About to buy my first setup

[Matticus_Tarp]

I've been told that starting brewing is like fishing. You can get a cane pole and go drop your line in a Creek, or you can buy a 50k bass boat with all the fixings and hit the lake and catch the same fish.

I am very new to home brewing, I have recently just made my first batch of Irish stout in the mr beer home brew kit. I will find out Saturday how that turned out. If it goes well, I will soon be purchasing my first real "big boy" setup. For a new home Brewer on a budget, what would you recommend I purchase immediately, and what can wait till later? (I am basically starting with nothing)

Any help will be much appreciated.

 

[Wolfbrau]

Number one priority: Fermentation temperature control. Get a chest freezer or "very large mini fridge" and a temperature controller. The STC-1000 seems to get good reviews here; I use a Ranco ETC. You do this, you're already making killer beer.

Next step is a full volume boil.

After that, yeast handling equipment like a stir plate, flask, and oxygenation equipment. All extract with full volume boil, pitching a healthy amount of yeast into oxygenated, temperature controlled wort can, and does, win awards time after time. Modern extracts kick ass.

THEN (and only after all that!) go all grain. I recommend a three tier system with a cooler set up to do a no-sparge method.

Kegging is icing; it makes your job easier (i.e. you can be lazier) and allows you to dial in CO2 levels. That's minor stuff. A lifestyle item, if you will.

That's how i'd do it.

 

[kaconga]

First thing is to get yourself the essentials:

Ale pail*
Bottling bucket*
Racking cane*
Bottle wand*
Tubing to fit the racking cane and bottling wand*
Airlocks*
5 gallon pot.
Sanitizer- I prefer Starsan.

*can be bought in a kit

On to the non essentials that will be helpful:

Some form of temp control, if on a tight budget then I recommend a bucket big enough to hold your fermenter plus a few gallons of water and a fan. Put an old t-shirt on your fermenter and let it come in contact with the water, turn fan on and point at t-shirt. Viola, temp control! <this is the number one upgrade>

A stir plate. These can be fabricated or bought pretty cheap from stirstarters.com. If you use liquid yeast at all then a stir plate will be your best friend.

A kegging set up. This is actually a fairly large outlay financially if you do it all at once. But bottling will get tedious and kegging will sound better and better with each batch.

Brewing software. This can be free or relatively cheap. Essentially it does all the leg work of calculations for you so you can accomplish the brewing aspect easier. Definitely not essential but a nice addition at low/no cost.

A scale that measures in .05 oz or 1 gram increments. This might be essential in some peoples minds but I feel it is more of an add on when considering that you can eyeball hop amounts with decent accuracy.

10 gallon pot. Full boils will become necessary to move into the IPA/DIPA territory bitterness wise. Also any all grain brewing will require full boils.

Wort chiller. Once you start doing full boils you will need one to chill the wort down.

I could think of more but it is time for me to sleep. Best of luck to you getting started.

 

[flars]

Check out a starter set like this.
http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/...-starter-kits/deluxe-brewing-starter-kit.html
Good for doing extract and partial mash. You will also need a 5 to 6 gallon boil kettle if you plan to boil on the kitchen stove. Most of the extract kits are designed for a partial boil of 2.5 to 3 gallons, then topping off to 5 gallons in the fermentor. Get a kettle with a clad bottom. Better heat distribution and less chance of scorching. Kettle will also be good for large batches of soup. pasta, and corned beef brisket boils.

You will also need a hydrometer for checking specific gravity. Absolute necessity for knowing when a fermentation is complete. A bench capper would also be a nice addition. Much easier to use than a wing capper. Bench cappers work well on all brands of pry off cap bottles.

 

[Wolfbrau]

I'm a moron and totally took this question differently than I should have. Sorry!

 

[tooladverser]

The basics would be a fermenter , bottling setup, brew kettle, propane burner, a mash tun.
How much is your budget?

 

[Mike66]

ATTN: WOLFBRAU....Maybe for his question but for me that's good info. Thanks. I am in the middle Of John Palmers book . I need everything and am soaking up tidits. It's a steep learning curve but loads of fun.

 

[fmr_army]

I got a starter kit (complete, w/10 gal kettle and a kit)from William's Brewing and have been very pleased with it. I keg, so now use the priming bucket as another fermenter (having bought another lid).

As you decide how to take the plunge, I strongly recommend that you do so with an eye towards expansion/growth. A large brew kettle is better (and only a little more expensive) than a smaller kettle: will enable you to do full extract boils and then make the jump to all grain more easily. Less chance of boil over also.

Welcome to the hobby, and congratulations on making beer!

 

[Jordo_nb]

Here was my progression

1. Starter Kit
2. Freezer w/ temp control
3. Immersion Chiller
4. Kegging
5. Full Volume Boil (Stove, Extract)
6. BIAB (Stove, All Grain)
7. Propane Burner
8. Bigger Pot
9. Plate Chiller

For me this worked well. It was nice to get the temps under control early, and it made better beer. Kegging just made my life easier. The rest was a natural, easy and "fairly" affordable progression

 

[drewsk]

My progression:

0. Hop vines.

1. 2 buckets (1 for fermenting, 1 for bottling) - starter kit (http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/brewing/beer-equipment-starter-kits/essential-brewing-starter-kit)
2. Turkey fryer burner and pot for full boils

3. A 5 gallon carboy and a bunch of free bottles from friends
4. DIY copper immersion chiller
5. Utility pump to recirculate water from rain barrel through chiller

6. 1L flask for yeast starters

7. A 6 gallon carboy
8. Temperature control (STC 1000) and a 5cf chest freezer
9. More bottles!

10. Just bought a few kegs and am building a keezer


I put spaces where I took a few batches to enjoy the setup that I had and decide what I wanted to do next. I did a few batches with 1-6, then when I realized I enjoyed making and drinking the beer- I added more fermenting capacity and the ability to do lagers (and higher quality ales) through temperature control.

 

[Matticus_Tarp]

I like that water bucket with the shirt setup. Sounds much cheaper than a freezer. So that setup in a closet, what ambient temp should the closet be?

 

[JohnSand]

I started with MrBeer, and stayed pretty simple for a long time. An Ale Pail for 5gal batches costs only about $16. You might find a used kettle, check craigslist, tag sales etc. For partial mash or extract+grains you don't need as big a pot. I used a 20qt for almost a year, even for BIAB, topping off in the fermenter. A wing capper, hydrometer, and autosiphon can be had for perhaps $50. You do need an accurate thermometer to mash, but I think my slow glass one cost <$10. You can even do small batches and keep using your MrBeer LBK fermenter. Just cut 5gal recipes in half. Then you can probably use your biggest spaghetti pot. You can certainly make good beer with less than $100 of equipment. Don't go crazy until you are sure what you want.

 

[mmb]

I like that water bucket with the shirt setup. Sounds much cheaper than a freezer. So that setup in a closet, what ambient temp should the closet be?

Since you're in Austin, you should get in touch with the Austin Zealots Homebrew club. http://www.austinzealots.com/ Got to hang out with a few at NHC this year, awesome crew.

For most ales, an ambient temp of 65°F is going to be your best bet. Might be hard for you to achieve that in Austin without cooling. Really, under 70°F is where you want your fermentation to happen and some shoot for right around 60°F. That might take some work in your climate. If the beer ferments higher than that, it won't be "bad" but the yeast won't ferment as cleanly as they would at cooler temperatures and it will take longer to condition and age those yeast derived flavors away.

 

[Newsman]

No one is suggesting you have to buy all-new equipment. Pick up a used chest freezer of Craig's List. Buy/build a temp controller for better temperature control. The reason for a chest freezer is that it's easier to fit a fermenter in there than in a refrigerator. But, if you can find a large "mini-fridge" (Or refrigerator-only w/o a freezer compartment) then that would work even better. Seriously.

 

[Kevin79]

You have just opened the door and let in the flood lol. Ask 100 home brewers what to purchase to get started in home brewing and you undoubtedly get 100 different answers. What you buy depends largely on your budget and how serious you plan to get into home brewing. Of course, the catch is, no one really knows how serious they are going to get until they at least brew their first few batches. There are many of us that wished they would have simply bought x,y,z right away instead of upgrading to it later. But hindsight is 20/20, and I can personally tell you that if someone told me that I had to buy everything I have accumulated over the past 2 years right at the start, I might not have a hobby in home brewing. I think your best bet is to decide whether you will be brewing inside on a stove, or outside on a burner. If you are brewing inside, then a standard 5 gallon starter kit such as those from northern brewer, morebeer, Midwest, or any of the mainstream homebrew suppliers will be adequate to get you started. They won't break your budget, and you will have infinite avenues to expand later on. If you can commit to brewing outside, you may want to look into getting a kettle larger than 5 gallons (at least 10 gallons). This will give you the ability to do full boils and make it easier to do all grain when you are ready

 

[Kevin79]

After this, purchase upgrades for temp control and oxygenation/aeration.

You have just opened the door and let in the flood lol. Ask 100 home brewers what to purchase to get started in home brewing and you undoubtedly get 100 different answers. What you buy depends largely on your budget and how serious you plan to get into home brewing. Of course, the catch is, no one really knows how serious they are going to get until they at least brew their first few batches. There are many of us that wished they would have simply bought x,y,z right away instead of upgrading to it later. But hindsight is 20/20, and I can personally tell you that if someone told me that I had to buy everything I have accumulated over the past 2 years right at the start, I might not have a hobby in home brewing. I think your best bet is to decide whether you will be brewing inside on a stove, or outside on a burner. If you are brewing inside, then a standard 5 gallon starter kit such as those from northern brewer, morebeer, Midwest, or any of the mainstream homebrew suppliers will be adequate to get you started. They won't break your budget, and you will have infinite avenues to expand later on. If you can commit to brewing outside, you may want to look into getting a kettle larger than 5 gallons (at least 10 gallons). This will give you the ability to do full boils and make it easier to do all grain when you are ready

 

[unionrdr]

Here's the basic starter kit from Midwest that'll get you going. You can also add on to the kit for other things you'll need if you like. I think it's the best bang for the buck. http://www.midwestsupplies.com/brewing-basics-equipment-kit.html
I still use the 5 gallon (20qt) stainless steel stock pot I started with. I've gone from kit-n-kilo beers up to partial boil, partial mash brew in a bag in that same kettle. Just get a 5 gallon nylon paint strainer bag & a floating thermometer & your in business! The Super Agata bench capper, bottle tree & vinator will make bottling day quicker & easier. Here's a couple pics of my brewery corner;

 

[JohnSand]

If you decide to continue with small batches for a while, your LBK will fit in many picnic style coolers, and can be kept cool with ice packs.

 

[kaconga]

I like that water bucket with the shirt setup. Sounds much cheaper than a freezer. So that setup in a closet, what ambient temp should the closet be?

Your temp. will be determined by the yeast you use. Or rather you can find yeast to use for most any temp. range. The shirt/fan should get you 5*F below ambient temp and adding ice packs can get you down 10-15*F from ambient temps. So for us-05 you can have your house set to 68 and be able to ferment in the low 60s to produce a clean ale profile. You will need to check the temps when you do it to dial in your setup.

 

[Matticus_Tarp]

Update. I tried my mr beer stout tonight, it is not too shabby. For having brewed it in the mr beer and had it ferment on the kitchen counter at ambient room temp of 74. I also got a chest freezer off craigslist. May get the Johnson temp control this weekend and the 5 gallon starter kit, and an aluminum kettle turkey fryer next week. So, am I on the right path? Also, I'm reading home brewing: a complete guide by James Houston.

 

[Matticus_Tarp]

The stout doesn't taste like a 512 Pecan Porter like I had hoped, but hey, it's got the strong dark taste I love.

 

[kaconga]

Definitely on the right track! Temp control is number one thing most brewers need to do. A chest freezer takes all the guess work out of it. If you haven't then I suggest "how to brew" for the most comprehensive homebrewing book I have seen. Welcome to the obsession

 

[MindenMan]

If you are not a DYI guy,you can purchase a Johnson controller, but it will only control cooling, not heating and cooling. The STC-1000 is a well known and used controller by members of this site. The STC-1000 will control both heat and cooling, and are available through Flea-Bay, and Amazon for less than $30.00. If you find a used Turkey fryer setup for approximately $20.00, the pot it comes with (usually 30qt), is big enough for any beginner IMO. When you decide to purchase a larger a larger pot, the burner can still be used and has plenty of heat available, even with a 15 gallon pot. At that point you have a $50.00 equivalent burner and a free pot. I still use my turkey fryer with a 10 gallon pot, a 5psi regulator, and I have never run it wide open heat. Granted, that burner doesn't bring water or wort to a boil in less than 10 minutes, but I don't care, as I use between 3 and 3-1/2 pounds of propane for a full boil 5 gallon batch.

 

[MB331]

You have just opened the door and let in the flood lol. Ask 100 home brewers what to purchase to get started in home brewing and you undoubtedly get 100 different answers. What you buy depends largely on your budget and how serious you plan to get into home brewing. Of course, the catch is, no one really knows how serious they are going to get until they at least brew their first few batches. There are many of us that wished they would have simply bought x,y,z right away instead of upgrading to it later. But hindsight is 20/20, and I can personally tell you that if someone told me that I had to buy everything I have accumulated over the past 2 years right at the start, I might not have a hobby in home brewing. I think your best bet is to decide whether you will be brewing inside on a stove, or outside on a burner. If you are brewing inside, then a standard 5 gallon starter kit such as those from northern brewer, morebeer, Midwest, or any of the mainstream homebrew suppliers will be adequate to get you started. They won't break your budget, and you will have infinite avenues to expand later on. If you can commit to brewing outside, you may want to look into getting a kettle larger than 5 gallons (at least 10 gallons). This will give you the ability to do full boils and make it easier to do all grain when you are ready

Well said. My only suggestion would to get PET carboys (fun to observe fermentation and the price is right) and bomber bottles instead of the 12 ouncers (capping 48 bottles per batch is not fun).

 

[Matticus_Tarp]

Are bomber bottles the flip top grolsch looking bottles?

 

[Riot]

Nope, bombers are regular crown cap bottles at about 24 oz. A turkey fryer is a good investment. It will be a workable pot until you start to upscale and I know the burner that came with mine is powerful enough for a 15 gallon kettle.

 

[Thompson8816]

just brewed my first batch this past weekend of an IPA. Turned out great! Started small so I can gain some experience before spending a lot of $$$ on 5 gallon equipment and ingredients. I would hate to go spend all the money and just ruin beer because of the lack of experience!! Anyways this is what I bought and it wasnt expensive at all.
1 Gal carboi (might as well get the ale pale)
bottle siphone
siphone tubing
Bottle caps
bottle capper
Sanitizer
stopper
airlock

 

[ChelisHubby]

Thompson just keep it cool when you ferment with it for the first 3 or 4 days use a bucket with water and Iced plastic bottles if you can check the water temp you want to try for 65 degrees as this is the middle range of where most yeast like to ferment. Enjoy your Pale Ale as it is Summer!

 

[eadavis80]

I am 10 extract batches in. I have never purchased any temp control devices and I don't think my beers have been anything short of good. Would I like to down the road? Sure, but there are other things I am glad I have instead.

Here are the essentials:

1. 6.5 gallon primary bucket - the cheapest place to let your beer ferment - about $16
2. A spoon - metal or plastic to stir ingredients - less than $5
3. An airlock - a little piece of plastic that helps you gauge Co2 release during fermentation - $1.50
4. A kettle. Bigger is better, but starting with a 5 gallon stainless steel kettle is fine for a beginner. You can find these online for $20. I would not use this kettle for any other cooking. I kept mine exclusively for beer only.
5. A bottling bucket - you'll transfer your fermented beer into this other bucket on bottling day
6. A bottle capper - used to cap your freshly bottled beers
7. Tubing - used to transport the beer from the primary bucket to the bottling bucket on bottling day.
8. Auto siphon - see descriptor for no. 7
9. Thermometer - essential to keep water and wort at certain temps at various stages
10. Hydrometer - While not "essential" for a beginner, it's the only way to really know if fermentation is complete. That being said, 95% of beers you'll do as a beginner will be done fermenting if you just let them sit in the primary for 2 weeks.
11. OxyClean - Some will say always buy BPW or some other home brewing CLEANER, but I find OxyClean works fine and is cheaper. I've never had any infections.
12. Sanitizer - Oxy Clean works to CLEAN your equipment, but a sanitizer like StarSan or Iodophor is truly essential to keep bacteria from contaminating your batch.

This would be fine to start: http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/...arter-kits/essential-brewing-starter-kit.html

Later on, you might want to get a BIGGER kettle to do full volume boils, meaning instead of adding 2.5 gallons of water to your wort, you'll boil all the wort together. You'll also want to add a wort chiller because doing ice baths is cheap and easy, but it's also annoying and slow. Wort chillers will cool your wort a lot faster.

Yeast starter kits and stir plates would also be something to look at, though I myself have not done either and I'm 10 batches in. I either just pitch the WYeast Smack Pack directly into the wort or pitch dry yeast (cheaper and you get more yeast cells).

AS you can see, brewing is like any hobby. It's cheap to get started and make good beer. However, if you're like most, you'll just continue to add to your resources with time and experience.