bought 5 gal igloo cooler...

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TheBeerNerd

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I've been holding out for a 10 gal, but while at Walmart today I found a 5 gallon igloo on sale for $12.50. According to the chart, the max is 12 lbs of grain. For most of my beers this is fine, but I have one recipe with a 14 lb grain bill. I've read stories on here of people doing 14 lbs in a 5 gal with a real thick mash. I'm not above trying it, but my question is, how will this affect my efficiency?
 
You can do 14lbs in a 5Gallon at 1.1quarts per pound with .03 G of head space left :D Maybe just do 1qt per pound. to allow some room for your manifold setup. I just built a round 5G tun after also seeing the good deal at walmart. It's actaully doing a drain test right now in the kitchen to test for dead space after I just finished the CPVC manifold. I also have a 12.5G one already. I'll use this new one probably for what ever grain bills I can.
 
This is of course, until the inner liner warps and you lose some volume to that too :D
 
In my experience the 5 gallon coolers are really only good up to 10lbs of grain. If I mashed any more than 10lbs, the mash became too thick and there wasn't enough room to get the grist stirred very well. My efficiency suffered 10-12% increasing from 10 to 13.5lbs. I have since moved up to a direct fired sanke MLT.
 
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