Partial grain question

[Beer Snob]

Hey I found coolers (at Target if anyone is interested) Good ones too and bloody cheap! Igloo extream water ones... 5 gal like... 17 bucks a piece! So I'm gonna get two this Wensday. I am confused about one thing..... I am not finding a consistent resource that says I can do a boil like extract. Some say I need a 5 gal brewpot like I have to do 2.5 to 3.5 gal boils like what I have been doing (which would be good) and some say I need to do a full boil and get a 10 gal brewpot (which would not be bad.... but not be all that good either).

So, which is it... do I have to do a full boil with partial mashes?

 

[ajf]

IMHO the more grains you use in the partial mash, the more you need a 10 gallon brew-pot to do a full boil. The large pot would also come in very handy for high gravity beers. Providing you can successfully mash and sparge the amount of grains you will be using without overflowing the 5 gal pot, you should be OK.
If you do go for the full boil and you use a domestic stove, you may well find that it doesn't have enough oomph to give you a good boil, so you may need to find alternate ways of heating.
Of course, with a 10 gallon pot, and a suitable heat source, you would't need much extra equipment to go all grain. This is considerably cheaper than using extract, and you may eventually recover the cost of the extra equipment, as well as having more fun while brewing.

Hope this helps.

-a.

 

[david_42]

The more grains you use, the more sparging you do. This means a bigger pot. If you keep your partials to less than 1/2 the malt, 3.5-4 gallons of runs will probably be enough. All grain for a five gallon batch typically requires 7-8 gallons of runs.

 

[El Pistolero]

So, which is it... do I have to do a full boil with partial mashes?

No, you don't have to do a full boil with a mini-mash. But, you want to do full boil, if you can, even with an extract only batch...you'll get better hop utilization, and have cleaner, clearer, more appropriately colored beer if you do.

 

[Antipodean Aler]

No, you don't have to do a full boil with a mini-mash.

so, are a mini mash and partial mashing the same thing ?

stupid question probably

thankyou
aa

 

[DeRoux's Broux]

so, are a mini mash and partial mashing the same thing ?

stupid question probably

thankyou
aa

no stupid questions! yep, they are the same.

 

[Beer Snob]

Palmer says that this is how he started with AG. Partial mashes Just got the Igloo 5 Gal water cooler Its an Extream one. Says it can hold cold liquid in the thing at 90 degrees for 5 days! At $20... hey... what the hell you know... I got it at Walmart by the way... not Target. Was able to get the tap off without distroying it and picked up a ball valve and some hardware at Lowes to replace it with. Because its not distroyed I can use the same nylon washers (had both plastic and rubber ones) that came with it. That way I'm assured it will have a tight fit. I think for my first batch I'm going to use thick walled vinyl tubing for the manifold since I have something that would work(this way I'll keep the cost down while being eyed by the SWMBO). I'm still not exactly sure how to make a circular manifold...

I'm going to use the bottling bucket as the HWT for my first batch for the same reason. I'll put a blanket around it to consearve the heat. I figure in a few weeks I could sneak in another cooler at the price I found it. I want to get a larger pot.... sneaking a $20 in one thing.... $130 is something entirly different. Birthday is in May though

Hmmm.... so far is anything in the HOLY S**T! YOU DON'T WANT TO DO THAT! catagory? In my mind of how it looks I'm thinking it will look something like orfy's setup.

 

[Beer Snob]

After looking at options I decided that the Phil's Mashing bottom is the best one for me now. Guess I'm impatient. Want to brew this weekend and dont want to bother making a manifold now. The only reason why I was not going to go that route is that I've read that stuck mashes are possible with false bottoms, but then I've seen people say that they have a stuck mash with a manifold sometimes as well. At any rate, for $20 I cant go too wrong and it sounds like people have been using it for a while.

 

[DeRoux's Broux]

it'll work good too. just hock it up and let 'er rip!