70 Qt. Cooler with false bottom

Hello all, I am going to move into 10 gallon batches and need to get a new mash tun. I am thinking of doing a 70qt coleman with round false bottom. Anyone had good luck with this setup? see picture for example.

I would suggest you give a try at building a drain manifold for your cooler, you won't regret it! Having only one drain point in a MT creates more pressure on the single drain point than if, for example, you had two or three drain points. Having a single drain point also seems to push more particles through to the boil kettle in my experience. Once I built a drain manifold I noticed the grain bed started filtering right away and I could drain at a faster rate into the BK. You can build a really effective drain manifold on the cheap too, use CPVC instead of copper like I did here

If you have a pump, it's a moot point.


Recirc with a pump is effortless.

Why not go the cheap, easy way. Get a big bag made and use that instead. A ratcheting pulley and some kind of support above and the bag will be easy to raise and suspend to drain. If you want a conventional sparge, just lower the bag of grains and do your sparge, then raise it again to let it drain. The advantages of this is that it lets you use grains that are milled finer getting you higher efficiency, the bags large filter area makes them virtually impossible to get a stuck sparge, and cleanup is a breeze as the grains are already constrained in a bag for easy disposal.

A $10 water heater braid works well in a large cooler for batch sparging or full volume mash. 8-12" of braid is all you need. Simple and very effective batch sparger. No risk of the FB upsetting and getting grain beneath and fouling, then having to empty the tun of hot mash, clear the blockage and redoing everything.

I've seen pics of huge 150 qt boat coolers with no more than an 8" water heater braid that are reported to work very well.

A braid runs cleaner than a FB or manifold and doesn't pose the risk of unintentional disassembly during a mash. Just rinse and repeat, nothing to disassemble b/w uses.

A bag is even easier.....and maybe cheaper.

A classic example of MT overbuild lol

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1480861727.690404.jpg

All you need IMHO

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I have good luck with a stainless screen, it takes advantage of the slope toward the drain on the Coleman 70 qt coolers. I was all set to fabricate a copper manifold until I tried the stainless screen and was so pleased with the results I kept the screen.

I switched everything of mine over to BIAB in a cooler (no more false bottoms and immediately clear wort draining with no vorlauf needed and easy cleanup). Here's my 70-qt bulkhead setup with dip tube for the trough space.View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1480872357.510090.jpgView attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1480872388.505867.jpg

Wow so much great info everyone! - thank you this will help me a lot.

ITV said:

I have good luck with a stainless screen, it takes advantage of the slope toward the drain on the Coleman 70 qt coolers. I was all set to fabricate a copper manifold until I tried the stainless screen and was so pleased with the results I kept the screen.

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where did you get this screen? I like it.

Looks like its the bazooka screen. Sells on amazon for about $8

Thanks !

numberspace said:

Looks like its the bazooka screen. Sells on amazon for about $8

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Correct, It is a 12" bazooka screen. Here is the replacement: https://www.morebeer.com/products/kettle-tube-screen-stainless-steel.html?gclid=CIDg34Sm3tACFZQ2gQodtMoCBA