Switching to AG, need some guidance

Hey guys, looking for some pointers on all-grain brewing. Have a system in my head but not sure if I'm overlooking anything. Right now, I've got:

- 9 gallon brew kettle w/ 1 spigot
-13 gallon mash/lauter tun
-ss immersion wort chiller
-a couple smaller (wanna say 5 gallon) pots

As it goes in my mind's eye, I'm heating the strike water in my 9 gallon kettle, transferring it to my MLT + grains, mashing, transferring wort to same 9 gallon kettle, and using the smaller pots for my sparge water. After I chill the wort, I'm not sure what a good way to transfer it to the fermenter would be. Maybe a bazooka screen inside my brew kettle to separate? Also, I'm a little unsure as to sparging in general. Thanks in advance for any tips/suggestions/links to relevant threads!

Is this equipment you are thinking of purchasing, or equipment you have?

JacobiusRex said:

After I chill the wort, I'm not sure what a good way to transfer it to the fermenter would be. Maybe a bazooka screen inside my brew kettle to separate? Also, I'm a little unsure as to sparging in general. Thanks in advance for any tips/suggestions/links to relevant threads!

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I use the kettle screen in my boil kettle. It helps to seperate out whole hops, which I rarely use, and does a decent job of getting out a lot of other stuff.

With that setup you should be okay to batch sparge. If you are going to fly sparge you would need a hot liquor tank.

A bazooka screen is fine for the transfer.

Sparging can be done 2 ways. Either you continuously add water as you are running wort to your kettle or you can do it in batches. Fly (continuous) sparging is good if you have a false bottom. Batch sparging works well if you have a screen setup in your mash tun.

Thanks guys. Gonna do some more research on batch sparging, but good to know I'm on the right track.

IMO you need a second kettle. My reasoning is that the first kettle is fine for your strike water and using that in the tun, however you do not have another kettle to begin collecting your runnings. The first kettle would still be required to heat and deliver your sparge water. Unless you wanted to collect all your runnings in buckets and then transfer all the wort into the kettle. Remember you will be collecting at least 6.5-7.5 gallons of wort for a 5 gallon batch.

Having another kettle also allows you to begin heating your wort as you are sparging and shaves a little time.

Get two kettles.

Boil one SEPARATE gallon of water, not from the recipe, to heat up mash tun and dump that water when you transfer strike water so there is no heat loss because the tun is already warmed. I use this style of mash tun: http://www.flickr.com/photos/webcareer79/3266547587/. I have hit my exact temperature every time so far.

Use paint strainer bags for your hop additions. Cut two holes in it so you can put a dowel through and rest it across the mouth of the kettle and just add the hops in the bag during the boil. Makes life a lot easier.

I am going on the 5th all grain batch and have learned lots to make it as easy as possible.