6 gallon boil on 12” electric stovetop burner

I am about to do a kitchen remodel and I am looking at an electric Maytag stovetop that has a big 12 inch burner on it. It is one of those that can be 6”, 9” or 12” of burner space and I think it is 2,700 watts on that one burner. Has anyone used one of these to do a full boil? I have seen a lot of threads about stove tops not working without a heat stick in the pot to help. But I have not heard if anyone has used one of these big burners that are made for big jobs. Here is a link to what I am talking about:

http://www.amazon.com/Maytag-MEC7536WB-Smoothtop-Electric-Cooktop/dp/B002TPM3MM

Let me know if anyone has used one of these and what did it do.

I don't have any experience with the particular stove, but I did try this on our old stove top. It was a glass smooth top electric similar to what you have linked below.

I, like you, was curious what it could do. I had a small kettle which I filled with about 4 gallons of water. I cranked the heat and after 90 minutes was still NOT at a boil, in fact I couldn't get the water over about 190. The element kept cycling on and off and wouldn't stay on long enough to get the water boiling.

Granted, YMMV especially with a different and new stove. But I would not expect to be happy trying to brew on one of these...

If gas (sorry if I I shouldn't say that on the electric brewing forum...) is an options I would try that or maybe even splurge for an induction cooktop!

Cheers,
Jeff

You can calculate how fast you can heat water (wort is probably not too different) - the biggest unknown is heat loss from the water (evaporation from the top, loss through the sides of the pot), and loss from the burner that doesn't even get into the pot. Assuming you have 6 U.S. gallons (about 50 pounds) of water and heat with 2700 watts with no heat loss at all, then your rate of temperature rise is:
(2.7 kW)(3412 BTU/hr KW)(1 lb ºF/BTU)/50 lb = 184 ºF/hr or 3.1 ºF/minute.
Realistically, you will lose quite a bit of heat, depending on a lot of factors, so I'd dial back the heating rate by 1/3 and guestimate that it's more like 120 ºF/hr. The other question is whether you can get to a boil at all. With no heat loss, of course you can. It comes down to whether the rate of heat loss as the wort nears boiling is greater than the rate you put heat in - you may need to insulate your kettle.

Sounds like I may have to stay in the backyard even after the remodel. If nothing else, I will be able to heat mash water and sparge water faster. I already do that inside with the small burners.

Brewing on a brand new stove sounds dicey. A $10, 2000w element installed in a kettle would likely do more than the new stove w/ less at risk.

Another thing to keep in mind; most of the ranges or cooktop with a glasstop have a weight limit. 6 gallons of water will weight roughly 50 pounds. Make sure you don't exceed that limit.

I've got a similar frigidaire model with the same power level. Used it before I went eBIAB and it worked great. I had to pull the stove away from the wall because the pot wouldn't fit under the microwave, but it worked great otherwise. It maintained a boil at 65%. Would have kept doing BIAB on it but SWMBO was tired of the kitchen looking like a meth lab and offered to pay for the eBIAB upgrade. :rockin:

Lesson: get it, use it, make it messy and hang hoses all over...