time to ge there.

Stout-n-Braggot said:

Yes, it will boil, but it will take a loooooooong time to ge there.

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Any estimates on what a "long time" is?

I use a 32 quart, 4mm thick aluminum pot and getting ~6.5 gallons up to a boil takes a LOOOOOONG time... Maintaining the boils is also not that easy. I'm talking about it taking at least an hour to get up to a boil (from mash/sparge mixed temps)...

I'll be doing the same thing on Thursday evening on a propane burner... I'll post up how long it takes there... I'm estimating ~15 minutes, maybe...

Unless you have one burner that throws a LOT of heat, I'd seriously think about getting a propane burner.

Split that boil!!!


I am in a one bedroom apartment and split boils are the sweet sweet answer. I only have one large burner on my stove, which I stuff aluminum foil underneath to increase the heat output. I insulate my 3 gallon pot with foil also and then have no trouble getting a nice rolling boil with 2.5 gallons - I do not even have to crank the burner all the way up. I boil another 1.5 gallons in a separate 2 gallon pot. This is only a 4 gallon boil but I am sure if I felt like investing in another 3 gallon pot I could easily do full 5 gallon boils.

One simple trick that shaves 20 minutes or so off of total brew time is to start the 3 gallon pot with 1.5 gallons in it, while bringing another gallon to boil in a different pot and combining the two when both are at a full boil. This lets me put a third burner to use to decrease the workload.

Golddiggie said:

I use a 32 quart, 4mm thick aluminum pot and getting ~6.5 gallons up to a boil takes a LOOOOOONG time... Maintaining the boils is also not that easy. I'm talking about it taking at least an hour to get up to a boil (from mash/sparge mixed temps)...

I'll be doing the same thing on Thursday evening on a propane burner... I'll post up how long it takes there... I'm estimating ~15 minutes, maybe...

Unless you have one burner that throws a LOT of heat, I'd seriously think about getting a propane burner.

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Oh wow that's quite some time... I'm not sure my complex would allow me to use a propane burner outside so I might need to think about going the partial boil route.

Almost two hours, if i remember correctly. The first batch I ever made was in a friend's apartment, took forever with the old electric stove.

Hoppin_Mad said:

Split that boil!!!


I am in a one bedroom apartment and split boils are the sweet sweet answer. I only have one large burner on my stove, which I stuff aluminum foil underneath to increase the heat output. I insulate my 3 gallon pot with foil also and then have no trouble getting a nice rolling boil with 2.5 gallons - I do not even have to crank the burner all the way up. I boil another 1.5 gallons in a separate 2 gallon pot. This is only a 4 gallon boil but I am sure if I felt like investing in another 3 gallon pot I could easily do full 5 gallon boils.

One simple trick that shaves 20 minutes or so off of total brew time is to start the 3 gallon pot with 1.5 gallons in it, while bringing another gallon to boil in a different pot and combining the two when both are at a full boil. This lets me put a third burner to use to decrease the workload.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the tips! They seem pretty helpful. I saw some people mentioning some good finds at Dollar General for the smaller pots so I might need to go there tomorrow and check out what they have.

If you have the option of splitting the wort into two pots for the boil, go for it... I would just try to get them as balanced as possible, and add even amounts of the hops to both. So if you have 1oz of bittering and 1oz of flavor hops, give each pot 1/2oz of both...

I would also use something to measure how much volume is in each pot. A practice boil with the pots would probably be a good idea too. That way you won't be surprised with how much boils off and have to top off with tap water. Although, as long as you're within ~1/2 gallon of target, I would just let it ferment.

Awesome! Well, I think I'll go the split boil route and am ridiculously excited to get started on my first batch. Shame I have to wait several days for all the equipment to ship.

Just a thought to save energy(electricity) go for a partial boil. Just boil your components in 3 gallons. It will still be good beer, and you'll "save the planet".

NRS

Check this out, I can boil at least 8 gallons on my crappy electric apartment stove and can get a boil fairly quickly:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/stovetop-problems-ag-224438/#post2635179

scroll down a few posts for pics

I get seven gallons to a rolling boil on my stove every brew day.

Depends on how much brass your stove is carrying under its kilt.

If I could not do so, I would augment with a heat stick - lots of good info about those around here.

You may also look into building a heatstick to supplement your stove.

I have a glass top that is some kind of mutant. It will boil 5 gals in 30 minutes. So far as I can tell, this is uncommon, but it will boil a full boil pretty quickly.

I bought a burner anyway so I can brew in my garage. SWMBO didn't appreciate the hop smell.

There is going to be a lot of variation depending on how hot the burners get. I've brewed in a couple of apartments with electric stoves, and though I've used the same equipment, the boil time can be drastically different.

One obvious question: why do you need to boil 6.5 gallons? You can easily boil a lot less and just add water at the end of the process to get up to 5 gallons. Extract brewers can easily get away with kettles that are half as large and do only 2-3 gallon boils. The only reason why you'd need to start with 6.5 is if you're doing all-grain, any recipe that uses extract can easily be filled out at the end with water.

Lots of good reasons to move to full boil even with extract, including better hop utilization and not having to scale recipes. Plus theres no unboiled water, although ive never had any issues with unboiled city water.

But dont forget that youre not just going to heat it, you have to cool it too. No way I could get a good cold break in a full boil in my tiny kitchen sink without a good chiller.

If it's your first brew, just do a partial boil.

Sure you might be able to make better beer with a full boil, but you can still make great beer with a partial boil.

A lot of people will confess to long brew days on their first try, trying to boil 5 gallons on a stove without a dry run plus the additional time to cool off if you don't have a chiller could turn your first brew day into a very long brew day.

jwplessner said:

Lots of good reasons to move to full boil even with extract, including better hop utilization and not having to scale recipes. Plus theres no unboiled water, although ive never had any issues with unboiled city water.

But dont forget that youre not just going to heat it, you have to cool it too. No way I could get a good cold break in a full boil in my tiny kitchen sink without a good chiller.

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If you need better hop utilization it's much easier to just do late extract additions. I'm not saying full boils aren't ideal, but there are a lot of reasons why it is a PITA to do so in an apartment setting. And yes, agreed, getting the wort back down to pitching temperature is just one more of them.

CortexBomb said:

There is going to be a lot of variation depending on how hot the burners get. I've brewed in a couple of apartments with electric stoves, and though I've used the same equipment, the boil time can be drastically different.

One obvious question: why do you need to boil 6.5 gallons? You can easily boil a lot less and just add water at the end of the process to get up to 5 gallons. Extract brewers can easily get away with kettles that are half as large and do only 2-3 gallon boils. The only reason why you'd need to start with 6.5 is if you're doing all-grain, any recipe that uses extract can easily be filled out at the end with water.

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I was getting confused with the large pot size numbers being thrown out there relative to batch size and didn't realize you get use smaller boils for extract brewing. Following that method in shooting for a five gallon batch what size pot would work in my situation, 21qt?

This is all foreign to me still so I might need to ask some obvious questions.

blokeyhighlander said:

I was getting confused with the large pot size numbers being thrown out there relative to batch size and didn't realize you get use smaller boils for extract brewing. Following that method in shooting for a five gallon batch what size pot would work in my situation, 21qt?

This is all foreign to me still so I might need to ask some obvious questions.

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A lot of brewer's prefer 5 gallon pots for extract brewing. It allows you to boil 2-4 gallons and still have some room at the top.

Some other tips, check out your stove, some burners will have higher wattage then others, if there is a difference there is often one simmer burner, two regular burners, and one power burner for boiling.

Most extract kits call for 2-3 gallon boils. They do this for a reason, because you can brew them just fine with that much water. They aren't trying to trick or mislead you.

The fool proof method is to spend an evening just boiling some water, pour in about 2.5 gallons of hot water and see how long it takes to get to a boil. If it goes pretty quick you might want to try again with 3.5 or 4 gallons. If it was trouble maybe see if it can do at least 3.

Don't get too caught up with doing a full boil at first. I'd love to do a full boil, but I'm in a condo. I have a 12k BTU burner, no matter how hard I try, I can't keep up with a 55k BTU turkey fryer.

I boil about 3 gallons on my apartment stove and I think it all depends on your stove. My stove does great and has that 3 gallons boiling in about 20 minutes and keeps a great boil for the full 60 minuets. A split boil is a good idea, but it also depends on the size of you kitchen. I really don't have the room for more pots on the stove, I need the extra space for all my other brewing crap. Good luck with it, apartment brewing can seem like a huge pain at the beginning, but once you get your process down it becomes second nature.

My last batch I steeped in 1.5 gallons and in another pot boiled another 2 gallons. Working on my timing so that they can both be close to boiling at the same time.

I would still suggest doing 2.5 -3 gallon boil and using kit that says the same.

When using an electric stove you may want to stir the heck out of it the whole time. My first try I scorched the malt extract that settled to the bottom because of how electric stoves work. I was told to keep stirring and now dont have that problem. My last brew , a coopers liquid extract kit , I really didnt need to boil. I just heated up 3 gallons to near boiling and after being sure the extract was good and disolved/mixed I added ice to bring it up to 5 gallons which cooled it fast so I could put it in the bucket. It worked good.

I do partial mashes on my stove, and I usually have about 4 gallons boiling after the mashing, which comfortably fits into my 7.5 gallon pot. If you're thinking about stepping up to PM somewhere down the line (not recommended at first, but it doesn't take much extra work and you have more control over the malt profile of your beer) then a 7.5 gallon+ pot size makes sense. Even having the 10 gallon one isn't a big deal, there's nothing wrong with having more space for boil-over, just don't feel like you have to do the full boil.

I agree with OhioChris up above as well, if you're using liquid extract make sure to stir the hell out of the pot. I had some issues with it scorching on my electrics as well, and I've since moved on to only dry because it seems to dissolve before it gets to the bottom of the pot.