Anvil Foundry 5.5 Gallon Kettle Brewing 5 gallons of beer

[petermb72]

I have an Anvil Foundry 5.5 gallon brewer. From what I read, I can do 2.5 gallons of beer in it. I was wondering if I did the 3.5 gallons of water with a grain kit that is for 5 gallons of beer and then at the end before I let it sit, I added water to bring the total to 5 gallons, would that work? I have read that you can do this with concentrates rather than grain. Any insight would be great. I hate getting a 5 gallon kit and having to break it into two parts and only brew one half the kit. In hindsight I should of gotten the bigger Anvil.

Thanks,
Peter

 

[CascadesBrewer]

For all-grain brewing, this is easier to pull off with a low gravity beer. For example, I was able to produce 5.5 gallons of wort via a BIAB process using my 5 gallon kettle, but that was for a sub 1.050 Irish Red. With adding in a sparge step, I was able to produce around 3.5 gals of 1.070 wort that I diluted when I topped up the fermenter.

It also helps if your process gets a decent efficiency. For a low gravity beer with a sparge, I could likely get around 80% efficiency. As I recall, with that Irish Red, even with the thicker mash and top up, I was able to get around 75% overall efficiency. If instead I was only able to get 65% overall efficiency, I would have to use more grain which might hit the capacity limits.

Since the 5.5 gal Foundry was not really made to produce 5 gallon batches, you will have to jump through hoops to make that batch size fit. If you don't want to brew 3 gal batches, I might suggest you aim for producing about 3 gallons of wort all-grain, then adding DME toward the end of the boil to boost your OG before topping up in the fermenter. Or save up money for the 10.5 gallon version.

 

[mashdar]

It's possible, but you'll have to try and see what your max OG will be. Probably not super high.

You'll want to treat and boil your dilution water. Maybe (?) bottled water is sanitary enough?

Per cascades, above, DME is a good option to boost gravity a bit.

 

[PashMaddle]

I think you mean the 6.5(?)

I use the same system and generally brew 3-3.5 gallon batches depending on the size of the grain bill.
Brewing software (Brewfather) has been a great resource in scaling/ planning my batches since it will give you mash water and top up volumes so you know what to expect. It’s my understanding that with experience, you learn cool stuff that improves efficiency… with better efficiency, you need less grain… you see where this is going so there’s that too.
I hope this helps, I’m still very much a noob but I figure sharing what little information I have is a nice thing to do, there are a lot of knowledgeable folks here who will hopefully weigh in and give much better/helpful tips.