Help with new setup please

Yesterday I brewed my 3rd batch. It was a partial mash kit from Austin homebrew and was the Alaskan smoked porter with some additional grains I added to the recipe. Both batches before this I did my steeping of the grains and the boil on an electric stove which was miserable lol. So I bought this setup on craigslist a few days back and this was my first time using it. Overall it was much more simple and the brew process was great but I ran into one issue. The beginning directions were to put 2 gallons of water in my pot or keg i suppose and heat to 156 to steep the grains. I had roughly 5 1/2 lbs of grains and with 2 gallons of water in such a large pot the water would not cover the grains completely. So my question is do i need to buy something smaller or can i use more water from the start. Thanks Jake

 

You can add more water for the steeping portion, then just adjust any additions after that. It's not uncommon for people to step up to a "full boil" at this point. Basically starting out with your full volume of water + an adjustment for boil off (usually around a gallon over a 1 hour boil). You'll just need to make sure that your chiller is up to the task as you won't be adding water to "top off" to 5 gallons

 

I agree, time to jump into full boils. This will help with hop utilization too. You will need at least an immersion chiller if you don't have one already. Stir while cooling for faster results.

 

Awesome I keep seeing people talk about a full boil and I assumed this might apply to me at this point but wasn't 100% sure. And are you implying on the average you loose a gallon for an hour of boiling? so for a 5 gallon batch you would want to start with roughly 6 gallons? I also got a wort chiller with this little package deal so I'm assuming it would be sufficient for cooling the wort.

Also one other quick question instead of creating another thread for a simple question. As I stated before I Brewed a Alaskan Smoked Porter the OG was 1.071 and I used WLP002 and I plan to let the Beer sit in the fermenter for 2-3 weeks. My question Is would you just transfer at this point to bottle or would you transfer to the carboy to clear on the particular brew. Ive always transferred to the carboy but not sure why I do? Thanks Jake

 

Another member posted this boil off calculator and it is fairly accurate compared to my keggle boil-off rate (http://sigginet.info/brewing/tools/boil-off-calculator/). You can always add a little top-off water if you're short. For 5 gallon batches, a 25ft immersion chiller will do just fine. Just make sure your ground water is cold, which can be an issue over the summer.

 

Something's wrong here. I can't see the picture, so maybe it explains it, but a typical water/grain ratio for a thick mash is 1.25 quarts of water per pound of grain. That'll give you a consistency of thick oatmeal. In your case, with 5.5 pounds of grain, that would be just under 7 quarts of water, or 1.75 gallons. With 2 gallons, you would have been mashing at a ratio of 1.45 qt/lb, which should have been adequate. Is the kettle geometry factoring into this somehow that the photo explains?

But to answer your question, go ahead and mash with more water in order to ensure the grain is entirely wetted.

 

yes the confusion is due to not being able to see the picture I do believe. Its a full sized keg with the top cut out. correct me if I am wrong i think I have seen them called a keggle? Any opinions on transferring to secondary or not for this particular beer?

 

OP stated partial mash so I'm guessing there's LME or DME being added. Most kit instructions state to steep the grains in 1-2 gallons of water, and with his equipment it's just not enough water to cover the grains.

 

Dead on the money, then after this I added around 10 1/2 cups at 170 degrees to pour over the grain bags while I'm a strainer then added one more gallon and brought to a boil then removed the Keggle and added the lme and dme. So I was just trying to follow instructions but next time I will try the full boil as I think that would work much better for the equipment.